New Creation
by Miriam Hogan, O.C.D.
This time of year helps us to focus upon the theme of New Creation as it is presented in II Cor 5:17
Whoever is in Christ is a new creation:
the old things have passed away;
behold, new things have come.
And all this is from GodToday, when I do a Google search on the Internet I find that while New Creation is not a very popular expression in our Catholic tradition, it does have many references in other traditions. For example, there are New Creation Churches listed and one can even order New Creation toddler shirts. The shirts may bring joy and many smiles to those that see the little ones wearing them. Yet, I cannot help but think that the New Creation shirts could also be worn by the seniors among us and convey a deep truth. For, are we not all being recreated and renewed in Christ moment by moment?
Yet, we can perhaps understand this process of new/ongoing creation in various ways. In philosophy class, we talked about the word esse meaning be-ing or for lack of a better English word is-ing. St. Thomas Aquinas in his early work entitled On Being and Essence focused on the on-going work of creation as it applies to past/present/future. Jacques Maritain in flamboyant poetic French fashion argued that “everything even the most humble blade of grass, is all the time exerting a dynamic thrust over nothingness.” His notion of the intuition of being brings us close to a natural yet, mystical understanding of the world around us and within us.1
Further, in theology, and art we have the portrayal of Christ as the New Adam.2
Jesus is conceived by the Holy Spirit in the Virgin Mary's womb because he is the New Adam, who inaugurates the new creation: "The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven."(1 Cor 15:45,47) From his conception, Christ's humanity is filled with the Holy Spirit, for God "gives him the Spirit without measure."(Jn 3:34) From "his fullness" as the head of redeemed humanity "we have all received, grace upon grace."3
In this context we accept that while grace does not go against what we see in creation around us, it can bring us beyond what we see to a new reality. This is the reality of the spirit that is beautifully and briefly described in The Catechism of the Catholic Church concerning the eighth day:
But for us a new day has dawned: the day of Christ’s Resurrection… The eighth day begins the new creation. Thus the work of creation culminates in the greater work of redemption. The first creation finds its meaning and its summit in the new creation in Christ, the splendor of which surpasses that of the first creation.4
The Singing Of The Exultet
Further, as Fr. Gerald O’Collins5 notes: “Calling Christ the second Adam is a solidly traditional practice.” In the second century St. Irenaeus developed the differences between the first and last Adam.” Also this contrast between the two Adams continues to be expressed today in icons and the liturgy of the Eastern Churches. In our own tradition we have the singing of the Exultet during the Easter Vigil which implies Christ’s role as the second Adam.
The connection between the two Adams has been beautifully expressed in literature by John Donne in the “Hymn to God my God, in my sickness”:We think that Paradise and Calvary,
Christ’s Cross and Adam’s tree, stood in one place;
Look, Lord, and find both Adams met in me;
As the first Adam’s sweat surrounds my face,
May the Last Adam’s blood my soul embrace.6One might be tempted to say that this is nice poetry or philosophy but what does it have to do with my life? Fr. O’Collins holds in his article that “we are saved not merely through divine power ‘from the outside.” By the loving kindness of God’s plan, we are also saved ‘from the inside,’ through the incarnate Son of God, who is our brother.” The Easter transformation that takes place in the human heart is also transformative for the whole world. This is the on-going creation that we are invited and in fact enabled through Baptism to participate in ever more fully.
St. Thomas Aquinas, Maritain and others approached the mystery of creation and pondered the intuition of Being in the world from their personal philosophical experience. Fr. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin in his Hymn of the Universe also sees Christ’s Incarnation as being an on-going activity that sanctifies all of the material world. This view of new creation includes all people both young and old as well as all of the material world.
In the final paragraph of Chapter 1: The Mass On The World Fr. Teilhard expresses:It is to your body in this its fullest extension – that is, to the world become through your power and my faith the glorious living crucible in which everything melts away in order to be born anew; it is to this that I dedicate myself with all the resources which your creative magnetism has brought forth in me: with the all too feeble resources of my scientific knowledge, with my religious vows, with my priesthood, and (most dear to me) with my deepest human convictions. It is in this dedication, Lord Jesus, I desire to live, in this I desire to die.7
Finally, during this Easter Season my prayer is that once again we may focus on the freshness of new life in the world as it is given in our lived experience and/or our faith and reclaim and rejoice in our newness in Christ8, just as Christ has laid claim to us in his suffering death and Resurrection.
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1God, Zen and the Intuition of Being
http://www.innerexplorations.com/catew/gz3.htm
2This point was brought home to me especially in 1982, when I was touring the catacombs. The grave stones are not considered especially interesting artistically but what I found extremely interesting about them were the themes that the early Christians in Rome considered important enough to portray on the tombs of their dead. One of these themes was unmistakably the New Adam. The figure of Christ in Risen splendor stands tall and below him are smaller figures of Adam and Eve.
3Catechism of the Catholic Church (Liguori, MO: Liguori Publications, 1994, Liberia Editrice Vaticana) p. 127. #504
4Ibid. p. 89. #349
5America Vol. 190 No. 13 April 12, 2004 The Second Adam by Gerald O’Collins (professor of theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome).
6As quoted in Fr. Gerald O’Collins article. On a personal note, my brother-in-law who is now recovering from cancer surgery recently reminded me of the connection between Adam/Christ.
7http://www.religion-online.org/showchapter.asp?title=1621&C=1535
8”With Christ, eternity has entered time!... Jesus' work involves two closely related aspects: it is a saving action which frees humanity from the power of evil, and it is a new creation which obtains for humanity participation in the divine life.” Quoted from: The Catechesis of the Holy Father Wed. 26, Nov. 1997 — http://www.vatican.va/jubilee_2000/magazine/documents/ju_mag_01121997_p-20_en.html