Defending the Faith, Session 17
The Incarnation, the mystery of Jesus Christ, and the salvation of humanity
Opening Prayer
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
Lord Jesus Christ,
eternal Son of the Father,
You became man for our salvation.
You entered the world You created,
shared our human life,
and took upon Yourself our weakness, suffering, and death.
Open our minds to the mystery of Your Incarnation.
Help us to believe that You are truly God and truly man.
Teach us to recognise the depth of Your love,
to follow Your example of holiness,
and to receive the salvation You came to bring.
Amen.
Introduction
Throughout this series, we have been asking some of the questions Catholics are often asked.
We began with the most important question:
Why be Catholic?
We saw that Catholic faith begins with Jesus Christ.
We then considered the Church He founded, the authority He gave to the Apostles, the Scriptures, the sacraments, and the life of grace.
We have also asked difficult questions about suffering, death, prayer, and how God acts in the world.
In our last session, we considered the sacraments and saw that they are not simply religious ceremonies. They are actions of Christ through which He gives us His grace.
But all of this rests upon an even deeper truth.
Jesus Christ is God made man.
And so we come to our next question:
Why did God become man?
This is not merely a Christmas question.
It is not simply about the birth of a baby in Bethlehem.
It is one of the central questions of Christianity.
Why would the eternal Son of God become a human being?
Why would the Creator enter His own creation?
Why would the One who made the stars be born as a helpless child?
Why would the Lord of heaven experience hunger, tiredness, rejection, suffering, and death?
Could God not have saved us in some other way?
Why did He not simply forgive everyone from heaven?
And if Jesus was truly God, how could He also be truly human?
These are serious questions.
Some people believe Jesus was a good man, but not God.
Others believe He was a prophet or a particularly holy teacher.
Some say that God could never become human because God is too great.
Others imagine that Jesus was partly divine and partly human.
And some Christians believe in Jesus without ever having considered what the Incarnation really means.
But the Catholic faith makes an extraordinary claim.
The eternal Son of God became truly man without ceasing to be truly God.
He did not simply appear human.
He did not become a second, lesser god.
He did not surrender His divinity.
And He was not simply an ordinary man upon whom God placed special favour.
He is Jesus Christ.
True God.
True man.
One divine Person.
Our Lord and Saviour.
And He became man for us.
That is what we need to understand.
1. The Incarnation is at the heart of Christianity
The word Incarnation means that the Son of God took human nature.
Saint John expresses it in one of the most important sentences in the whole Bible:
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” (John 1:14)
Think about those words.
The Word became flesh.
The eternal Word through whom all things were made became man.
Not merely a messenger from God.
Not simply a representative of God.
God Himself, the eternal Son, entered human history.
This is what makes Christianity so extraordinary.
We do not merely believe that God sent us a message.
We believe that God came to us personally.
He did not remain distant.
He did not simply send instructions from heaven.
He did not merely raise up another prophet.
He came Himself.
The God who created the universe entered the world as one of us.
The One who gives life to every creature received human life in the womb of the Virgin Mary.
The One who sustains creation was carried in His mother’s arms.
The One whom angels worship was laid in a manger.
This is astonishing.
And it is easy to become so familiar with the Christmas story that we forget how astonishing it is.
We see the crib.
We sing carols.
We hear about shepherds and angels.
But what is actually being proclaimed?
That the eternal Son of God has become man.
That the Creator has entered creation.
That God has come to save us.
The Church expresses this mystery in the Nicene Creed.
For us and for our salvation, the Son of God came down from heaven, was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary, and became man.
Those words are not decorative.
They are a declaration about who Jesus is.
The Incarnation is not an optional Catholic belief.
It is at the centre of the Christian faith.
2. Jesus did not begin to exist at Bethlehem
This is an important distinction.
Sometimes people imagine that Jesus began to exist when He was conceived in Mary’s womb.
That is not Catholic teaching.
The eternal Son of God has always existed.
He is not a creature.
He did not come into existence at a particular moment.
He is eternally begotten of the Father.
That is why the Creed calls Him:
“God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God.”
And then:
“Begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father.”
Those words matter.
They mean that the Son shares the one divine nature with the Father.
He is not a lesser god.
