Jesus, Mercy Incarnate

Dina (1897-1929) was a holy soul of Quebec who had similar experiences: On Christmas night, during my thanksgiving after Holy Communion, I was inundated with divine consolations….After receiving the Sacred Host, I seemed to be suddenly transported to Bethlehem like the shepherds on that first Christmas night. Our Lady held up to me the Infant Jesus who gave me a kiss of loving tenderness, and His Heart communed with mine…. The joys of Heaven of which God sometimes gives us a foretaste can be felt but they cannot be described. 9 Admittedly, this Christological tradition stemming from St. Isaac the Syrian, St. Maximus the Confessor and Bl. John Duns Scotus is purely speculative, with no clear scriptural or magisterial warrant. Nevertheless, the theory does not contradict the definitive teachings of the Church regarding the state of “original righteousness” of Adam and Eve. The Catechism seems to leave the door open to a continuation of this Scotist- Eastern view in section no. 374 by stating that Adam’s state of original holiness and justice late would be “surpassed” by the glory of the “new creation” in Christ. Thus, it may be that even an unfallen race would have been capable of further sanctification and exaltation through communion with the IncarnateWord. This would seem to cohere alsowith the witness of St. Ireneus, who held that even thoughAdam before the fall possessed many supernatural gifts from the Holy Spirit, he still needed to grow and develop from the created “image” to the full “likeness” of God. On St. Ireneus, see Kelly, Early Christian Doctrine, 171. On the eastern Fathers seeKallistosWare, TheOrthodoxWay (London:Mowbray, 1979), 92-93: The Incarnation of Christ, looked at in this way, effects more then a reversal of the Fall, more then a restoration of man to his original state in Paradise. When God becomes man, this marks the beginning of an essentially new stage in the history of man, and not just a return to the past. The Incarnation raises man to a new level: the last state is higher than the first. Only in Jesus Christ do we see revealed the full possibilities of our human nature; until he is born, the true implications of our personhood are still hidden from us. Christ’s birth, as St. Basil puts it, is “the birthday of the whole human race;” Christ is the first perfect man—perfect, that is to say, not just in a potential sense [the 36 Jesus, Mercy Incarnate