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Adam Did Not Have to Suffer or Die
As long as he remained in the divine intimacy, man would not have to suffer or die [Gen 2:17; 3:16, 19] (CCC376). God created man a rational being, conferring on him the dignity of a person who can initiate and control his own actions. "God willed that man should be 'left in the hand of his own counsel,' so that he might of his own accord seek his Creator and freely attain his full and blessed perfection by cleaving to him." Man is rational and therefore like God; he is created with free will and is master over his acts (CCC1730). God permits physical and even moral evil is a mystery that God illuminates by his Son Jesus Christ who died and rose to vanquish evil. Faith gives us the certainty that God would not permit an evil if he did not cause a good to come from that very evil, by ways that we shall fully know only in eternal life (CCC324).
After his fall, man was not abandoned by God. On the contrary, God calls him and in a mysterious way heralds the coming victory over evil and his restoration from his fall [Gen 3:9, 15]. This passage in Genesis is called the Protoevangelium ("first gospel"): the first announcement of the Messiah and Redeemer, of a battle between the serpent and the Woman, and of the final victory of a descendant of hers (CCC410). The divine plan of salvation: "You were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your fathers... with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. He was destined before the foundation of the world but was made manifest at the end of the times for your sake" [1Pt 1:18-20]. Man's sins, following on original sin, are punishable by death [Rom 5:12; 1Cor 15:56]. By sending his own Son in the form of a slave, in the form of a fallen humanity, on account of sin, God "made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God" [2Cor 5:21; Phil 2:7; Rom 8:3] (CCC602). Jesus [was] delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God [Acts 2:23] (CCC599).
Man was Created in a State of Holiness
Created in a state of holiness, man was destined to be fully "divinized" by God in glory. Seduced by the devil, he wanted to "be like God", but "without God, before God, and not in accordance with God" [Gen 3:5] (CCC398). This grace of original holiness was "to share in...divine life" (CCC375). God created man in his image and established him in his friendship. A spiritual creature, man can live this friendship only in free submission to God. The prohibition against eating "of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" spells this out: "for in the day that you eat of it, you shall die" [Gen 2:17]. The "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" [Gen 2:17] symbolically evokes the insurmountable limits that man, being a creature, must freely recognize and respect with trust. Man is dependent on his Creator, and subject to the laws of creation and to the moral norms that govern the use of freedom (CCC396). The account of the fall in Genesis 3 uses figurative language, but affirms a primeval event, a deed that took place at the beginning of the history of man (CCC390).
God is the sovereign master of his plan. But to carry it out he also makes use of his creatures' co-operation. This use is not a sign of weakness, but rather a token of almighty God's greatness and goodness. For God grants his creatures not only their existence, but also the dignity of acting on their own, of being causes and principles for each other, and thus of co-operating in the accomplishment of his plan (CCC306). God does not want to impose the good, but wants free beings.... There is a certain usefulness to temptation. No one but God knows what our soul has received from him, not even we ourselves. But temptation reveals it in order to teach us to know ourselves, and in this way we discover our evil inclinations and are obliged to give thanks for the goods that temptation has revealed to us (CCC2847).
Adam and Eve Were Created To Transmit Human Life
In marriage God unites them in such a way that, by forming "one flesh", [Gen 2:24] they can transmit human life: "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth" [Gen 1:28]. By transmitting human life to their descendants, man and woman as spouses and parents co-operate in a unique way in the Creator's work (CCC372). Creating the human race in his own image . . .. God inscribed in the humanity of man and woman the vocation, and thus the capacity and responsibility, of love and communion." "God created man in his own image... male and female he created them"; [Gen 1:27] He blessed them and said, "Be fruitful and multiply"; [Gen 1:28] "When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. Male and female he created them, and he blessed them and named them Man when they were created" [Gen 5:1-2] (CCC2331). The union of man and woman in marriage is a way of imitating in the flesh the Creator's generosity and fecundity: "Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh" [Gen 2:24]. All human generations proceed from this union [Gen 4:1-2, 25-26; 5:1] (CCC2335).
