The total mass of humanity that is to appear before Christ at His second coming is identified in the Creed as "the living and the dead." How closely the Creed links these two categories which we consider so distinct or even opposite. From one perspective we might see this as an intimation that the dead are not so far from us the living, that they have, after all, only crossed a narrow stream, are only separated by a thin veil. The reverse perspective, however, may be less comforting. It intimates that we the living are not so far from the dead. Both perspectives necessarily emerge from the context of the Creed in which the living and the dead appear before Christ who is Lord and Judge of both. In this relationship we see that the dead are not as dead as we thought and that the living are not as alive as we had assumed.

To God it must seem quite natural to speak of the living and the dead in the same breath. In the dead He sees so much life for "all live to him" (Luke 20:38). And in the living He can see so much that is dead: "you have the name of being alive, and you are dead" (Rev 3:1). We tend to relate the two groups in a sequential way; first you are the living and then you are the dead. But God must see us simultaneously in both states. All of humanity and each individual human being are "the living and the dead." Death as we perceive it must seem a very small transition in the eyes of God.

The chauvinism of the living shows itself in the way we think and talk of the resurrection of the dead. We assume the resurrection is something which concerns only the dead. It is their problem. How will their buried bodies be reconstituted. What of those cremated, buried at sea, torn apart by wild beasts? Does bodily resurrection mean molecular correspondence? If we were to imagine the resurrection taking place today we would naturally visualize ourselves in the role of spectators watching the resurrection of the predeceased. This is the perspective of those artists who picture the dead arising from the ground or peeking out from their coffins.

But at the revelation of Christ’s complete and unavoidable lordship, which is what the last judgment is, we the living will not be bystanders or curious spectators. We too will be taken up in our own resurrection to a life fully purified, healed, restored and thus raised to new life. How busy and preoccupied we the living will be when so much that should have died long ago must now die and so much in us that sleeps in the dust of the earth must now arise and come to life! This mysterious spiritual awakening and even physical arising–a resurrection of the living–is implied in the graphic description of St. Paul to the Thessalonians: "the dead in Christ will rise first; then we who are alive, who are left, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air" (1 Thes 4:16f). To that life which "no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared" (1 Cor 2:9) everyone–the dead but also the living–must be raised up.

Already in Baptism the distinction between the living and the dead, death and life, has been blurred. "We were buried therefore with Christ by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life" (Rom 6:4). It is also to the biologically alive that the words are addressed "you have died, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory" (Col 3:3f). What is the real and enduring life of the dead? It is the same as our true life now. It is the faith, hope and love by which we share in the eternal life of God Himself. These three do not cease but "abide" (1 Cor 13:13). This threefold relationship to God was the real life of the dead before they died; it is still their real life; it is also our real life now.

As we come to the final period of the Church year we are directed to the "last things": death and judgment. We ought to feel personally involved, because the teaching concerning the resurrection of the dead is for the living too. We are reminded how much we share with the dead when on the last Sunday of the Year we place ourselves before Christ the King "who died for us so that whether we wake or sleep we might live with him" (1 Thes 5:10).

Sincerely,
Fr. Richard G. Herbel