The Office of Readings for today's Solemnity of the Annunciation has a splendid passage from one of my favourite Patristic writers, St Leo the Great, who was Pope in the years 440-461. It comes from one of his letters, and combines clear and profound thought with great elegance of expression. In its reflection upon God taking Flesh it is not just immediately applicable to today's feast but to the seasons of Advent and Christmas and indeed to any point in the Christian year.
This is the online Universalis translation, which is slightly different from that version printed in the Divine Office.
| The mystery of man's reconciliation with God |
|---|
Lowliness
is assured by majesty, weakness by power, mortality by eternity. To pay
the debt of our sinful state, a nature that was incapable of suffering
was joined to one that could suffer. Thus, in keeping with the healing
that we needed, one and the same mediator between God and men, the man
Jesus Christ, was able to die in one nature, and unable to die in the
other.
He who is true God was therefore born in the complete
and perfect nature of a true man, whole in his own nature, whole in
ours. By our nature we mean what the Creator had fashioned in us from
the beginning, and took to himself in order to restore it.
For in the Saviour there was no trace of what the
deceiver introduced and man, being misled, allowed to enter. It does not
follow that because he submitted to sharing in our human weakness he
therefore shared in our sins.
He took the nature of a servant without stain of sin,
enlarging our humanity without diminishing his divinity. He emptied
himself; though invisible he made himself visible, though Creator and
Lord of all things he chose to be one of us mortal men. Yet this was the
condescension of compassion, not the loss of omnipotence. So he who in
the nature of God had created man, became in the nature of a servant,
man himself.
Thus the Son of God enters this lowly world. He comes
down from the throne of heaven, yet does not separate himself from the
Father’s glory. He is born in a new condition, by a new birth.
He was born in a new condition, for, invisible in his
own nature, he became visible in ours. Beyond our grasp, he chose to
come within our grasp. Existing before time began, he began to exist at a
moment in time. Lord of the universe, he hid his infinite glory and
took the nature of a servant. Incapable of suffering as God, he did not
refuse to be a man, capable of suffering. Immortal, he chose to be
subject to the laws of death.
He who is true God is also true man. There is no
falsehood in this unity as long as the lowliness of man and the
pre-eminence of God coexist in mutual relationship.
As God does not change by his condescension, so man is
not swallowed up by being exalted. Each nature exercises its own
activity, in communion with the other. The Word does what is proper to
the Word, the flesh fulfils what is proper to the flesh.
One nature is resplendent with miracles, the other
falls victim to injuries. As the Word does not lose equality with the
Father’s glory, so the flesh does not leave behind the nature of our
race.
One and the same person – this must be said over and
over again – is truly the Son of God and truly the son of man. He is God
in virtue of the fact that in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He is man in virtue of the fact that the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.
