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Sunday 12, Year A
A few weeks ago, a little girl approached a group of priests among which I was standing: “May I ask a question?”, she said. “Yes, of course”. “Why do people die?” We had her repeat the question a few times, as we were not sure we had properly understood. The question seemed without proportion with this very little girl – she was under five.
“Why do people die?” Our second reading, from the Letter of St Paul to the Romans, addresses precisely this fundamental human question. In a few sentences, the Apostle provides us with a full answer by situating us between two men.
ADAM
The first one is Adam, our common ancestor and father. He is the first man, mankind at its beginning. We are all connected with him by ties of blood and history. We are not only his descendants and successors. We shre with him a common identity. He is mankind. He is “us”, first in the state of creation, and then in the state of sin.
“Sin came into the world through one man” – note that there is no blame put on Eve for once! – “and death through sin”. Death is, first of all, a consequence of a bad choice: Adam’s and ours. This means that human death is more than the end of a tired organism which ceases to work at some point. Death has a moral, or if you prefer a spiritual meaning. True, man dies because we are limited fleshly creatures whose lifespan is limited. But such was not our original vocation: we were meant to enjoy a life without end by the gift of God.
Sin, what we call “original sin”, consisted in turning away from God and His gift; it was an attempt to make ourselves eternal, instead of receiving God’s gift. It failed as we can observe. We did not reach life without end; we found death. That is the origin of human death and why it is for us a scandal and indeed a drama.
JESUS
But, by God’s mercy, there came a second man. “The free gift of God” abounded for many “by the grace that one man, Jesus Christ”. There is a second man, a second Adam. Just as mankind starts with Adam, we can also make a fresh start with this new man. Christ is mankind recreated according to God, in harmony with God, even, directly united with God. Christ is God recreating us according to God’s plan, reharmonising us to God’s truth.
Jesus was heir to Adam and, although He had no sin in Himself, He took on Himself our sinfulness and its consequence: death. He confronted death. He went through death. His death restored us all to life by the grace of God. Whereas Adam had disobeyed and said no to God’s lifegiving commandment, Jesus obeyed His Father’s lifegiving will and said Yes to the Cross, thus opening for us the doors to eternal life by His resurrection.
DEATH FOR LIFE
“Why do people die?” Well, little girl, the answer is twofold: 1st a negative one: We die because Adam sinned, and by sinning plunged us all into death; 2nd a positive one: We die in view of the gift of the resurrection which Jesus, first of many, received from the Father and offered to all who believe in Him.
In Adam, death is the tragic consequence of sin. In Jesus, death is the way into the gift of eternal life. There is a death which we do not choose and which is part of our human condition. But there is also a death which we can give our consent to, after Jesus and with His grace. Let Saint Paul have the last word
“The saying is trustworthy, for: If we have died with him, we will also live with him; if we endure, we will also reign with him; if we deny him, he also will deny us; if we are faithless, he remains faithful— for he cannot deny himself.” (2 Tim 11-13)