Adam and Eve are our first parents; but unlike us they were brought into a world full of God's beauty and free of sin. In the beginning, God created man to share in His holiness and glory forever. He placed Adam and Eve in His beautiful and harmonious creation where death did not exist and all human needs were met. The Bible tells us in the Book of Genesis, and the Church has always proclaimed that when God finished His masterpiece, creation, He looked at everything He had made, and He found it very good. God gave man and woman everything they needed to love each other and to care for everything around them. Most importantly, God gave them free will that they might freely and faithfully love Him, their Father.

God's original plan for man included perpetual happiness, perfect health, companionship, food, and dominion over His creation. It did not include pain, suffering, and death. The book of Wisdom (2:23) says, "For God formed man to be imperishable; the image of His own nature He made him." Adam and Eve were created to live in a state of "original justice:" that state where man's whole focus was on the will of God. The Book of Wisdom says in verse 24, "But by the envy of the devil, death entered the world, and they who are in his possession experience it."

God created the angels to be good, even the fallen angels. They freely chose to reject God and His reign. Their decision is irrevocable, because they stood in the presence of God and still rejected Him. Satan, the leader of these fallen angels and the "Father of Lies," tricked man into believing that he could be like God, if he simply took action on his own. Unfortunately, when Adam and Eve trusted Satan's wisdom over God's, man fell out of communion (friendship) with God. When man fell out of communion with God, he lost his immortality, his integrity, his knowledge of truth, and control over his passions. Thus, when each of us came into the world, we were not in communion with God because of the action of our first parents.

God had one expectation of Adam and Eve: total obedience to His wisdom and unimpeded love for Him. Our first parent messed up. They were given everything any man or woman could ever desire: beautiful weather and surroundings, companionship, all the water and food they needed, and a God who loved them. Yet, it wasn't enough. Satan (the Devil, the serpent, the tempter) convinced them that they would not die if they ate from the forbidden fruit of the tree in the middle of the Garden of Eden. "You certainly will not die! No, God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is bad," says Gen 3:4-5. From that very moment when Adam and Eve ignored the wisdom of God, sin and death entered the world and man was in need of a savior. Here's a key testament to the change that came over man when he first disobeyed God: before man and woman sinned, they were both naked, yet they felt no shame; after man and woman sinned, they realized they were naked and sought to cover themselves.

Saint Cyprian of Carthage wrote in 256 A.D. wrote a sermon entitled The Advantage of Patience. Here's some of his insight from that sermon. "The devil bore impatiently the fact that man was made in the image of God; and that is why he was the first to perish and the first to bring others to perdition. Adam, contrary to the heavenly command, was impatient in regard to the deadly food, and fell into death; nor did he preserve, under the guardianship of patience, the grace received from God."

Adam and Eve surrendered to temptation; and down through history men and women have continued to surrender to it. Yet, our all caring, all loving God has never and will never abandon us. Our friends and our family may abandon us, but our God will never abandon us. The Church (CCC 301) confirms that "not only did God give us being and existence, but at every moment He upholds and sustains us, enables us to act, and guides us to our final end." God is truth. He is incapable of deceiving us. Therefore, we can trust fully, always and everywhere, in God and His promises.

The Catechism (215) tells us, "The beginning of sin and of man's fall was due to a lie of the tempter who induced doubt of God's word, kindness, and faithfulness." Then the Catechism (397-98) reveals what comprised man's first sin. "Man, tempted by the devil, let his trust in his Creator die in his heart and, abusing his freedom, disobeyed God's command...In that sin man preferred himself to God and by that very act scorned Him."

The Church has taught from the beginning that God did not create man to die. Instead, man's disobedience brought not only sin but death into the world. Listen to the words of St. Methodius of Philippi who wrote the following before 300 A.D. "Man too was created without corruption...But when it came about that he transgressed the commandment, he suffered a terrible and destructive fall and was reduced to a state of death." Let's step back to an even earlier Church Father: St. Theophilus of Antioch who wrote the following around 181 A.D. "For the first man, disobedience resulted in his expulsion from Paradise. It was not as if there were any evil in the tree of knowledge; but from disobedience man drew labor, pain, grief, and, in the end, he fell prostrate in death." Now let's read CCC 1008. "Death is a consequence of sin. The Church's Magisterium, as authentic interpreter of the affirmations of Scripture and Tradition, teaches that death entered the world on account of man's sin. Even though man's nature is mortal, God had destined him not to die. Death was therefore contrary to the plans of God the Creator and entered the world as a consequence of sin. 'Bodily death, from which man would have been immune had he not sinned' is thus 'the last enemy' of man left to be conquered."

Man brought sin and death upon himself, but God did not desert him.

For more insight read CCC paragraphs 215, 301, 310-12, 324, 341, 353, 374-79, 385, 390-401, 1008, 1018. Also, pull out your "Catholic" Bible and reference Gen 1:31; 2:15-17; 3:1-24; 4:1-8; 2 Sam 7:27; Ps 119:160; Wis 1:13; 2:23-24; 11:24-26; Rom 3:23; 5:12, 19; 8:18-23; 1 Pet 5:8-9a; 1 Jn 2:16; 1 Jn 3:4, 8.