I saw a video by the Dimond brothers. It considers Apocalypse 13 is already fulfilled, and Wojtyła is the head which was wounded and all the world marvelled, while Ratzinger (Benedict XVI) is the false prophet. In fact, both Ratzinger and Bergoglio have contributed to giving "John Paul II" veneration of a saint.
And both can be considered as 666, Benediktos in Greek and Bergoglio in ASCII.
I am a bit sceptic, to me the chapter seemed like Antichrist also primarily, not just his false prophet, having that number, also, Wojtyła does not look like being alive up to Second Coming and getting thrown alive into the lake of fire, considering he's already dead. However, it could be so to speak "dress rehearsal" for the thing upcoming. As worse than what already happened, but I could be wrong.
Now, in the video, Dimond Brothers were claiming that "John Paul II" denied Heaven, Hell and Purgatory are places.
I don't think they are liars, I did not dismiss it, but I wanted to check and also see if the actual words are as bad ... they are.
I found it on EWTN who cite Wednesday audiences he held.
HEAVEN, HELL AND PURGATORY
Pope John Paul II
https://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/JP2HEAVN.HTM
2. In biblical language "heaven"", when it is joined to the "earth", indicates part of the universe. Scripture says about creation: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Gn 1:1).
So far correct.
Metaphorically speaking, heaven is understood as the dwelling-place of God, who is thus distinguished from human beings (cf. Ps 104:2f.; 115:16; Is 66:1). He sees and judges from the heights of heaven (cf. Ps 113:4-9) and comes down when he is called upon (cf. Ps 18:9, 10; 144:5). However the biblical metaphor makes it clear that God does not identify himself with heaven, nor can he be contained in it (cf. 1 Kgs 8:27); and this is true, even though in some passages of the First Book of the Maccabees "Heaven" is simply one of God's names (1 Mc 3:18, 19, 50, 60; 4:24, 55).
Here we are less well at ease. "Metaphorically speaking"? No, while Heaven cannot contain God, it certainly can be a kind of reception room for creatures that are intelligent, rational, and blessed. Where they adore Him.
Therefore, "heaven" in this sense is not a metaphor.
As to Maccabees, we may have a metonymy : God and His angels, namely those who dwell there. I have not checked. Wait, here is the first reference:
And Judas said: It is an easy matter for many to be shut up in the hands of a few: and there is no difference in the sight of the God of heaven to deliver with a great multitude, or with a small company:
The linguistic and exegetic analysis is not even correct, since heaven is put in relation to God, not used as synonym for God.
In the context of Revelation, we know that the "heaven" or "happiness" in which we will find ourselves is neither an abstraction nor a physical place in the clouds, but a living, personal relationship with the Holy Trinity.
No, we do precisely NOT know it is not a physical place, we rather know it is.
While there is no doubt that Heaven implies a complete peace and joy and bliss with the Holy Trinity, and enjoying God without fear of loss, which is a loss that cannot happen, Heaven is also a place where this occurs. Adding "in the clouds" after "physical place" is a smokescreen, whether it is in or far above clouds, it is a place.
Now, why exactly would EWTN defend this,
Exeunt for now quotes from Wojtyła, enter EWTN.
This language of place is, according to the Pope, inadequate to describe the realities involved, since it is tied to the temporal order in which this world and we exist. In this he is applying the philosophical categories used by the Church in her theology and saying what St. Thomas Aquinas said long before him.
"Incorporeal things are not in place after a manner known and familiar to us, in which way we say that bodies are properly in place; but they are in place after a manner befitting spiritual substances, a manner that cannot be fully manifest to us." [St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, Supplement, Q69, a1, reply 1]
Now, there is a problem here. Q 69 actually does state this, I trust EWTN, and also recall, but it comes in a context; and that context implies the Resurrection of the Body:
[From index page to Supplementum:]
The Resurrection
PRECEDING THE RESURRECTION: Where souls go (69) after death. The quality (70) of separated souls, and the punishment by fire. How the living assist the departed souls (71). How the saints assist the living (72). The signs preceding (73) the last judgment. The world's final conflagration (74) which will precede the Second Coming.
