Riddle of Recognition

Learning how to see and love others in heaven

11/06/2022

Lk 20:27-38 Some Sadducees, those who deny that there is a resurrection, came forward and put this question to Jesus, saying, "Teacher, Moses wrote for us, If someone's brother dies leaving a wife but no child, his brother must take the wife and raise up descendants for his brother. Now there were seven brothers; the first married a woman but died childless. Then the second and the third married her, and likewise all the seven died childless. Finally the woman also died. Now at the resurrection whose wife will that woman be? For all seven had been married to her." Jesus said to them, "The children of this age marry and remarry; but those who are deemed worthy to attain to the coming age and to the resurrection of the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. They can no longer die, for they are like angels; and they are the children of God because they are the ones who will rise."

One of the unresolved controversies about heaven is whether or not we will recognize other people when we get there. We might call it a sort of riddle of recognition. Some theologians say that we will be able to tell who is who, and be able to see others as God sees them. Other theologians, on the other hand, insist we will not recognize others because that might spoil the joy of heaven if we saw our ex-spouse or former boss in heaven. Let me give you an example of how hard it may be to recognize people in heaven.

One day when Jesus was relaxing in heaven, he happened to notice a familiar-looking old man. Wondering if the old man was his father, Joseph, Jesus asked him, “Did you, by any chance, ever have a son?” The old man answered, “Why yes. But he wasn’t my biological son. He was born by a miracle, by the intervention of a magical being from heaven.”

Jesus said: “Very interesting. Did this boy ever have to fight temptation?” The old man replied: “Oh yes, many times. But eventually he won. Unfortunately, he heroically died at one point, but came back to life shortly afterwards.” Jesus couldn’t believe his ears. Could this actually be his father? Jesus said: “Okay, one last question. Were you a carpenter?” “Why yes!” exclaimed the old man, “Yes, I was!” Jesus rubbed his eyes and said, “Dad?” the old man rubbed his eyes and said, “Pinocchio?”

The gospel today from Luke 20: 27-38 also weighs in on the question of recognizing people in heaven. Jesus, however, only gives half the answer to this riddle of recognition. Let me explain how. The Sadducees paint a picture of a poor woman who successively marries seven brothers, and finally dies herself. What woman wouldn’t die after all that? So the Sadducees ask who the woman would recognize as her husband in heaven. At that point, Jesus supplies half the answer by saying there will be no marriage in heaven as you find it on earth. In other words, we will not recognize anyone else as our husband or wife when we get to heaven. That may come as a welcome relief to some people.

But we hear the second half of the answer to the riddle of recognition in Rev 21. That is, there will be a marriage, and a Husband and Wife clearly recognizable in heaven. There we hear who will be recognized as the Bride in heaven. John the author of Revelation writes: “And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.” I’ll give you one guess who the heavenly Husband is. John answers that question in Rev 22:17, “The Spirit and the Bride say, ‘Come [Lord Jesus]’.” That is, we may or may not be able to recognize one another in heaven, but we will definitely recognize Jesus as our divine Spouse, and he will recognize us as his Bride. And he will recognize his beloved Bride a lot easier than he recognized poor Geppetto (Pinocchio’s father).

Whenever I conduct a wedding rehearsal the evening before the wedding I tell the wedding party (the groomsmen and bridesmaids) which way they should be facing during the ceremony. I tell them: “All eyes on the bride!” And I explain that there is a theological reason for this, and not just a practical one so they all look good for the wedding pictures. At every wedding we see a snapshot of the end of time, which will be a great, cosmic wedding. How so?

The end of time is when the Bride, the Church, is finally made perfect, “without spot or wrinkle or any such thing” as St. Paul taught the Ephesians. And as we watch the human bride walk down the aisle, we see how she proceeds toward her human husband, who himself stands as a symbol of Jesus at the end of time. And this I believe is the second half of the answer to the Sadducees: that is, there will be marriage in heaven, but a mystical marriage between the Church, the Bride, and Jesus, the Bridegroom. So, there will be no human marriage but there will be a heavenly marriage.

It is interesting that we use the word “consummation” to describe both the end of the world, we say “the consummation of the world.” But the same word consummation also describes how a husband and wife on their honeymoon ratify their consent through marital intimacy where the two become one flesh. That, too, is called “consummation.” Perhaps Shakespeare meant both these meanings when Hamlet said in his famous “To be or not to be” speech: “Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished” – the end of the world, and intimate union with Christ.

So, I suppose that would be my answer to the riddle of recognizing people in heaven. Will we recognize our brothers and sisters, our mother and father, our ex-spouse and our former boss in heaven? Will we recognize Fr. John? If we do, that will all be secondary in a sense. Why? Well, because the main Person we are going to heaven to see is Jesus. And the main Person Jesus is waiting to see in heaven is his Bride, the Church, in splendor.

Let me add that, of course, God loves each of us individually. Each person is unique and unrepeatable and created in God’s image and likeness. We all have an experience of this dual identity: we are individually U.S. citizens, but we are collectively called “Americans”. So, too, we have an individual identity as Christians, but we also have a corporate identity as the Bride of Christ, and all eyes are on the Bride at the end of the world, and especially the eyes of Jesus.

Praised be Jesus Christ!