Catholic Dictionary
Find accurate definitions of over 5,000 Catholic terms and phrases (including abbreviations). Based on Fr. John Hardon's Modern Catholic Dictionary, © Eternal Life. Used with permission.
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BODILY RESURRECTION
The reunion of the soul of each human being with his own body on the last day. Christ taught the resurrection from the dead (Matthew 22:29-32; Luke 14:14; John 5:29, 6:39-40, 11:25), and the Apostles preached the doctrine as a cardinal mystery of the Christian faith (I Corinthians 15:20; Revelation 20:12). Belief in the resurrection is professed in all the ancient creeds. "The human beings that rise again are the identical persons who lived before, though their vital processes are performed in a different way. Now their life is mortal, then it will be immortal. . . . [But] they still are of the same kind and are still the same individuals as before . . . They do not assume a heavenly or ghostly kind of body. Their bodies remain truly human, though they are invested with an immortality coming from a divine strength which enables them so to dominate the body that corruption cannot enter" (St. Thomas, Compendium Theologiae, 155).
