a theology of resurrected bodies

Decades ago, I learned a theology of "resurrection of the body" that told me that someday I'd be in a resurrected body that was identifiably me but also not.

New creation means a new body - which is a whole new interesting thing. My body works as most bodies should work. Maybe it's not as pretty or as sexy or as shapely as our society thinks a woman's body should be, but it does pretty much all the things I've needed to, and when it 'malfunctioned', it was something that could be dealt with.

What about the friend I have who died twenty years ago, wheelchair bound? The theology of resurrected bodies that I learned wasn't one with a space for non-standard bodies. Does Abby get a 'new body', too? Will it still be her body? Was her body - her physicality - innately sinful, then, for being "non-standard"?

Or does her body just do all the things she needs it to do in the new creation, her physicality no longer a binding upon her in the next life as it was in this life?

Abby died around two decades ago. My fully-abled and very physically-capable cousin Tina died around one decade ago. Both Christian women, from very different traditions, with very different bodies, but very steadfast faiths. And one night I dreamed of them both dancing before the Throne - Tina as she loved to do, Abby as she never had the opportunity to do. Did I see what kind of body Abby had? Nope. Apparently it was beyond my comprehension as limited by this world, and so my brain lacks the ability to think beyond the bound of the society it was raised in - where Abby's body was "wrong" for not being capable of all the things that my body and Tina's body were capable of doing and being.

Or maybe I just made it all up in my head. Always possible.

A theology of disability - of "differently abled bodies" - is an interesting one, because it forces us to confront that if the flesh is not inherently sinful, then having a body that doesn't fit our social expectations isn't a sin either.