← The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz)
The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz)
Day 93: The Meaning of the Resurrection (2025)
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The Catechism wraps up its discussion surrounding Article 5 of the Creed (“He descended into hell; on the third day he rose again from the dead”) and asks the question, “What does Jesus’ resurrection mean for me?” Fr. Mike points out that Christ’s resurrection proves—definitively—that he is the only begotten Son of God. Today’s readings are Catechism paragraphs 651-658.
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Father Mike Schmitz
Before we get started, I just wanted to offer a quick thank you to all those who have supported the Catechism in a Year or the Bible in a Year podcast. We hear stories every day about how those shows have transformed people's lives and because of your prayers and financial gifts, you are a significant part of that. You might ask a question, though. The question is, what does Ascension do with these financial gifts? Great question. The answer is we make authentically Catholic podcasts and videos and other digital content to help people know the Catholic faith and grow closer to God every day. And we do it all for free. If you found this podcast to be helpful in your life and would like to help us continue making free Catholic content we can post online, please consider making a financial contribution, an ongoing financial contribution, by going to ascensionpress.com support that's ascensionpress.com support. Thank you and God bless. Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz and you're listening to the Catechism in a Year podcast where we encounter God's plan of sheer goodness for us revealed in Scripture and passed down through the tradition of the Catholic faith. The Catechism in a Year is brought to you by ascension. In 365 days, we'll read through the Catechism of the Catholic Church, discovering our identity in God's family as we journey together toward our heavenly home. This is day 93. We're reading paragraphs 651 to 658. As always, I'm using the Ascension edition of the Catechism, which includes the Foundations of Faith approach. If you can follow along with any recent version of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, you can also download your Catechism in a Year reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com ciy and lastly, you can click follow or subscribe in your podcast app for daily updates and daily notifications as we start today. Day 93. I don't know. Hopefully at this point, by this moment, you're recognizing that. Yes, I've said it a thousand times. This is not merely transfer of information, but about transformation. And we've been talking the last couple days about the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Yesterday, two days ago, we talked about how this is an historical and transcendent event, that all these signs are pointing to the reality of Jesus risen from the dead. Yesterday we talked about what was the condition of his resurrected body. That is a glorious body. It was truly his body, right? That it still had the wounds of the nail marks in his hands and the spear in his side. He still had those wounds but it was a glorified body in this unique way that he was risen from the dead, not just resuscitated, but. But brought to a new state of being. Right? Incredible. And a state of being that transcends time and transcends space. He has this glorified body. And we also talked about the fact that the resurrection is the work of the Holy Trinity, that God the Father raised Jesus from the dead and perfectly, perfectly unites Christ's humanity, including his body, to divinity and. And of course, for the Son, since he is a divine being. Right. He's second Person in the Trinity. He affects his own resurrection by virtue of his divine power. And so this whole Trinity working together, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Today we're talking about the meaning and the saving significance of the resurrection. The meaning and saving significance of the resurrection. So the resurrection in and of itself. Incredible. Incredible. But what does the resurrection have to do with us? One of the things we're going to highlight in paragraph 654 is that the paschal mystery, right, the life, death and resurrection of Jesus has two aspects. First, his death. And by his death, Christ liberates us from sin. That's the first part. By his death, Christ liberates us from sin. By his resurrection, he opens for us the way to a new life. And this new life, it says here in 654, is above all justification that reinstates us in God's grace so that we might walk in newness of life. And this is. I love this. The middle sentence buried in paragraph 654 says justification consists in both victory over death caused by sin and a new participation in grace. So I'm justified. It doesn't mean just like my sins are forgiven. Yes. Although that's incredible. Right. Victory over death caused by sin and also a new participation in grace that it brings about the fact that we can be adopted by. By the Father. We have this adoption that happens to us in