He is not an angel.
He is not the first creature God made.
He is God.
One God with the Father and the Holy Spirit.
When the Incarnation took place, the Son did not begin to exist.
He began to exist as man.
He assumed a human nature.
What He had always been — God — He remained.
What He had not previously been — man — He became.
This does not mean the Father became man.
Nor does it mean the Holy Spirit became man.
It is the eternal Son, the second Person of the Blessed Trinity, who became incarnate.
The whole Trinity acts inseparably in the work of salvation, but the Son alone assumed human nature.
This is important because we must never confuse the Persons of the Trinity.
The Father sends the Son.
The Son becomes man.
The Holy Spirit brings about the conception of Christ in the womb of the Virgin Mary.
One God.
Three divine Persons.
And one of those Persons, the eternal Son, becomes truly human.
3. Jesus is truly God and truly man
This is perhaps the most important doctrine to understand in this session.
Jesus is not half God and half man.
He is not a mixture of divinity and humanity.
He is not sometimes God and sometimes man.
He is not a human person with a divine person living alongside Him.
He is one divine Person, the eternal Son of God, possessing two natures.
A divine nature.
And a human nature.
Both complete.
Both real.
United without confusion or separation.
The Church had to defend this truth very carefully in the early centuries.
Some people denied that Jesus was truly God.
Others denied that He was truly human.
Some imagined that His humanity was merely an appearance.
Others divided Him into two persons.
The Church rejected these errors.
At the Council of Chalcedon in 451, the Church solemnly taught that Jesus Christ is truly God and truly man, one and the same Lord, in two natures.
Why does this matter?
Because if Jesus were only human, He would not be the divine Saviour.
He might be a great teacher.
He might be a prophet.
He might be a moral example.
But He would not be God Himself coming to save us.
And if Jesus were not truly human, He would not have shared our human condition.
His suffering would not be truly human suffering.
His obedience would not be truly human obedience.
His death would not be a true human death.
The Incarnation would become a kind of performance.
But the Church teaches something far greater.
The Son of God truly became one of us.
He had a human body.
A human soul.
A human mind.
A human will.
A human heart.
He experienced hunger.
He experienced tiredness.
He experienced sorrow.
He experienced physical pain.
He experienced human friendship.
He experienced rejection.
He truly suffered.
He truly died.
Yet He never ceased to be God.
This is not easy to understand.
It is a mystery beyond our full comprehension.
But mystery does not mean nonsense.
The Church is not claiming that Jesus is both God and not God in the same respect.
She is saying that the one divine Person possesses both divine and human natures.
Jesus Christ is fully God and fully man.
Nothing less.
And nothing else.
4. Jesus was like us in everything except sin
Sometimes people ask:
“If Jesus was God, was His human life really like ours?”
The answer is yes.
Jesus experienced real human life.
Saint Luke tells us that Jesus grew in wisdom and stature.
He learned and developed according to His human nature.
He lived within a family.
He experienced the ordinary demands of human existence.
He worked.
He prayed.
He listened.
He spoke.
He walked long distances.
He became tired.
He knew hunger and thirst.
He loved His friends.
He wept at the tomb of Lazarus.
He experienced anguish in Gethsemane.
His humanity was not imaginary.
But there is one essential difference.
Jesus was without sin.
The Letter to the Hebrews tells us that He was tested as we are, yet without sin.
That does not make Him less human.
It makes Him the perfect man.
We sometimes behave as though sin is simply part of being human.
As though a person cannot really be human without selfishness, lust, dishonesty, pride, or rebellion.
But sin is not what makes us human.
Sin damages our humanity.
Adam and Eve were created good.
They did not become more human by sinning.
They became wounded.
Jesus shows us humanity as God intended it to be.
Perfectly obedient.
Perfectly loving.
Perfectly truthful.
Perfectly free.
Perfectly united to the Father.
He was not less human because He never sinned.
He was humanity without the wound of sin.
And that is why He can heal us.
He is not simply another wounded sinner trying to rescue wounded sinners.
He is the sinless Saviour who enters our condition in order to restore it.
5. Why did we need God to become man?
Now we come to the heart of the question.
Why did God become man?
The first answer is:
To save us from sin and reconcile us with God.
