Why Catholic Saints are said to be in heaven but not yet given their resurrected bodies?
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Souls separated from their bodies understand not from their bodily senses but spiritually.
See:
- ch. 12 "Knowledge in the Separated Soul" of Life Everlasting by Fr. Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., which quotes:
- Of the Knowledge of the Separated Soul, Summa Theologica I q. 89 by St. Thomas Aquinas:
Do these souls know what is happening on earth? St. Thomas replies:
In the natural order they do not know, because they are separated from the society of those who are still on the road to eternity. Nevertheless, if we restrict the question to the souls of the blessed, it is more probable to say that they, like the angels, do know what happens on earth, particularly what happens to those who are dear to them. This is a part of their accidental beatitude.*Those in purgatory too can have love of us, even though they do not know our actual state, just as we pray for them, although we do not know their actual state, their nearness, for example, to deliverance.
[ibid. a. 8 "Whether separated souls know that takes place on earth?"]
*See Life Everlasting ch. 31 "Accidental Beatitude"
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Why Catholic Saints are said to be in heaven but not yet given their resurrected bodies?
The saints resurrected bodies will be reunited to their glorified souls only in the last day, with the exception of Blessed Virgin Mary and St.Joseph who are in Heaven with their glorified souls reunited with their resurrected sinless bodies.
994 But there is more. Jesus links faith in the resurrection to his own person: "I am the Resurrection and the life."544 It is Jesus himself who on the last day will raise up those who have believed in him, who have eaten his body and drunk his blood.545 Already now in this present life he gives a sign and pledge of this by restoring some of the dead to life,546 announcing thereby his own Resurrection, though it was to be of another order. He speaks of this unique event as the "sign of Jonah,"547 the sign of the temple: he announces that he will be put to death but rise thereafter on the third day.548
545 Cf. Jn 5:24-25; 6:40,54.
How do the dead rise?
997 What is "rising"? In death, the separation of the soul from the body, the human body decays and the soul goes to meet God, while awaiting its reunion with its glorified body. God, in his almighty power, will definitively grant incorruptible life to our bodies by reuniting them with our souls, through the power of Jesus' Resurrection.
Does it mean when the Catholic faithful pray to the Saints for their intercession, they are conscious but have not received their resurrected bodies? If so, why do the Church said (Catechism paragraph 956-957) that the Saints are in heaven?
The Saints in Heaven intercedes for us in "spirit and truth" just like all the glorified souls must worship God in "spirit & truth" and not by means of the senses of flesh.
But a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father is seeking such as these to worship Him. 24God is Spirit, and His worshipers must worship Him in spirit and in truth.”(John4:23-24)
If the Saints in Heaven can already worship God in spirit & truth and intercedes for us having a beatific vision, then why is the need for the Saints glorified souls to be reunited in their resurrected bodies at the last day?
The Saints who live up a pious life on this earth like Jesus, and had used their bodies to glorify God, are the only bodies worthy to be resurrected at the last day.
999 How? Christ is raised with his own body: "See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself";553 but he did not return to an earthly life. So, in him, "all of them will rise again with their own bodies which they now bear," but Christ "will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body," into a "spiritual body":554
The rest of the baptized believers will be given a "spiritual body" because how can God resurrect bodies that already decay into dust?
1016 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.
1017 "We believe in the true resurrection of this flesh that we now possess" (Council of Lyons II: DS 854). We sow a corruptible body in the tomb, but he raises up an incorruptible body, a "spiritual body" (cf. 1 Cor 15:42-44).
The degree of glory of all the Saints in Heaven who are reunited with their resurrected bodies esp. the incorruptible bodies of the Saints shines more brightly than the glorified souls whose mortal flesh are turn into dust and were only given a "spiritual body".
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