In God's plan man and woman have the vocation of "subduing" the earth [Gen 1:28] as stewards of God. This sovereignty is not to be an arbitrary and destructive domination. God calls man and woman, made in the image of the Creator "who loves everything that exists", [Wis 11:24] to share in his providence toward other creatures; hence their responsibility for the world God has entrusted to them (CCC373). To human beings God even gives the power of freely sharing in his providence by entrusting them with the responsibility of "subduing" the earth and having dominion over it. [Gen 1:26-28] God thus enables men to be intelligent and free causes in order to complete the work of creation, to perfect its harmony for their own good and that of their neighbors (CCC307). "God cannot be tempted by evil and he himself tempts no one"; [Jas 113] on the contrary, he wants to set us free from evil (CCC2846).
If you love the LORD your God, by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his ordinances, then you shall live and multiply [Deut 30:16] (CCC2057). "We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him... For those whom he fore knew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the first-born among many brethren. And those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified" [Rom 8:28-30] (CCC2012). All Christians in any state or walk of life are called to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection of charity. All are called to holiness: "Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" [Mt 5:48]. In order to reach this perfection the faithful should use the strength dealt out to them by Christ's gift, so that... doing the will of the Father in everything, they may wholeheartedly devote themselves to the glory of God and to the service of their neighbor. Thus the holiness of the People of God will grow in fruitful abundance, as is clearly shown in the history of the Church through the lives of so many saints (CCC2013). The way of perfection passes by way of the Cross. There is no holiness without renunciation and spiritual battle [2 Tim 4]. Spiritual progress entails the ascesis and mortification that gradually lead to living in the peace and joy of the Beatitudes: He who climbs never stops going from beginning to beginning, through beginnings that have no end. He never stops desiring what he already knows (CCC2015).
Faced with a moral choice, conscience can make either a right judgment in accordance with reason and the divine law or, on the contrary, an erroneous judgment that departs from them (CCC1786). Man is sometimes confronted by situations that make moral judgments less assured and decision difficult. But he must always seriously seek what is right and good and discern the will of God expressed in divine law (CCC1787). To this purpose, man strives to interpret the data of experience and the signs of the times assisted by the virtue of prudence, by the advice of competent people, and by the help of the Holy Spirit and his gifts (CCC1788). Some rules apply in every case: One may never do evil so that good may result from it; the Golden Rule: "Whatever you wish that men would do to you, do so to them" [Mt 7:12; Lk 6:31; Tob 4:15]; charity always proceeds by way of respect for one's neighbor and his conscience: "Thus sinning against your brethren and wounding their conscience... you sin against Christ" [1 Cor 8:12]. Therefore "it is right not to... do anything that makes your brother stumble" [Rom 14:21] (CCC1789).
A human being must always obey the certain judgment of his conscience. If he were deliberately to act against it, he would condemn himself. Yet it can happen that moral conscience remains in ignorance and makes erroneous judgments about acts to be performed or already committed (CCC1790). A good and pure conscience is enlightened by true faith, for charity proceeds at the same time "from a pure heart and a good conscience and sincere faith" [1 Tim 5; 8:9; 2 Tim 3; 1 Pet 3:21; Acts 24:16] (CCC1794). A well-formed conscience is upright and truthful. It formulates its judgments according to reason, in conformity with the true good willed by the wisdom of the Creator. Everyone must avail himself of the means to form his conscience (CCC1798). Faced with a moral choice, conscience can make either a right judgment in accordance with reason and the divine law or, on the contrary, an erroneous judgment that departs from them (CCC1799). Conscience can remain in ignorance or make erroneous judgments. Such ignorance and errors are not always free of guilt (CCC1801). The Word of God is a light for our path. We must assimilate it in faith and prayer and put it into practice. This is how moral conscience is formed (CCC1802).
