Theological Foundations new file

175 The Eschatological Direction that we would follow Him in everything that we are capable of, in virtues and in holy conduct. And wherever He is, we will be also. 9 In such a perspective of our future life, the necessity of death “imposed” upon us is, in Father Stanislaus’s opinion, something very desirable. In our hope of resurrection, too, he sees the motives which should stimulate us to diligent work on self-improvement while always taking into account the call to perfection in the Christian life. For while it is true that death came by a man, it is also true that resurrection will come by a man. People die in Adam, but they will be made alive in Christ (cf. 1 Cor 15, 21-22). In this manner the perishable will put on the imperishable, and the mortal nature will put on immortality (cf. 1 Cor 15, 53). 10 To support the faith in the resurrection, the Founder of the Marians also uses a rational argument borrowed from St. Augustine, in whose opinion the entire order of the universe testifies to a future resurrection. “St. Augustine was quite right when he said: “ ‘All creation speaks of the resurrection. It is winter, but the trees now dry and parched will surely come forth in leaves in the spring. I ask you who doubt the resurrection’ — continues St. Augustine — ‘whence do these things come, whence do they return again? To what secret places do they depart; fromwhat hid- den places do they come to us again? They cannot be seen any- where, but God generates them with His mysterious power. The grass which was alive and is now dying, will come alive again from the seed. And our bodies, too, will return to life from the dust.’ “There is nothing more consistent with reason than this eternal endurance of our Mystical Temple. ‘The example are caterpillars and butterflies. We see them being born, die and come alive again (...). All this is done by nature. And God, will He not do even more perfect things with my body which is His Temple? In what- ever grave our mortal limbs may be found, still, due to the power of God, they will come out of it immortal.’ ” 11