Eternal life (Christianity) in the context of "Evangelical counsels"

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⭐ Core Definition: Eternal life (Christianity)

Eternal life traditionally refers to continued life after death, as outlined in Christian eschatology. The Apostles' Creed testifies: "I believe... the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting." In this view, eternal life commences after the Second Coming of Jesus Christ and the resurrection of the dead, although in the New Testament's Johannine literature there are references to eternal life commencing in the earthly life of the believer, possibly indicating an inaugurated eschatology.

According to mainstream Christian theology, after death but before the Second Coming, the saved live with God in an intermediate state, but after the Second Coming, experience the physical resurrection of the dead and the physical recreation of a New Earth. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states, "By death the soul is separated from the body, but in the resurrection God will give incorruptible life to our body, transformed by reunion with our soul. Just as Christ is risen and lives for ever, so all of us will rise at the last day." N.T. Wright argues that "God's plan is not to abandon this world... Rather, he intends to remake it. And when he does, he will raise all people to new bodily life to live in it. That is the promise of the Christian gospel."

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👉 Eternal life (Christianity) in the context of Evangelical counsels

In Christianity, the three evangelical counsels, or counsels of perfection, are poverty, chastity, and obedience. As stated by Jesus Christ in the canonical gospels, they are counsels for those who desire to become "perfect" (τελειος, teleios).

The Catholic Church interprets this to mean that they are not binding upon all, and hence not necessary conditions to attain eternal life (heaven), but that they are "acts of supererogation", "over and above" the minimum stipulated in the biblical commandments. Catholics and Lutherans who have made a public profession to order their lives by the evangelical counsels, and confirmed this by public vows before their competent church authority (the act of religious commitment known as a profession), are recognised as members of the consecrated life.

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Eternal life (Christianity) in the context of Jesus in Christianity

In Christianity, Jesus is the Son of God as chronicled in the Bible's New Testament, as well as prophesied in the Old Testament, and is held to be God the Son, a prosopon (Person) of the Trinity of God. Christians believe him to be the Jewish messiah (giving him the title Christ), who was prophesied in the Bible's Old Testament. Through Jesus's crucifixion and resurrection, Christians believe that God offers humans salvation and eternal life, with Jesus's death atoning for all sin.

These teachings emphasize that as the Lamb of God, Jesus chose to suffer nailed to the cross at Calvary as a sign of his obedience to the will of God, as an "agent and servant of God". Jesus's choice positions him as a man of obedience, in contrast to Adam's disobedience. According to the New Testament, after God raised him from the dead, Jesus ascended to heaven to sit at the right hand of God the Father, with his followers awaiting his return to Earth and God's subsequent Last Judgement.

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Eternal life (Christianity) in the context of Assumption of Mary

The Assumption of Mary is one of the four Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church. Pope Pius XII defined it on 1 November 1950 in his apostolic constitution Munificentissimus Deus as the assumption of Mary, body and soul, into heaven. It is celebrated on 15 August.

It leaves open the question of whether Mary died or whether she was raised to eternal life without bodily death.

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Eternal life (Christianity) in the context of Spiritual body

In Christianity, the apostle Paul introduced the concept of the spiritual body (Koine Greek: sōma pneumatikos) in the New Testament (1 Corinthians 15:44), describing the resurrected body as "spiritual" (pneumatikos) in contrast to the natural (psychikos) body:

Christian teaching traditionally interprets Paul as comparing a resurrected body with a mortal body, saying that it will be a different kind of body; a "spiritual body", meaning an immortal body, or incorruptible body (15:53—54). In the Catholic Church, traditionally the resurrected body is called the "glorified body", and retained four characteristics: incorruptibility, subtlety, impassibility, and agility. The bodies of the damned are also raised incorrupt, but not glorified or free from suffering.

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Eternal life (Christianity) in the context of Christian conditionalism

In Christian theology, conditionalism or conditional immortality is a concept in which the gift of immortality is attached to (conditional upon) belief in Jesus Christ. This concept is based in part upon another biblical argument, that the human soul is naturally mortal, immortality ("eternal life") is therefore granted by God as a gift. This viewpoint stands in contrast to the more popular concept of the "natural immortality" of the soul. Conditionalism is practically synonymous with annihilationism, the belief that the unsaved will be ultimately destroyed.

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Eternal life (Christianity) in the context of Election in Christianity

In Christianity, particularly within the theological framework of Calvinism, election involves God choosing a particular person or group of people to a particular task or relationship, especially eternal life.

Election to eternal life is viewed by some as conditional on a person's faith, and by others as unconditional. According to Calvinist theology, before the foundation of the world, God chose certain individuals, known as the "elect", to receive his saving grace and be predestined for eternal salvation; Calvinists view this election as unconditional, based not on human merit or works but solely on God's sovereign will and purpose.

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Eternal life (Christianity) in the context of Fall of man

The fall of man, the fall of Adam, or simply the Fall, is a term used in Christianity to describe the transition of the first man and woman from a state of innocent obedience to God to a state of guilty disobedience. The doctrine of the Fall comes from a biblical interpretation of Genesis, chapters 1–3. At first, Adam and Eve lived with God in the Garden of Eden, but the serpent tempted them into eating the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, which God had forbidden. After doing so, they became ashamed of their nakedness and God expelled them from the Garden to prevent them from eating the fruit of the tree of life and becoming immortal.

In Nicene Christianity, the doctrine of the Fall is closely related to that of original sin or ancestral sin. Nicene Christians believe that the Fall brought sin into the world, corrupting the entire natural world, including human nature, causing all humans to be born into original sin, a state from which they cannot attain eternal life without the grace of God. The Eastern Orthodox Church accepts the concept of the Fall but rejects the idea that the guilt of original sin is passed down through generations, based in part on the passage Ezekiel 18:20, which says a son is not guilty of the sins of his father.

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