Telling the Truth With Our Body

This week, Christina Valenzuela from Pearl and Thistle wrote a piece for us about telling the truth with our body. We can’t recommend her ministry enough…check them out! Thank you Christina!

Nothing is quite as simultaneously infuriating and heartbreaking as when we find out that our child isn’t telling the truth. We’re angry because we feel disrespected when someone lies to us, but we are also saddened because we wonder, “Why didn’t they feel comfortable telling the truth? Were they worried about how I would react??” Teaching our children the value and the importance of truth-telling is something that we all want to instill in them as they grow; however, it’s important for us also to remember that Truth isn’t something that is only meant to be spoken: it is meant to be expressed, and lived. 

One of the key challenges issued to us through JPII’s Theology of the Body is to remember that our bodies, like the words we use, can either be used to express the Truth or to express a lie. What on earth does that mean? 

Well, I think it’s helpful to think first about what would it mean to “lie” with our bodies. 

In the Gospels, we actually get a perfect example of this. After the Last Supper, Jesus goes to Gethsemane to pray, and then Judas — one of the Twelve who had left everyone else, comes back. He comes back with guards and he greets Jesus with… what? A kiss on the cheek. 

Greeting Jesus with a kiss should have meant that Judas was showing Jesus how much he loved him: a kiss is a sign of affection, respect, and friendship. It is a sign of welcome and greeting, yet Judas intended none of those things. Instead, he used something which is supposed to be a sign of love as the very instrument of betrayal. In other words, Judas’ body spoke a lie. 

So now we can think about what it means to tell the truth with our bodies: it means that we use our bodies to express truly the things that we think and feel. It means that we use our bodies to express the truth of who God made us to be. Our children will not learn to speak the Truth with their bodies unless we teach them about appropriate and honest signs of affection, but it also goes deeper than that. In order to freely speak the Truth with their bodies, they need to know who they are. Our kids need to know:

I was made in the image and likeness of God.

I am a son or daughter of my parents. 

Through baptism, I am a precious member of God’s Church.

How we use our bodies should always reflect those truths. So, we should do things which help us show the image and likeness of God to others. We should do things which honor our identity as sons or daughters of our parents. We should do things that show others we are members of the Church. 

Fortunately, the Church has not left us without some valuable instructions on how to do this. 

First, God gave the Israelites the Ten Commandments, but Jesus also taught us a special list of things we call the Corporal Works of Mercy. The word “corporal” means pertaining to the body. So these are ways we give mercy and love to others through our bodies, specifically by tending to the needs of their bodies. 

The list is: 

To feed the hungry.

To give water to the thirsty.

To provide clothing for those without clothes.

To shelter the homeless.

To visit the sick.

To visit the imprisoned

To bury the dead.

When we do these things, we speak the truth with our bodies. 

This is the Truth of who God made us to be: helpers for one another out of love, which means that we have a responsibility to use our bodies to speak this language of love in truth, never in falsehood. 

 Maybe today your family could think about these Corporal Works of Mercy. You can choose one of them and ask: when does our family do this? And what truths about God and our selves do we communicate when we do? 

For more information on talking with your children about the importance of telling the Truth with our bodies in all things, download your FREE copy of this week’s Pray, Grow, and Serve Devotional or the LIFE Focus guide collaborated on by The Pelican Project and Pearl and Thistle, “Telling the Truth with Our Body!”