Catholic Replies
Q. In a recent reply about whether God answers our prayers, you said that God does answer all sincere prayers, but we don’t always get the answer we want right away because He wants us to continue praying fervently to Him. A situation in my family proves this to be true. My kid brother was born with a severe case of edema, which was almost debilitating. Being devout Catholics, my whole family prayed fervently for 18 years for, if not a complete cure, at least a lessening of his suffering. My parents traveled to the shrine of St. Anne de Beaupre in Quebec and to St. Joseph’s Oratory in Montreal, and they prayed for the intercession of all the saints, as well as to Our Lady of Lourdes and Our Lady of Fatima.
When the Vietnam War broke out, my brother and some of his friends went to enlist in the Army, but my brother was rejected because of his condition. It wasn’t too long after that he was completely cured of edema. Does God hear and answer prayers? In my large family, we have literally dozens of such stories! — Name Withheld, via e-mail.
A. Thank you for sharing your family’s prayer experiences with our readers.
Q. I once read or heard that an adoration chapel should not have any statues, icons, or other pictures in it — nothing but the Blessed Sacrament. I have tried to find something about this on the Vatican website and elsewhere, but with no success. Can you help? — T.L., Colorado.
A. We have never heard of such a thing and could not find such restrictions in a variety of Church documents on the Eucharist. These documents include two by Pope John Paul II (Dominicae Cenae and Ecclesia de Eucharistia), Holy Communion and Worship of the Eucharist Outside Mass, The General Instruction of the Roman Missal, Redemptionis Sacramentum, and two books: 101 Questions and Answers on The Eucharist by Giles Dimock, O.P., and Celebrating the Holy Eucharist by Francis Cardinal Arinze.
But what you heard doesn’t make sense anyway. The Lord is displayed in a beautiful gold monstrance, which is flanked by at least six lighted candles and usually some flowers. Most chapels, or churches, where adoration takes place are adorned with statues, icons, and pictures of holy persons, including the Blessed Virgin Mary, the original tabernacle and Mother of the Eucharist. Should all these adornments be removed every time adoration is scheduled? Certainly not. They don’t take anything away from the Eucharistic Lord; instead, those portrayed surround His Real Presence in the chapel just as they surround His real Person in Heaven.
Q. What is the essence of our heavenly reward? Are we reunited with loved ones or is our primary and perhaps sole reward contemplation of the Beatific Vision? — W.K., via e-mail.
A. No one knows for sure what things will be like in Heaven since, as St. Paul said, “What eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, / and what has not entered the human heart, / what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Cor. 2:9). However, we know that our primary reward will be the glorious contemplation of the One who created us. The Catechism says that “the life of the blessed consists in the full and perfect possession of the fruits of the redemption accomplished by Christ. He makes partners in His heavenly glorification those who have believed in Him and remained faithful to His will. Heaven is the blessed community of all who are perfectly incorporated into Christ” (n. 1026).
We also know that each of the blessed will experience degrees of happiness that will depend on how devoted they were to God on earth. St. Paul explained this when he said that “whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully” (2 Cor. 9:6). He also said that “the brightness of the sun is one kind, the brightness of the moon another, and the brightness of the stars another. For star differs from star in brightness” (1 Cor. 15:41). In other words, those who practiced heroic virtue on earth will shine brighter and enjoy a higher degree of happiness in Heaven than those who “backed into Heaven” after a spiritually mediocre life.
This situation, however, will not cause any envy or rivalry. Instead, said Fr. Charles Arminjon in his book The End of the Present World, “union, peace, and harmony will not reign any less in this countless array, in which the lesser ranks cooperate with the highest in the repose and harmony of all. The elect will form but one heart among themselves. Their one link will no longer be force or self-interest, but charity. Forming a single body, whose head is Jesus Christ, and having become living stones of the one building, they will share in the conquest with the same joy and the same love. Each will be rich in the richness of all; each will thrill in the happiness of all” (pp. 230-231).
Furthermore, we know that we will have bodies in Heaven (that’s what we mean by the “resurrection of the body”), and various saints and Church Fathers have speculated that everyone, regardless of how old they were when they died, will be in the prime of life in Heaven, perhaps in their twenties or thirties.
What will our bodies be like? They will be “remodeled and transfigured to the pattern of the risen Christ,” said Dr. Ludwig Ott in his book Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma (p. 491). He said that the writings of the “Schoolmen,” a group of medieval leaders of Scholasticism that included St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Albert the Great, St. Bonaventure, and St. Anselm, distinguished four properties of the bodies of the just (cf. pp. 491-492):
(1) Incapability of suffering, sorrow, sickness, or death, as indicated in Rev. 21:4: “He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there shall be no more death or mourning, wailing, or pain, [for] the old order has passed away.” (2) Subtility or a spiritualization of the body that enables it to pass through closed doors, as Christ did on the night after His resurrection from the dead. (3) Agility or the ability of the body to move with the speed of thought from one place to another, as the risen Christ was able to appear suddenly to the Apostles and just as suddenly to disappear. (4) Clarity or the absence of any deformity and the fullness of radiance and beauty, the same splendor manifested by Christ in the Transfiguration (cf. Matt. 17:2).
And finally, we will know family members and friends in Heaven. In talking about the “social joys of heaven,” Fr. John Hardon explained in his Catholic Catechism:
“Tradition further amplifies this idea by suggesting the joys of the blessed when they meet and recognize one another, not only in the intuitive vision of God but also by direct mutual intercourse. To deny such communication would be to deny them the legitimate exercise of their faculties and contradict the very concept of beatitude, which is the perfection of every human power and satisfaction of every legitimate desire.
“Since Christianity differs from such oriental religions as Hinduism and Buddhism precisely in believing that man retains his identity in a future life, it is essential to the Christian notion of Heaven that its inhabitants live together as distinct persons, knowing and being known by their fellow citizens in the New Jerusalem, and living in the company of those they had known and loved on earth” (p. 266).
Q. I recently attended a funeral Mass at a Catholic church in Woodstock, Md. The priest celebrating the Mass told us to sit during the Consecration and during the distribution of Holy Communion. I found this disturbing since I have always knelt during these parts of the Mass. Your thoughts? — R.M., via e-mail.
A. You are correct that kneeling is the proper posture during the Consecration and Communion time. We don’t know why the priest told everyone to sit since this is contrary to the way in which Mass is supposed to be conducted. According to the General Instruction of the Roman Missal (cf. n. 43), the faithful should kneel during the Eucharistic Prayer and after the “Lamb of God,” unless the diocesan bishop determines otherwise.
Paragraph 42 says that “attention must therefore be paid to what is determined by this General Instruction and by the traditional practice of the Roman Rite and to what serves the common spiritual good of the People of God, rather than private inclination or arbitrary choice.”
