On Perfection, Eternity, and Immortality

Hi, Father,

Thank you for your response. I will spend some time studying it. However, this jumped out at me -- humans are created, and have a beginning -- but I thought that because we have an immortal soul, we will have no end -- that we will continue for all eternity, either in heaven or in hell.

Could you elaborate on how we will have an end, even if we are with God in heaven?

Brian

Brian, I'm delighted that you intend to read my answer to your previous question over again, and study it further. If you do, I trust you will find, as I do, that it is a very good question: How can we have an end, even if we are with God in heaven?

Let's start at the very beginning [a very good place to start!]. A seed is planted, a plant sprout, a flower blooms, and finally, the plant withers away. A sperm cell unites with an egg cell, the body grows, matures, ages, and eventually dies.

All created life ends in death. That is not an imperfection of created nature, but an aspect of created life, whether vegetative, animal, or human. This brings us back to the question you raised: if human life is mortal, ending in death, how is it that we live forever in heaven [or elsewhere]?

The principle of life that animates animals [both words come from the Latin anima, which English translates as soul]. It comes into existence at the beginning of life, when the seed is planted, and it vanishes at the end of life, when the plant or animal dies. From a philosophical perspective, there is no reason why the same should not be true of human life, if the soul were merely natural.

Earlier, I mentioned that Aquinas used a new word in reference to the divine nature; he called God's being supernatural, beyond the nature of living beings in the natural world: plants and beasts. According to Christian belief, the human soul is not merely natural, but supernatural; it is a participation in the very life of God, and thereby, it is immortal, not eternal: human life begins at conception, but it will not end in death.