We have already considered the reality of sin and our need for grace.
But think about the situation more deeply.
Humanity was created for communion with God.
We were created to know Him.
To love Him.
To live in His friendship.
To share His life.
But sin wounded that communion.
We turned away from God.
We became subject to death.
Our nature was wounded.
Our wills became weakened.
Our desires became disordered.
We could not restore ourselves to supernatural life by our own power.
Humanity needed salvation.
Not merely advice.
Not merely encouragement.
Not simply another set of commandments.
We needed a Saviour.
A teacher can show us what is right.
But teaching alone cannot remove sin.
A prophet can call us to repentance.
But no prophet can redeem the world by his own natural power.
A moral example can inspire us.
But inspiration alone cannot give us sanctifying grace.
We needed more.
And so the Son of God became man.
He entered the human condition to redeem it.
He came not merely to explain the way to the Father.
He came to be the Way.
Not merely to speak about life.
He came to give life.
Not merely to describe salvation.
He came to accomplish it.
This is why Jesus is not simply another religious founder.
He does not merely point towards salvation.
He is the Saviour.
6. Jesus is the one Mediator between God and humanity
There is another way of understanding the Incarnation.
Saint Paul calls Jesus Christ the one Mediator between God and humanity.
What is a mediator?
A mediator brings together those who are separated.
Sin had wounded our communion with God.
And humanity could not heal that separation by its own power.
But in Jesus Christ, something unique happens.
He is truly God.
And He is truly man.
He belongs fully to the divine life.
And He has fully assumed our human nature.
In His one Person, God and humanity are united.
He does not stand between God and humanity as a third party who is neither.
He is both truly divine and truly human.
And so He is uniquely able to reconcile humanity with God.
This is a deep mystery.
But the essential point is simple.
Jesus is not simply speaking for God.
He is God.
And He is not simply speaking about humanity.
He is man.
He stands before the Father as the obedient Son who has truly assumed our nature.
His human obedience is real.
His human love is real.
His human sacrifice is real.
And because the acting Person is the eternal Son of God, His saving work has a unique and inexhaustible worth.
This is why no ordinary human being could simply take His place.
The Incarnation is not merely God sending help.
It is God Himself coming to rescue us.
7. Jesus is the new Adam
Saint Paul gives us another important way to understand why Christ became man.
He speaks of Jesus as the new Adam.
What does that mean?
Adam stands at the beginning of humanity’s fallen history.
Through human disobedience, sin and death entered the human condition.
But Jesus Christ begins a new humanity.
Where Adam disobeyed, Christ obeyed.
Where Adam turned away from God, Christ remained perfectly faithful.
Where humanity fell through pride, Christ humbled Himself.
Where sin brought death, Christ opened the way to life.
This is especially important.
Jesus did not simply come to cancel a punishment.
He came to restore humanity.
He came to heal what sin had wounded.
He came to begin a new creation.
In the Letter to the Philippians, Saint Paul describes Christ’s humility.
Although He was in the form of God, He took the form of a servant and became obedient even to death on a Cross.
Think about that contrast.
Human sin often says:
“I will not serve.”
Christ says:
“Your will be done.”
Human pride grasps.
Christ gives.
Human selfishness refuses love.
Christ loves to the end.
The obedience of Jesus is not merely an example.
It is part of His saving work.
He offers to the Father the perfect human obedience that fallen humanity had failed to give.
And He does this for us.
The new Adam comes to restore what the old Adam lost.
That is why salvation is not simply God pretending that sin never happened.
It is God making humanity new in Christ.
8. God became man to show us His love
The Catechism gives another reason for the Incarnation.
The Word became flesh so that we might know God’s love.
This is beautiful.
Because many people have a distorted image of God.
Some imagine God as distant.
Others imagine Him as harsh.
Some think He is mainly interested in punishment.
Others think He is indifferent to suffering.
Some think they must earn His attention.
Others feel that God could never truly love them.
But then we look at Jesus Christ.
We see Him touching lepers.
We see Him welcoming children.
We see Him speaking with sinners.
We see Him defending the vulnerable.
We see Him feeding the hungry.
We see Him weeping with those who grieve.
We see Him forgiving those who repent.
We see Him praying for those who crucify Him.