It Is A Revolt Against Through The Will To Become "Like Gods"
Sin is an offense against God: "Against you, you alone, have I sinned, and done that which is evil in your sight" [Ps 51:4]. Sin sets itself against God's love for us and turns our hearts away from it. Like the first sin, it is disobedience, a revolt against God through the will to become "like gods," [Gen 3:5] knowing and determining good and evil. Sin is thus "love of oneself even to contempt of God." In this proud self- exaltation, sin is diametrically opposed to the obedience of Jesus, which achieves our salvation [Phil 2:6-9] (CCC1850). In that sin man preferred himself to God and by that very act scorned him. He chose himself over and against God, against the requirements of his creaturely status and therefore against his own good. Created in a state of holiness, man was destined to be fully "divinized" by God in glory. Seduced by the devil, he wanted to "be like God", but "without God, before God, and not in accordance with God" [Gen 3:5] (CCC398). Freedom and sin. Man's freedom is limited and fallible. In fact, man failed. He freely sinned. By refusing God's plan of love, he deceived himself and became a slave to sin (CCC1739). Sin is an offense against reason, truth, and right conscience; it is failure in genuine love for God and neighbor caused by a perverse attachment to certain goods. It wounds the nature of man and injures human solidarity. It has been defined as "an utterance, a deed, or a desire contrary to the eternal law" (CCC1849).
Man, tempted by the devil, let his trust in his Creator die in his heart and, abusing his freedom, disobeyed God's command. This is what man's first sin consisted of [Gen 3:1-11; Rom 5:19]. All subsequent sin would be disobedience toward God and lack of trust in his goodness (CCC397). Scripture portrays the tragic consequences of this first disobedience. Adam and Eve immediately lose the grace of original holiness [Rom 3:23]. They become afraid of the God of whom they have conceived a distorted image - that of a God jealous of his prerogatives [Gen 3:5-10] (CCC399). The harmony in which they had found themselves, thanks to original justice, is now destroyed: the control of the soul's spiritual faculties over the body is shattered; the union of man and woman becomes subject to tensions, their relations henceforth marked by lust and domination [Gen 3:7-16]. Harmony with creation is broken: visible creation has become alien and hostile to man [Gen 3:17, 19]. Because of man, creation is now subject "to its bondage to decay" [Rom 8:21]. Finally, the consequence explicitly foretold for this disobedience will come true: man will "return to the ground", [Gen 3:19; 2:17] for out of it he was taken. Death makes its entrance into human history [Rom 5:12] (CCC400).
Deep within his conscience man discovers a law which he has not laid upon himself but which he must obey. Its voice, ever calling him to love and to do what is good and to avoid evil, sounds in his heart at the right moment.... For man has in his heart a law inscribed by God.... His conscience is man's most secret core and his sanctuary. There he is alone with God whose voice echoes in his depths (CCC1776). Conscience is a judgment of reason whereby the human person recognizes the moral quality of a concrete act that he is going to perform, is in the process of performing, or has already completed. In all he says and does, man is obliged to follow faithfully what he knows to be just and right. It is by the judgment of his conscience that man perceives and recognizes the prescriptions of the divine law: Conscience is a law of the mind; yet [Christians] would not grant that it is nothing more; I mean that it was not a dictate, nor conveyed the notion of responsibility, of duty, of a threat and a promise.... [Conscience] is a messenger of him, who, both in nature and in grace, speaks to us behind a veil, and teaches and rules us by his representatives. Conscience is the aboriginal Vicar of Christ. (CCC1778). Conscience enables one to assume responsibility for the acts performed. If man commits evil, the just judgment of conscience can remain within him as the witness to the universal truth of the good, at the same time as the evil of his particular choice. The verdict of the judgment of conscience remains a pledge of hope and mercy. In attesting to the fault committed, it calls to mind the forgiveness that must be asked, the good that must still be practiced, and the virtue that must be constantly cultivated with the grace of God: We shall... reassure our hearts before him whenever our hearts condemn us; for God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything [1 Jn 3:19-20] (CCC1781). Man has the right to act in conscience and in freedom so as personally to make moral decisions. "He must not be forced to act contrary to his conscience. Nor must he be prevented from acting according to his conscience (CCC1782).
