Talk to Middle Schoolers at St. Joseph Catholic Church
Introduction to Theology of the Body, with focus on the sacramentality of the body, the language of the body, and the freedom of the gift.
I. What is a sacrament? (to remind you)
A. It takes spiritual things and makes them visible
B. For example Baptism shows (is the sacrament of) washing, cleansing
C. If a priest changed it, this would be a sin because here is a man who represents God who is not showing what God would want shown. (I.e. baptizing in tar) He is the sign of God, He makes God visible, He is a sacrament
D. Marriage is the sacrament that makes God’s love visible through the bodies of the married couple. It is the sacrament of the image of God.)
II. In its own way, the body is a sacrament
A. It makes God’s image visible, His image is love that gives fully, freely, faithfully, and fruitfully
B. It makes YOU visible, it is called the “Sacrament of the person”
C. When we live as an image of God we find happiness
D. The point of life is to give yourself like God does, this is God’s plan for each of his children, this is the secret to happiness
III. What you do with your body matters
A. You (both body and soul) were made in God’s image, you are His image, especially in your sexuality, which is what makes you most able to love as God loves. God gave you your sexuality so that you can give yourself fully freely faithfully and fruitfully. This way you can find your greatest happiness.
B. You (body and soul) have been bought at a very high price: Jesus, how do you know the value of something? You find out how much you have to pay for it.
C. Your body is the sacrament of you, the image of God
D. Just like a priest who can do the sacraments in the way that matches up, or he can change them and lie about God, we can use our bodies in a truthful way (that shows God’s real image) or we can use them to tell lies (when we use them to show something that goes against God’s image)
E. We can use it in a TRUTHFUL way, like, for girls, we dress our bodies in a way that highlights our value: you have to pay with the rest of your life (in marriage) if you want to see what I got… Modesty
For guys: we use our bodies in a truthful way when we image God’s free gift: Jesus didn’t die for us just because He would get something out of it, in the same way when you make a gift even when you won’t get something in return, you image God, like helping someone even when there is no advantage to you personally, helping someone who is not popular, or helping your mom or little brother or sister
F. We can use it to tell LIES when we act in a way that does not show God’s full, free, faithful, and fruitful giving love. When we mess around outside of marriage we say with our bodies that we give everything, the rest of our lives, our fertility, the right to change our mind about who we marry, when we do not actually.
When we tempt someone to lie to us by trying to turn them on, this is not loving, lying to someone is not loving.
Giving yourself in a truthful way is true love, in a way that makes the actual relationship that you have visible is true love. Until you are married, this does not include anything sexual.
G. Other ways we can act like the opposite of God’s image is to represent sexual things (which were made by God to be His holy image) as bad or nasty, like through bad notes (me), watching bad movies, shows, or magazines, certain jokes, and the way you talk about things, the places you go.
H. Watch who your friends are and think about what kind of person you are. Don’t hang around with people who tempt you to walk towards hell. Be the kind of person that helps others get to heaven. Jesus said that it was the pure of heart who would see God.
IV. How to protect your freedom
A. There is a great battle waged by the forces of evil to keep you from your greatest happiness.
B. The way they do this is to cheat you out of a greater happiness by trapping you with a much lesser one.
C. One of the most important things to be able to give yourself like God does is to be free to. This is why God gives us such a tremendous desire to be free.
D. But the forces of evil try to take away our freedom by tempting us to trade our true freedom for a passing pleasure. They even trap us in this way in the name of freedom. “Just do what you want.” Then they convince us that what we want is some passing pleasure, when what we really want is real lasting happiness, heaven.
E. To be free, you must have freedom of choice. If you get trapped by a sexual habit or addiction, you are no longer free.
F. To be free, you must be in control of your decisions, not being pushed around by your desires, or by your “friends”. This self control comes from learning to choose what is good even when it is difficult. (Great basketball player is in control, not like street ball guys who hurt others) Everyone can choose to sin, it is easy. Only people with self control can choose not to sin because it is more difficult, just like playing basketball badly can be done by anyone.
G. Ways to increase your self control are through being obedient to your parents and by being a pure person.
H. Other ways to protect your freedom are through the sacraments esp. Holy Communion which makes us more like God, and Reconciliation which frees us from our sins which are addicting.
V. Conclusion: Let us be true images of God
A. When we pray and think about whether we are acting like true images of God and getting closer to heaven God helps us as well.
B. It is through our actions that we choose God. It is not enough to just go to Church or say that we are God’s followers. We must also live in a truthful way, since this is how we follow Jesus who is the way the TRUTH and the life.