And we begin to understand something extraordinary.
This is not simply a good man teaching us about God’s love.
This is God’s own Son revealing divine love through His human life.
Jesus says:
“He who has seen me has seen the Father.” (John 14:9)
Of course, the Father did not become incarnate.
Jesus does not mean that He and the Father are the same Person.
He means that He perfectly reveals the Father.
The love we see in Jesus comes from the heart of God.
The mercy we see in Jesus reveals God’s mercy.
The holiness we see in Jesus reveals God’s holiness.
The truth we hear from Jesus is God’s truth.
Sometimes people imagine Jesus as loving but the Father as angry.
As though Jesus came to persuade a cruel God to become merciful.
That is wrong.
The Father loves us.
The Son loves us.
The Holy Spirit loves us.
The work of salvation comes from the love of the Blessed Trinity.
The Father sends the Son because He loves the world.
The Son freely offers Himself because He loves us.
The Holy Spirit brings the saving work of Christ into our lives.
The Incarnation is not Jesus protecting us from a Father who does not love us.
It is God revealing how deeply He has loved us from the beginning.
9. God became man to show us how to live
The Incarnation also gives us the perfect model of holiness.
This is another reason taught by the Catechism.
God did not merely tell humanity to be holy.
In Jesus Christ, He showed us holiness lived in a truly human life.
We sometimes imagine holiness as something strange.
Something reserved for priests, monks, nuns, or unusually religious people.
But Jesus shows us that holiness is the fulfilment of human life.
He prayed.
He worked.
He loved.
He obeyed.
He served.
He forgave.
He spoke the truth.
He resisted temptation.
He cared for the poor.
He gave Himself for others.
He placed the Father’s will before His own human comfort.
This is what holiness looks like.
And notice something important.
Jesus does not simply command:
“Love your enemies.”
He forgives His enemies.
He does not merely command:
“Pray.”
He prays.
He does not merely command humility.
He washes the feet of His disciples.
He does not merely speak about sacrifice.
He gives His life.
Christ is both our Saviour and our example.
We must keep those truths together.
If Jesus were only an example, Christianity would become another moral system.
We would admire Him, try to imitate Him, and eventually discover that our strength was not enough.
But because He is our Saviour, He also gives grace to make imitation possible.
He does not simply say:
“Become holy.”
He says:
“Follow Me.”
And He gives the Holy Spirit to help us.
This is why Christian holiness is not self-improvement.
It is becoming like Christ through grace.
10. God became man so that we might share in divine life
Here we reach perhaps the most astonishing purpose of the Incarnation.
God became man not only to forgive us.
Not only to rescue us from death.
Not only to teach us.
Not only to show us love.
He became man so that we might share in God’s own life.
Saint Peter speaks of becoming partakers of the divine nature.
The Fathers of the Church loved this teaching.
Saint Athanasius expressed it in a famous way: the Son of God became man so that we might be made divine.
What does that mean?
It does not mean that human beings become gods by nature.
It does not mean we become equal to the Blessed Trinity.
It does not mean we cease to be creatures.
God alone is God by nature.
But through grace, we are made children of God.
We are given a real participation in His life.
We are adopted into the family of the Father.
We become temples of the Holy Spirit.
We are joined to Christ.
This connects directly with what we have already learned about grace.
Sanctifying grace is not merely a favourable opinion God has of us.
It is a real sharing in divine life.
And the Incarnation makes that sharing possible within God’s saving plan.
The eternal Son became man so that human beings might become children of God through Him.
Think about that.
The Son of God took our human nature.
And through Him, we are invited into communion with divine life.
We do not become divine by nature.
We become sharers in divine life by grace.
That is the dignity of the Christian vocation.
God did not become man simply to make us slightly better behaved.
He came to make us holy.
To make us His children.
To bring us into communion with the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit.
To prepare us for eternal life.
The Incarnation tells us how great our destiny is.
We were not made merely to survive.
We were made for God.
11. Why was Jesus born of the Virgin Mary?
The Incarnation also brings us to the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Why does the Church insist that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary?
Because this is part of the truth about who Jesus is.
Jesus did not become the Son of God later in life.
He did not begin as an ordinary human being who was gradually promoted to divine status.