Adam Disobeyed and Christ Obeyed
Death is transformed by Christ. The obedience of Jesus has transformed the curse of death into a blessing [Rom 5:19-21] (CCC1009). Jesus is the new Adam who remained faithful just where the first Adam had given in to temptation. Christ reveals himself as God's Servant, totally obedient to the divine will. In this, Jesus is the devil's conqueror: he "binds the strong man" to take back his plunder [Ps 95:10; Mk 3:27] (CCC539). The "New Adam" who, because he "became obedient unto death, even death on a cross", makes amends superabundantly for the disobedience, of Adam [1 Cor 15:21-22, 45; Phil 2:8; Rom 5:19-20] (CCC411). Like ours, his human nature is destined for eternal life; but unlike ours, it is perfectly exempt from sin, the cause of death [Rom 5:12; Heb 4:15]. By accepting in his human will that the Father's will be done, he accepts his death as redemptive, for "he himself bore our sins in his body on the tree" [1Pt 224; Mt 26:42] (CCC612).
"By the grace of God" Jesus tasted death "for every one" [Heb 2:9]. In his plan of salvation, God ordained that his Son should not only "die for our sins" [1Cor 15:3] but should also "taste death", experience the condition of death, the separation of his soul from his body, between the time he expired on the cross and the time he was raised from the dead (CCC624). "The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil" [1 Jn 3:8] (CCC394). 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 (CCC1016). Finally, Christ's Resurrection - and the risen Christ himself is the principle and source of our future resurrection: "Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep... For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive" [1Cor 15:20-22] (CCC655).
The victory that Christ won over sin has given us greater blessings than those which sin had taken from us: "where sin increased, grace abounded all the more" (Rom 5:20) (CCC420). "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. He destined us before him in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace which he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved" [Eph 1:3-6] (CCC1077).
If God the Father almighty, the Creator of the ordered and good world, cares for all his creatures, why does evil exist? To this question, as pressing as it is unavoidable and as painful as it is mysterious, no quick answer will suffice. Only Christian faith as a whole constitutes the answer to this question: the goodness of creation, the drama of sin and the patient love of God who comes to meet man by his covenants, the redemptive Incarnation of his Son, his gift of the Spirit, his gathering of the Church, the power of the sacraments and his call to a blessed life to which free creatures are invited to consent in advance, but from which, by a terrible mystery, they can also turn away in advance. There is not a single aspect of the Christian message that is not in part an answer to the question of evil (CCC309).
Christ Restores Fallen Man to His Original Vocation
Christ's whole life is a mystery of recapitulation. All Jesus did, said and suffered had for its aim restoring fallen man to his original vocation: When Christ became incarnate and was made man, he recapitulated in himself the long history of mankind and procured for us a "short cut" to salvation, so that what we had lost in Adam, that is, being in the image and likeness of God, we might recover in Christ Jesus. For this reason Christ experienced all the stages of life, thereby giving communion with God to all men (CCC518). By his Passion, Christ delivered us from Satan and from sin. He merited for us the new life in the Holy Spirit. His grace restores what sin had damaged in us (CCC1708). We must know Christ as the source of grace in order to know Adam as the source of sin (CCC388).
In time we can discover that God in his almighty providence can bring a good from the consequences of an evil, even a moral evil, caused by his creatures: "It was not you", said Joseph to his brothers, "who sent me here, but God... You meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive" [Gen 45:8; 50:20; Tob 2:12]. From the greatest moral evil ever committed - the rejection and murder of God's only Son, caused by the sins of all men - God, by his grace that "abounded all the more", [Rom 5:20] brought the greatest of goods: the glorification of Christ and our redemption. But for all that, evil never becomes a good (CCC312). "We know that in everything God works for good for those who love him" [Rom 8:28] (CCC313). We firmly believe that God is master of the world and of its history. But the ways of his providence are often unknown to us. Only at the end, when our partial knowledge ceases, when we see God "face to face", [1Cor 13:12] will we fully know the ways by which - even through the dramas of evil and sin - God has guided his creation to that definitive sabbath rest [Gen 2:2] for which he created heaven and earth (CCC314).