What is your concept of Heaven?
Mine is very simple, and, well…selfish. I’ve had bad eyes since the second grade. I dream of opening my eyes in the morning and being able to see…without glasses or contacts. I’m too chicken to go for Lasik…and anyway, my eyes are so bad I’m not sure I’d qualify. So when I imagine Heaven, that’s my first thought: sight.
When someone passes away after a long illness, we tend to think in terms of what is no longer “wrong” with them: “She’s no longer in pain. He can walk now. He is finally able to live the way God created him.” We know we’ll get our bodies back at the end of time, but in a “glorified” state. We tend to assume that that means everything that was wrong with us on Earth will suddenly be fixed.
But a few weeks ago, I heard something that made me stop and think. Fr. Richard Hogan, who does the video clip on theology for our NFP classes, said something along these lines: When we get to Heaven, we’ll be able to put our fingers in the holes in Christ’s hands and feet and side.
That one simple statement opened up a whole new line of thinking for me. When Christ appeared on Earth after the Resurrection, he wasn’t suddenly “whole” again. He retained the wounds of his Passion. So the marks of our human journey stay with us through eternity. And after all, it only makes sense. Our bodies are the way in which we experience God, come to know God, come to follow God. How could we take away that which we have been, that which we have experienced, and still be the same person?
Anyone who reads this blog for a week knows how passionate I am in asserting that there is nothing “wrong” with my daughter. Down syndrome is simply part of the fabric of how God created her, and God doesn’t make mistakes. It’s our perception that distorts something out of the norm into something “wrong.” Shortly after Julianna was born, Christian and I received a note stating that “there is no Down syndrome in Heaven.” I started spitting nails. (I’m very good at outrage. J) There will be Down syndrome in Heaven, and MD, and cerebral palsy, and ADD and ADHD and autism. Those conditions are an integral part of the people who have them. If you take my daughter’s DS away, she wouldn’t be “Julianna the way God intended.” She’d be somebody else.
But if those conditions will stay with us into Heaven, then doesn’t it follow that all the other “marks” of our human journey will stay with us, too? Missing limbs, skin cancers… bad eyes?
I’m no theologian. If by some chance someone reads this who can offer a more informed perspective, please chime in! These are just my own reflections, which I share as food for thought.
Kathleen M. Basi 
I’ll never forget the moment I saw her…..She had all the signs of having down’s syndrome. She was having difficulties at delivery and I took her to the nursery. I stood over her bassinet in the hospital nursery. I wondered how her parents would cope with their first born baby having down’s syndrome. I knew that testing would have to be done. More waiting for the parents. More worries. I didn’t know what to say to them when I went back into the room. She’s being observered was all that I could manage to say to them. That was years ago and I wonder how the family is doing now. There are a lot of support groups. Just allow yourself to feel the way that you feel. You’ll be angery at first. Why me is a familiar question I would hear. The strength to get through life’s ups and downs will come from a place within. Only you know when the time is right. But for now you have the right to feel the way that you do.
I think you are right on. But to answer your last part… I don’t know. I think we have things in us that God created, the fabric of our being as you said. Cancer, missing limbs, etc. are things of this sinful world and are not created in us. Jesus has His passion scars because God created Him for that purpose. To be both God and man and die for us. Therefore the holes in his hands and feet were created in the fabric of his being. So, that being said, I think we’ll both be in need of contact solution for eternity :o)
My daughter wrote about this question here: http://bethchokmah.wordpress.com/2008/12/01/cognitive-treatment-and-core-identity/
The question always comes up when we think about treating cognition in DS. Does treating the brain change the essence of who my child is? Grace argues no. She says, in part, “Pretend for a moment that I have a time machine and a cure. If I go back in time, cure Mary at conception, and then return to the present—well, then, I’ll have changed her. She would be a different person, because her past would be different. All her struggles would be gone. Our experiences shape us.
“But changing Mary’s future doesn’t change who she is. That Mary isn’t made yet. As we treat her brain, she will have new experiences that shape her. She’ll grow. But her identity won’t be distorted, because she remembers those struggles. Everything she ever tried to learn, say, or do, and couldn’t is a part of her history.
“We’re adding to Mary, not subtracting.”
Please read Grace’s full post.
To apply that to your question, Julianna will enter heaven with her entire past intact. It will be part of who she is. She will bring her experiences and her relationships with her into heaven. But her future for eternity won’t have been made yet. And that future will be lived in a perfect body with no sickness. (Rev 21:4) She will have a glorified body. Why wouldn’t that include a perfectly functioning brain?
Interesting question. To be a smartass, if I die b/c someone nearly chopped my head off will I be like Nearly Headless Nick in Harry Potter? 🙂 I’m not trying to show disrespect for Jesus, I’m just following the logical conclusion that if he still has his crucifixion marks then won’t I have the marks of how I died?
But on a serious note, what does a glorified body look like? Does a soul look human? I tend to imagine my soul to look similar to me- I view it as a reflection of me. (Though if the soul was created first I should be a reflection of it.) But when I think “me” what my body looks like is secondary. For example, you may see me as short, but I tend to forget that I’m short.
I know Mary got to take her body to heaven. But I suspect that she didn’t care- probably even felt burdened by it. And I suspect that if we make it to heaven, we will not care either. I’ve been told the joy in being in the presence of God is all one can think about.
Me, I’m still secretly hoping to be able to go back and see history as it unfolded. (That’s the history major in me.) But then again, I’m not sure I’ve convinced God I’m the best candidate for sainthood so maybe I’m not the best person to ask. 🙂
Chrissy, you took my thoughts and gave me a whole new way of thinking about it. Harry Potter aside 🙂 it probably doesn’t matter in the long run. I was trying to point out that we keep imposing human order on Heaven, and you just gently reminded me that I was doing the same thing.
Eeesh!
BTW…I think it would be totally cool to go back and see history, too.
I also would just llllooooove to sit on the site of my home 300 years ago, and bask in the quiet, see the starscape, that must have been here at one time, before interstates and concrete and incandescent lighting.
Christ appeared with His wounds because He had not yet ascended to His Father- he says that to Mary specifically. What Jesus’ body looked like before He ascended is not necessarily what it looked like after, in the Kingdom. Read 1Cor:15. Paul discusses the glorified body in that whole chapter.
Thanks for that perspective. I guess I’ve always read that incorruptibility passage as being about more than earthly flaws. Yes, incorruptibility means no illness in Heaven, etc.–but so much of what we’re discussing in this post isn’t “illness” or “flaws.” Bad eyes are a liability on Earth, but are they really an imperfection in Godly terms? And don’t even get me started on Down syndrome. Something built into her genetic code can’t possibly be an “illness” in Godly terms. He made her that way because He wanted her that way. Just things we can debate to the end of time, but which we’ll never settle till we’re in Heaven ourselves, by which time we won’t be feeling a need to debate anymore. 🙂