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Sacred Scriptures/Liturgy- Commentary on Sunday's Readings |
"Why did god become man"
Fr. Raniero Cantalamessa, OFMCap, Pontifical Household Preacher
on the readings from the liturgy of Christmas:
Isaiah 52:7-10; Hebrews 1:1-16; John
1:1-18 .
www.zenit.org
Let us go right to the apex of the prologue of John's Gospel, which
is read at the third Mass on Christmas day.
In the Credo there is a line that on this day we recite on our
knees: "For us men and for our salvation he came down from heaven."
This is the fundamental and perennially valid answer to the question
-- "Why did the word become flesh?" -- but it needs to be understood
and integrated.
The question put another way is in fact: "Why did he become man 'for
our salvation?'" Only because we had sinned and needed to be saved?
There is a vein of the theology inaugurated by Blessed Duns Scotus,
a Franciscan theologian, which loosens a too exclusive connection to
man's sin and regards God's glory as the primary reason for the
Incarnation. "God decreed the incarnation of his Son in order to
have someone outside of him who loved him in the highest way, in a
way worthy of God."
This answer, though beautiful, is still not the definitive one. For
the Bible the most important thing is not, as it was for Greek
philosophers, that God be loved, but that God "loves" and loved
first (cf. 1 John 4:10, 19). God willed the incarnation of the Son
not so much as to have someone outside the Trinity that would love
him worthily as to have someone to love in a way worthy of him, that
is, to love without measure!
At Christmas, when the child Jesus is born, God the Father has
someone to love in an infinite way because Jesus is together man and
God. But not only Jesus, but us together with him. We are included
in this love, having become members of the body of Christ, "sons in
the Son." John's prologue reminds of this: "To those who welcomed
him he gave the power to become sons of God."
Therefore, Christ did descend from heaven "for our salvation," but
what moved him to come down for our salvation was love, nothing else
but love.
Christmas is the supreme proof of God's "philanthropy," as Scripture
calls it (Titus 3:4), that is, of God's love (philea) for man (anthropos).
John too responds to the why of the Incarnation in this way: "God so
loved the world that he gave his only Son so that whoever should
believe in him would not die but have life everlasting" (John 3:16).
So, what should be our response to the message of Christmas? The
Christmas carol "Adeste Fideles" says: "How can we not love one who
has so loved us?"
There is much that we can do to solemnize Christmas, but the truest
and most profound thing is suggested to us by these words. A sincere
thought of gratitude, a feeling of love for him who came to live
among us is the best gift we can give to the child Jesus, the most
beautiful ornament in the manger.
To be sincere, however, love needs to be translated into concrete
gestures. The simplest and most universal -- when it is pure and
innocent -- is the kiss.
Let us kiss Jesus, then, as we desire to kiss all children just
born. But let us not just kiss the statue of plaster or porcelain
but the child Jesus in flesh and blood. When we have kissed those
who are wretched, suffering, we have kissed him!
To kiss someone, in this sense, is to help in a real way, but it is
also to speak a good word, to give encouragement, to pay a visit, to
smile, and sometimes -- why not -- to give an actual kiss. These are
the most beautiful candles that we can light in our manger.
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