our baptism, the gift of grace, not by our nature. Right. The Son. The Son is a Son by virtue of his nature. We are sons and daughters by virtue of adoption, by virtue of the grace that God shares with us. Because of what? Because of the resurrection. And this is just. It's amazing. The. Lastly, we're going to. We're going to highlight the fact in paragraph 655 that Christ's resurrection and the risen Christ himself is the principle and the source of our future resurrection. You know, St. Paul writes to the Corinthians and he describes that. Yeah. As Christ's Body was glorified. It's the first fruits. Like that's how we will experience this same glory, that our bodies will be resurrected from the dead and we will be able to experience this glorified resurrected body that Jesus experiences already. And so this is the meeting and saving significance of the resurrection that we're launching into today. Let's say a prayer and just ask the Lord not only to illuminate our minds, but to pierce our hearts with great love and affection, to desire a desire to serve the Risen One, to belong to the Risen One, to love the Risen One with everything we have. Father in heaven, we praise you and thank you. We give you glory today. We ask that you please receive our praise and thanks. Thank you so much for being love and for sending your Son to be one of us, to suffer and die for us, for our forgiveness of sins, but also in rising from the dead and conquering death, to manifest the resurrection. You love us so much that you continue to give us your Holy Spirit of forgiveness, your Holy Spirit of redemption, your Holy Spirit that unites us to you and allows us to to call you Father. Let that spirit that raised Christ Jesus from the dead dwell in us. Help us to anticipate the glorified resurrected bodies that you desire us to experience for all eternity. And help us to say yes to you this day. Help us to say yes to your passion. Help us to say yes to your resurrection. Help us to participate in your suffering and cross. And help us to participate in your glory and resurrection. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. It is day 93. We're reading paragraphs 6:51 to 6:58. The meaning and saving significance of the resurrection. St. Paul wrote, if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. The resurrection above all constitutes the confirmation of all Christ's works and teachings. All truths, even the most inaccessible to human reason, find their justification. If Christ by his resurrection has given the definitive proof of his divine authority which he had promised. Christ's resurrection is the fulfillment of the promises both of the Old Testament and of Jesus himself during his earthly life. The phrase in accordance with the Scriptures indicates that Christ's resurrection fulfilled these predictions. The truth of Jesus divinity is confirmed by his resurrection. He had said, when you have lifted up the Son of man, then you will know that I am He. The resurrection of the crucified one shows that he was truly I am the Son of God, and God Himself. So St. Paul could declare to the Jews what God promised to the fathers. This he has fulfilled to us, their children, by raising Jesus as also it is written in the second Psalm, you are my Son, today I have begotten you. Christ's resurrection is closely linked to the incarnation of God's Son and is its fulfillment in accordance with God's eternal plan. The Paschal mystery has two by his death, Christ liberates us from sin. By his resurrection he opens for us the way to a new life. This new life is above all justification that reinstates us in God's grace, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. Justification consists in both victory over death caused by sin and a new participation in grace. It brings about filial adoption so that men become Christ's brethren, as Jesus himself called his disciples after his resurrection, saying, go and tell my brethren, we are brethren not by nature, but by the gift of grace, because that adoptive filiation gains us a real share in the life of the only Son, which was fully revealed in his resurrection. Finally, Christ's resurrection and the risen Christ himself is the principle and source of our future resurrection. As St. Paul wrote, Christ has been raised from the dead the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. The risen Christ lives in the hearts of his faithful. While they await that fulfillment in Christ, Christians have tasted the powers of the age to come, and their lives are swept up by Christ into the heart of divine life, so that they may live no longer for themselves. But. But for him who for their sake died and was raised in brief faith in the resurrection has as its object an event which is historically attested to by the disciples who really encountered the Risen One. At the same time, this event is mysteriously transcendent insofar as it is the entry of Christ's humanity into the glory of God. The empty tomb and the linen cloths lying there signify in themselves that by God's power, Christ's body had escaped the bonds of death and corruption. They prepared the disciples to encounter the risen Lord Christ, the firstborn from the