Honoring God Through Caring for Our Bodies

Wait a second. This is a center presents. I didn't come here for fitness advice. I came here for my soul. We are body and soul together. Like the human being is not just a soul trapped in a body. What we are is embodied souls, or we're in souled bodies. Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz, and this is Ascension Presents. I'm sure at some point, uh, we've all heard these words or we've uttered these words. Why can't you just take care of your stuff? Me or my siblings would leave our bikes out on the lawn or something and it would get they'd get rained on my dad would be like, what the heck? Why can't you take care of your stuff? We'd leave the basketball in the in the driveway. You're playing basketball and get leave it out in the weather. My mom would come out like, what's the point of us giving you this thing if you're not gonna take care of it? That's something so essential for us as Christians. Why would the Lord give us something if we're not gonna take care of it? I came across some statistics recently that roughly three out of four Americans are either overweight or obese. Less than twenty-five percent of Americans actually are are physically fit. These numbers have have doubled, or these stats have doubled since 1990. So in the span of one generation, we've had this this massive this this shift of some sort. And now wait, I don't want to hear this. I don't need to hear this. Maybe you don't. Maybe you maybe you don't want to, maybe you don't need to. But I think it's important you are your body and your soul. And so because of that, right, we because that we know that it actually matters. God gave us a soul. He gave us a body. God could say the same thing about our soul. If we're if we're driving it off a cliff, he could say, Why should I give you this thing if you're not going to take care of it? The same thing is true when it comes to our body. Our bodies are as much a gift from God as our souls are. So God could look at us and say, why would I give you this gift if you're not going to take care of it? We could fall into one of two traps, because these are the traps that humanity has fallen into over the course of all time. One trap is the body's nothing. The other trap is the body's everything. And we have to avoid these, because that's not the Catholic view. The Catholic view is not the body's nothing. Also it's not the body's everything. So the lot the view that the body's nothing. An example of that would be Gnosticism or Manichaeism, right? We'd say that no, we're just uh the body's just the shell for the uh for the soul, or the body is the cage that the soul dwells in. You also would say, like, you know, Hinduism would be something similar, right? Your body gets replaced. You have this kind of karmic cycle. We have reincarnation. Your body isn't new in those cases. Um, your body's simply, again, it's just the vehicle, it's the car that your soul is driving. That would be that'd be Gnosticism, that kind of idea. That would denigrate the reality of the body. It would say the body doesn't mean anything. It doesn't matter at all. All that matters is the unseen part of you. That's the true you. And we see that right now, right? We have we have certain ideologies going on in our culture right now that deny the reality that no, your body that's you. Your soul is yours, your body is yours. What a person is is a body and soul composite, right? The first extreme says the body's nothing. Doesn't even matter at all. The other extreme says the body's everything. John Paul II talked about this. In fact, he called it the cult of the body, because he was he was actually warning directly against this version, this vision that would see the body as nothing, that that that would see it just as the shell. But he said we can't fall into the trap of the cult of the body. Cult of the body does what? If the Gnosticism kind of idea would say that uh I can I can you know dismiss, break, be inattentive to the body, the cult of the body says the body's everything. I I compare my body to everyone else's body. My body has to look a certain way, has to, has to, has to work, has to work and look a certain way. It has to be a certain way. And people can sacrifice their entire lives for just this one particular gift. The voice that's really loud that says your body really isn't you is very, very powerful. But the voice in our culture that says , your worth is determined by your body, that's also very loud in our culture. Because of both of these voices, you have people who are rejecting either voice. But when they reject either voice, they get launched from one side to the other. Right? So you might hear me talk about like you guys, we're killing ourselves through being overweight and obese and not moving. You might say, no, no, listen, the bodies are matter at all and go over to the Gnosticism Gnostic version. Or you see all these people going through this Gnosticism and say, listen, I'm gonna go and perfect my body. We don't have to do either of those things . We wanna affirm the goodness of the body. You are your