330. Since the goal of creation is a heaven from the human race (and therefore the human race itself), the intermediate goals are everything else that has been created. Because these do relate to us, they focus on these three aspects of us: our bodies, our rational functioning, and, for the sake of our union with the Lord, our spiritual functioning. We cannot be united to the Lord unless we are spiritual; we cannot be spiritual unless we are rational; and we cannot be rational unless we are physically whole. These aspects are like a house, with the body as its foundation, the structure of the house as our rational functioning, and the contents of the house as our spiritual functioning. Living in the house is union with the Lord.

This enables us to see the sequence, level, and focus of the relationship to us of the useful functions that are intermediate goals of creation. That is, they are for the support of our bodies, for the development of our rational ability, and for our acceptance of what is spiritual from the Lord.

57. What has been said of heaven can be said of the Church, for the Church is the Lord's heaven on earth. There are also many Churches, and yet any one of them is called the Church and indeed is a Church, so far as the good of love and of faith rules there. There again, the Lord out of diversity makes a unity, thus, one Church out of many Churches. ¹ The same, too, can be said of the man of the Church in particular as is said of the Church in general, namely, that the Church is within a man and not outside him, and that every man in whom the Lord is present in the good of love and of faith is a Church. ² Again, the same can be said of a man in whom is the Church as of an angel in whom is heaven, namely, that he is a Church in least form as an angel is heaven in least form, and furthermore, that a man in whom is the Church, equally with an angel, is a heaven. For man has been created that he may come into heaven and become an angel. Consequently, he who has good from the Lord is an angel-man. ³ It may be mentioned what a man has in common with an angel and what he has in addition to what angels have. A man has this in common with an angel, that his interiors are equally conformed to the image of heaven and that he, too, in so far as he is in the good of love and faith, may become an image of heaven. In addition to what angels have, a man has these things, that his exteriors have been formed according to the image of the world, that so far as he is in good, the world with him is subordinated to heaven and serves heaven, ⁴ and that then the Lord is present with him in both worlds, just as if he were in his heaven. For the Lord is in His Divine order in both worlds, since God is order. ⁵

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