dead is the principle of our own resurrection. Even now, by the justification of our souls and one day by the new life he will impart to our bodies. Okay, there we are. Gosh. Day 93. You guys, this is incredible. Let's just go back to the very beginning of this first paragraph. Paris, paragraph 651. St. Paul, writing to the Corinthians, says this line, if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. The next line from the Catechism says, the resurrection above all constitutes the confirmation of all Christ's works and teachings. That, yes, if Jesus has not been raised from the dead, then what are we believing in? We're believing in someone who had some nice things to say, some challenging things to say, but ultimately who died like any other human being, and that's it, that's the end of the story. But if the resurrection is true, and it is true, an historical reality and historical fact, then above all, the resurrection points to the confirmation of all Christ's works and teachings. So even every truth that he has said, even those truths that are so challenging to us, all of them find their justification. If Christ, by his resurrection, has given the definitive proof of his divine authority, right? So if Jesus really is who he says he is, then man, then everything he says is true. Everything he says I need to pay attention to. And so this reality that the resurrection demonstrates Christ's divinity, so important. And that's why paragraph 653 says the truth of Jesus divinity is confirmed by his resurrection. Exactly. Now we go on to the next paragraph. 6, 54. We talked about this already, that the Paschal mystery has two aspects, right? By his death, Christ liberates us from sin. By his resurrection, he opens for us the way to a new life. And that new life is above all justification that reinstates us in God's grace. And that grace brings about a filial adoption. So filial adoption is a technical term that basically means, like we're adopted as sons and daughters of God the Father. So the grace that Jesus won for us by dying, right? Forgiveness, and by rising from the dead, that ability to be adopted as God's sons and daughters comes to us because of the Paschal mystery. Because of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, we now are able. We're capable of being adopted. We're capable of not only having God as our Father, but as this paragraph highlights, Jesus as. As our brother. Can you imagine? I mean, it is one thing, and I go back to this again and again, man, God is our Father. Because of baptism, we've been adopted by God as His sons and daughters. And yes, Jesus is the Son of God by nature, and we are sons and daughters of God by adoption, by grace. And that's incredible. I think it was St. Teresa of Avila who said that one could pray the first two words of The Lord's Prayer. And that could be the content of their prayer for maybe the rest of their life. I'm not sure if she said the rest of their life or just said for days, months, years. But those first two words of the Lord's Prayer, our Father, we'll get more and more deeply into that when we get to that. What it is to be adopted in baptism, but not only to reflect on the fact that God is our Father, but we can truly say that God the Son is our brother. I don't understand that. I don't understand that. But it's a gift. The gift of grace. Amazing. Incredible. Now, not only that, but paragraph 655 highlights this, highlights the fact that Christ's resurrection and He Himself is the principle and source of our future resurrection. That Christ has been raised from the dead. He's the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. And we know that Christ lives in our hearts, but in a unique way. In the future, Christ will restore our mortal bodies to be like his glorified body. And that is incredible. We're going to talk more and more about that when it comes to the resurrection from the dead. That article that we're going to profess in a few, in a little bit, not too long from now, but we're going to talk about what it is, what it is to believe in the resurrection of the body. What will your body be like? Well, Christ's body, His resurrected body is the first fruits. It is kind of like the foreshadowing of what we are called to experience. Right now, though, we experience the gift of his grace. Right now we experience the gift of being his brethren. Right now we experience the gift of being the Father's adopted sons and daughters. And so we just glorify and thank God. Today, man, what an incredible gift. Tomorrow we're going to talk about the fact that Jesus ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, which is the next article in the Creed. Of course. He ascended into heaven. Sometimes we. We blow past that. We think like, okay, yeah, yeah, okay, yeah, he left. That's not what this means. It is so much deeper than he just left. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of God, the Father Almighty. Oh, man. We're going to dive into that, and it's going to be amazing. I'm telling you right now, that's tomorrow. But today is today, and I am praying for you. Please pray for me. My name is Father Mike. I cannot wait to see you tomorrow. God bless.