When God comes to dwell amongst us at His incarnation, our own human nature is swept up into His divinity …
Where, indeed, did Christ obtain humanity, if not from us, upon whom He bestowed it?
“The one who previously shared in the image of God became the sharer of his image with God,” wrote Saint Anastasios of Sinai .
The favor bestowed by mankind hardly compares with the one he receives. For Christ returns the gift of humanity with His divinity – setting the precedent of “divine righteousness” with which His infinite love rewards our own, infinitesimal one…
A secular society may find nothing to celebrate in Christmas this year due to the prohibition of parties, or more sorrowfully, to the bereavement of many.
But the earthly promised land never provided more than the weakest imagery of the heavenly one, whose everlasting tabernacles will be seen “gleaming with light above the rays of the sun,” as Saint John Chrysostom noted, “beyond what the human eye can bear to look upon …”
For Christians, therefore, the joy of the Feast finds its meaning in sorrow, for the birth of Christ means the end of death. Never a time to turn from God according to the mores of a faithless culture, the Feast of the Nativity crowns the Fast by which we offer ourselves to union with Christ – more than ever this year, as sorrow highlights the evanescence of the best this world can offer …
Wishing to be born not just in Bethlehem, but mystically within the heart of every soul, Christ restores humanity to the light it once wore as a garment.
Juxtaposing the birth of Christ with the birth of the world, the Apostle John tells us that the Word became flesh in order to enlighten men with the life whose Light shines in the darkness – and is never overcome by it.
Anastasios of Sinai thus finds a staggering reference in Genesis 3.22 to the future Incarnation of Christ. Fallen Adam having traded His raiment of Light for the flesh now subject to death, which will one day be assumed by Christ, the Holy Trinity says: “Behold, Adam is become as one of Us …”
“Temporary death remains,” said Archbishop Damianos of Sinai, “to free us from the corruption of this life by reminding us of our fall from grace.”
But tears lead to joy for Orthodox Christians, according to the “joy-producing sorrow” (χαρμολύπη) of Saint John Klimakos. Why? Because Christ is born to deliver humanity from the passions causing that corruption. Reconciling ourselves with God, with ourselves, and with other people through each of the Mysteries instituted by Christ – Baptism, Chrismation, Confession and Holy Communion – estrangement from God gives way to union with Him.
“The humanity of Christ was deified by hypostatic union with the divine nature,” wrote Vladimir Lossky . Christ’s human nature was deified by coming into contact with His divine one – and so is ours … By the grace of God, the deified humanity of Christ is passed on to everyone who seeks it – and deity knows nothing of death …
For, truth be told, it is not death that has the power to separate loved ones, but their passions. And neither would they have the power, did we not give it to them ... Egotism, jealousy, depression, avarice … these are the enemies obscuring the Nativity star guiding souls to the Life who entered this world as one of us … and to the Light that shines in the darkness – which will never overcome it …
As the soul is reunited with the body at the general resurrection, the journey toward theosis in the kingdom of heaven presupposes its passage through the “kingdom of earth,” said St. Catherine’s abbot, Archbishop Damianos: “So intrinsic to salvation is purification of the soul through earthly trials, that this sanctification begins even in the womb, where an embryo profits by the Orthodox baptism and faith of its mother.”
“In fact,” he added, “it is through this mystical union with the divine energies that the theological nature of Orthodox worship, which is simultaneously communal, distinguishes it from the solely communal worship of every other faith confessing belief in the resurrection.”
Recalling the worship of the newly-Incarnate Christ by the Forerunner John who leapt with joy when both were still embryos in their mothers’ wombs, in the light of His Eminence’s comments one finds the earthly ministry of Christ beginning, like Life itself, within the mystery of the womb …
Who can imagine the astonishment of the Powers of heaven at the inexpressible humility with which the Creator puts on His own fallen creation as a garment? Having never seen the Lord of Glory until they gaze upon Him as a newborn infant wrapped in the swaddling cloths of burial, heaven cannot remain silent.
When the angels sing “Glory to God in the highest, and upon earth peace, good will amongst men,” it is not so that indifferent humans can reverse the order, as though the “good will” of empty parties with nothing to celebrate will lead to peace on earth and salvation in heaven.
Only by glorifying God does any soul find the inner peace on earth which goes out to others as true good will amongst men.
Anyone who has placed alms in a needy hand according to God’s love for mercy knows that glorifying Him gives birth to inner peace. And that this peace spontaneously goes out to others as good will – which therefore also originates, not in our own peace, but in its source – the glorification of God.
Do the blessings of the Holy Spirit not proceed from the Father to reach us through the Son?
“Today for the sake of humankind, is seen in the flesh, the One who by nature is invisible. Therefore let us too give glory as we cry to him, ‘Glory to God in the highest and peace on earth – that peace with which your Presence has awarded us. Our Saviour, glory to you !”
True “good will amongst men” thus proceeds not from our best intentions to save the world, but only from the glorification of God who can save it, and does, when His peace reaches it through the “peace on earth” overflowing the souls of those who do His good will amongst men.