ACCOMPANYING THE RESURRECTION: The resurrection itself (75). Its cause (76), its time and manner (77), and its term "wherefrom" (78). The conditions of the good and wicked in common: their identity (79), integrity (80), and quality (81). The conditions of the good: impassibility (82), subtlety (83), agility (84), and clarity (85). The conditions of the bodies of the wicked (86).
JUDGMENT FOLLOWING THE RESURRECTION: The knowledge (87) which men will have at the judgment. The time and place (88) of the last judgment. Who (89) will judge and who will be judged. The form (90) of the Judge.
FOLLOWING THE JUDGMENT: The state and quality of the world (91). The state of the blessed: their beatific vision (92), their happiness and mansions (93), their relations with the damned (94), their gifts (95) and their crowns (96). The state of the wicked: punishment of their bodies (97) by fire, and of their will and intellect (98). God's justice and mercy (99) in regard to the damned.
In order to be Catholic, one needs not to be just orthodox about "The state of the blessed: their beatific vision (92)" but also about "their happiness and mansions (93)". And as after resurrection we will not be incorporeal, the fac that incorporeal beings are only quodammodo in a place is not very relevant, there really are mansions, and they are physical.
And here is the corpus of Q 93, A 2:
I answer that, Since local movement precedes all other movements, terms of movement, distance and the like are derived from local movement to all other movements according to the Philosopher (Phys., liber viii, 7). Now the end of local movement is a place, and when a thing has arrived at that place it remains there at rest and is maintained therein. Hence in every movement this very rest at the end of the movement is called an establishment [collocatio] or mansion. Wherefore since the term movement is transferred to the actions of the appetite and will, the attainment of the end of an appetitive movement is called a mansion or establishment: so that the unity of a house corresponds to the unity of beatitude which unity is on the part of the object, and the plurality of mansions corresponds to the differences of beatitude on the part of the blessed: even so we observe in natural things that there is one same place above to which all light objects tend, whereas each one reaches it more closely, according as it is lighter, so that they have various mansions corresponding to their various lightness.
Denying placeness to Heaven, did Wojtyła believe Resurrection of the Body? Defending this from Supplement Q 69 as if there were not also a Q 93, did EWTN believe this very clear dogma, which comes at the end of the Creed?
Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
V Sunday after Epiphany
10.II.2019
If the quote from St Thomas is somehow insufficient, how about this one:
Question 83. The subtlety of the bodies of the blessed
http://newadvent.org/summa/5083.htm
Short answers to the six questions (or, as he considered, articles of same question):
- 1) Is subtlety a property of the glorified body? Depends on which subtlety, but it certainly is a body with same number of atoms. See below.
- 2) By reason of this subtlety, can it be in the same place with another not glorified body? No, see below.
- 3) By a miracle, can two bodies be in the same place? By miracle, yes.
- 4) Can a glorified body be in the same place with another glorified body? God could do it, but he won't.
- 5) Does a glorified body necessarily require a place equal to itself? Yes.
- 6) Is a glorified body palpable? Yes.
1) For certain heretics, as Augustine relates (De Civ. Dei xiii, 22), ascribed to them the subtlety whereby spiritual substances are said to be subtle: and they said that at the resurrection the body will be transformed into a spirit, and that for this reason the Apostle describes as being "spiritual" the bodies of those who rise again (1 Corinthians 15:44). But this cannot be maintained. First, because a body cannot be changed into a spirit, since there is no community of matter between them: and Boethius proves this (De Duab. Nat.). Secondly, because, if this were possible, and one's body were changed into a spirit, one would not rise again a man, for a man naturally consists of a soul and body. Thirdly, because if this were the Apostle's meaning, just as he speaks of spiritual bodies, so would he speak of natural [animale] bodies, as being changed into souls [animam]: and this is clearly false.
2) That Christ's body was able to be together with another body in the same place was not due to its subtlety, but resulted from the power of His Godhead after His resurrection, even as in His birth [Cf. III:28:2 ad 3]. Hence Gregory says (Hom. xxvi in Evang.): "The same body went into His disciples the doors being shut, which to human eyes came from the closed womb of the Virgin at His birth." Therefore there is no reason why this should be befitting to glorified bodies on account of their subtlety.
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