Dear Friends,
After the homily at Holy Mass, we profess our Faith by reciting the Nicene Creed. At the words, “...and by the Holy Spirit, [the Son] was incarnate of the Virgin Mary and became man.” In addition to this, there are two days every year that we kneel or genuflect while reciting these words: December 25, the celebration of Christmas, and March 25, the solemnity of the Annunciation. Why do we bow and genuflect at these words? In order to understand our actions, we should understand what we are saying. At the core of the word “incarnate” is the Latin word carne, meaning flesh. We are professing that the Son of God took on flesh from the Virgin Mary through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Perhaps our familiarity with what we profess inoculates us from being amazed at this mystery and reality. God has taken on human flesh and human nature. The immortal God has taken on mortality. The eternal God has entered into time. The God of light has entered into a dark world. The perfect God has entered into a sinful world. The God of love has entered into a realm of selfishness. In Jesus Christ, divinity and humanity meet; Jesus is God in the flesh.
More or less, we take these statements and realities for granted; we don't even think about them, and yet, serious theological debate and arguments were waged in the early Church in order to better explain the divine person of Jesus Christ. At the Council of Nicea in 325A.D., St. Athanasius vigorously defended and reinforced the divinity of Christ. At the Council of Ephesus in 431A.D., St. Cyril of Alexandria promoted Mary as the Theotokos, a Greek word meaning the Mother of God. This declaration emphasized that Mary gave birth to a divine Person and not simply the human nature of Jesus. Around the time of the Council of Chalcedon in 451A.D., Pope St. Leo the Great taught that Jesus is consubstantial—of the same substance, of the same being—with God by virtue of being the Son, of being divine and that Jesus is consubstantial with humanity by virtue of being given flesh by the Virgin Mary. He is one person with two natures: human and divine. Jesus is fully human, with a human body, human mind, human will, and He is fully God, with a divine mind and divine will.
This is amazing, and when we ponder this mystery, it should lead to awe. This is why we bow, this is why we genuflect when professing “...and by the Holy Spirit, [the Son] was incarnate of the Virgin Mary and became man.” God humbled Himself to the point of sending His Son, who took on our flesh and our nature, and therefore, we humble ourselves before God by bowing and genuflecting.
On this upcoming Thursday, March 25, we celebrate the liturgical solemnity of the Annunciation. We celebrate the Archangel Gabriel announcing to Mary that she is favored, full of grace and that God has chosen her to be the mother of the Son of God, of the Savior. We celebrate Mary's unconditional yes to God: “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.” We believe that with Mary's “yes,” she conceived through the power of the Holy Spirit, that “Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” With this solemnity of the Annunciation, we genuflect at the words of Nicene Creed because we celebrate that the Son of God has entered into the world in a concrete and real way. It is a day to celebrate, a day to relax our Lenten penances, and thank God for sending His Son.
We are saints under construction, imitating Mary's yes and celebrating that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Have a great week! God bless you!
In Christ,
Fr. Matt