body, it is good, and it's not good based off of how well it moves or how attractive it is. This is so important for us. Your worth. And the worth of your soul, the worth of your body, is not based off of how good your body looks, how attractive it is, or how well it moves. Your worth is based off the fact that it is a gift given to you by the Lord. I will talk to people all the time who have this self-condemnation when it comes to their bodies , they can be healthy, they can be unhealthy, they can be uh classically beautiful, they can be uh classically unattractive , but there's this accusation they hold against themselves because of some kind of standard of beauty that they're not reaching. If it's not the cult of the body, and it's not the body means nothing, what is it? It's that the body is you. And the body is a gift that's been entrusted to you. And to the degree that I'm willing to take care of my body is the will degree to which I honor the giver. Let's say that again. The degree to which I'm willing to care for my body , keep it healthy, feed it well, not poorly, keep it moving as best I can. The degree to which I care for my body is the degree to which I honor the giver of that gift who, is God Himself. And conversely, the degree to which I am unwilling to care for this gift he's given to me is the degree to which I am choosing to dishonor the giver of the gift. This is so important. Again, same same same thing is true for our souls, right? Same thing is true for our intellects. If I if I'm not gonna actually exercise my intellect to the degree that God gave it to me, I'm dishonoring the giver. By dishonoring the gift, I'm dishonoring the giver. If I don't exercise my intellect and be and and and try choose to become wise, I'm dishonoring the giver . If I don't take care of my soul, I'm dishonoring the giver. And if I don't take care of my body, I'm dishonoring the giver. I know there's people who are listening to this or watching this who would say, well , I uh I'm I'm sick, I'm injured, and there's a bunch of things I can't do. I'm getting old and I can't actually move the way I used to be able to move. Like I I I hear you. Two summers ago I had back surgery. Last summer I had shoulder surgery. There's a lot that I can't do right now that I w I wish I could do . But here's the tra p we fall into . We sometimes think that just because I can't do everything, that means I can't do anything . Just because I can't run a marathon right now, I I can't even stand up . Or maybe it is the case. Maybe I can't stand up. Okay . Well, what can I do? You might be listening to this and you're finding yourself in a place where it's like, no, actually, uh, you're in the hospital. You might might find yourself in a place that you were where you're actually are unable to use your legs or maybe most the majority of your body . Keep this in mind, go back to the original point. You are still your body. Your body matters. Your body has worth, regardless of how attractive it is or how well functioning it is. Your body still has worth. That's still you, even if you're unable to move that body. Even if you're if you can't, not only can you not deadlift 555 pounds, you also can't stand up, step out of your bed. Your body still has dignity. How do I honor the giver ? You take care of it to whatever degree you can. You use it to whatever degree you can . And if we're if we're standing between these two false versions of false visions of the body of Gnosticism doesn't mean anything, or a cult of the body means everything. I think a really wise vision for the body is what St. Francis of Assisi had. St. Francis of Assisi, he wasn't a Gnostic, that's for sure. But he also wasn't stuck in the cult of the body, that's for sure as well . He called his body brother ass , like brother donkey. And he said, Yeah, no, I well why? Because if I have if I had a donkey, I'd take care of it. If I had a donkey, I would feed it well. If I had a donkey, I would use it . If I had a donkey and someone gave that to me , I would care for that donkey, use it well, feed it well . And in doing so, I'd honor the person who gave me that donkey. He didn't call it brother Stallion, right? He didn't call it himself. I'm gonna take care of it. I'm gonna use it. I'm gonna feed it well. I'm gonna let it rest when it needs to rest. I'm gonna put it to work when it's time to go to work . I'm gonna take care of the gift . As often as we take care of the gift, we are honoring the giver of the gift. And conversely, once again, if I do not take care of the gift, I'm dis honoring the giver of the gift . So what's that mean? Well it means body's not nothing, it's also not everything. It also means your worth is not dependent on how attractive or how well functioning your body is. Your worth is not dependent on that at all . But you have been given a gift. And maybe just because I can't do everything doesn't mean I can't do anything. You've been given a gift . Just use the gift. If you can, get outside and walk. If you can't, just try to stand up. If you can't, just pra ise God for the gift of the body that He's given you