Dear brothers and sisters,
“He is not God of the dead, but of the living,
for to Him all are alive.”
(Luke 20:38)
We have arrived in Jerusalem. We listen to our Lord teaching us from within the setting of the temple area in the midst of the great crowds that have arrived there for the Passover festivals. Today we see how He is questioned by the chief priests and scribes and their intent is malicious. They are looking for an opportunity to put Him to death.
The Sadducees present themselves with a question to try and justify their position that there is no life after death. This question is very significant. It is not a mere political or religious stand.
The question reflects a very deep symptom in the broken human soul: death is the end of all life so this earthly life is all there is. The fallen human person lives like there is no God to answer to at the end, because we are already so thoroughly convinced with the lie that we do not have to answer to Him now.
We have decided to decide on our own who we are, where we come from and where we are going. We decide what the purpose of life is. We have no God to decide all this for us. This is the fall that is described in the book of Genesis.
In presenting the hypothetical case of the woman that married each of the seven brothers after the death of each one, the Sadducees have opened up to our Lord the whole question of God’s purpose for our lives, the life which began with a marriage in Eden.
Our sharing in the Holy Communion of the Holy Trinity is the purpose of our lives. Created by the Three Persons of the Triune God in their image and likeness, we were loved into being that we may, in turn, love them in their Divine Being.
This is the unity towards which all marriages are ordered. The call that draws spouses to marital unity comes from the Divine Unity and are sustained within the Divine Unity and ordered to that Divine Unity till at death it terminates in that Divine Unity.
Marriage terminates at death because it has fulfilled the purpose for which it came into being. Both husband and wife are called to lead one another to that fullness of love and life that can only be found in the Eternal Love and Life of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
So all that is about to transpire in Jerusalem on Good Friday is the gift of the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity to us of the Divine Bridegroom, the only Spouse who can raise all marriages, all lives to the fullness of Eternal Life and Love in heaven.
The faithful love of the Bridegroom is infinitely greater that the constant betrayal of the unfaithful and fallen Bride: us. It is a love that is always forgiving and will not give up on taking us, raising us to His Father in the Spirit. – Fr. Simi.