From the first moment of His human conception, the Person conceived in Mary’s womb was the eternal Son of God.
His conception was brought about by the power of the Holy Spirit.
He had no human father.
But He received a real human nature from Mary.
He was truly her child.
He was truly born.
He belonged to a human family.
He entered human history.
That is why Catholics call Mary the Mother of God.
We have already considered this when speaking about Our Lady and the saints.
But it is worth remembering the essential distinction.
Mary did not create the divine nature.
She did not exist before God.
She is not the origin of the Trinity.
She is the mother of Jesus Christ, who is one divine Person.
And because the child she bore is God the Son made man, she is rightly called Mother of God.
That title protects the truth about Jesus.
It does not make Mary divine.
It proclaims that the One born of her is truly God.
And Mary’s response also matters.
At the Annunciation, she gives her faithful consent to God’s invitation.
She says yes.
Her yes is free, obedient, humble, and trusting.
She receives the Word of God in faith.
And through the power of the Holy Spirit, the Word becomes flesh in her womb.
The salvation of the world enters human history through the humility of a woman who trusted God.
That should make us think.
God’s greatest work begins without worldly power.
Without public spectacle.
Without human ambition.
In hiddenness.
In humility.
In faith.
12. Why did God come as a baby?
We should not pass too quickly over this question.
Why a baby?
Why Bethlehem?
Why poverty?
Why an ordinary family?
Why not arrive in visible glory, surrounded by angels, demanding the obedience of the whole world?
Because God’s way of saving us reveals His humility and love.
The eternal Son of God chose to become vulnerable.
He allowed Himself to be carried.
Fed.
Clothed.
Protected.
He experienced human dependence.
He grew within a family.
He lived much of His earthly life in hiddenness.
Think about that.
For most of His earthly life, Jesus was not publicly preaching or performing miracles.
He lived the ordinary life of Nazareth.
He grew.
He worked.
He obeyed Mary and Joseph.
He shared in the daily rhythms of family and community.
This tells us something important about ordinary human life.
Ordinary life is not meaningless.
Work can be holy.
Family life can be holy.
Obedience can be holy.
Hidden service can be holy.
Growing old can be holy.
Caring for others can be holy.
Faithfulness when no one notices can be holy.
Jesus did not despise ordinary life.
He lived it.
And the fact that He came as a child should also shape how we regard human life.
A child is not valuable only when independent.
A sick person is not valuable only when productive.
An elderly person is not valuable only when useful.
Human dignity does not depend on strength, intelligence, wealth, health, or independence.
The Son of God entered the world in vulnerability.
He sanctified human life by truly sharing it.
The Incarnation should therefore deepen our reverence for every human person.
Especially the weak.
The unborn.
The sick.
The elderly.
The disabled.
The forgotten.
Those who cannot defend themselves.
Because the Son of God chose to become one of us.
13. Why did the Incarnation lead to the Cross?
Now we must face another difficult question.
If God became man out of love, why did Jesus have to suffer and die?
Why the Cross?
Could God not simply have forgiven humanity from heaven?
We must be careful here.
God is almighty.
He is not bound by some law above Himself that forces Him to save us in only one conceivable way.
Catholic theology recognises that God freely chose the manner of our redemption.
But the way He chose is wonderfully fitting.
Through the Incarnation and the Cross, God reveals the seriousness of sin and the greatness of His mercy.
Sin is not a small thing.
It wounds communion with God.
It damages human life.
It brings disorder and death.
God does not save us by pretending evil does not matter.
Nor does He abandon sinners to their own destruction.
Instead, the Son becomes man and freely offers Himself for our salvation.
Jesus takes upon Himself the consequences of human sin.
He enters suffering.
He experiences rejection.
He submits to an unjust death.
And He offers His life to the Father in perfect love and obedience.
We must never imagine the Cross as though an angry Father punished an unwilling Son.
That would divide the Trinity.
The Father and the Son are not opposed in their love for us.
The saving work of Christ flows from the one divine will of the Blessed Trinity.
The Son freely becomes man.
And in His true human will, He obediently offers Himself to the Father.
This is why Gethsemane matters.
Jesus genuinely experiences the anguish of approaching death.
His suffering is real.
His humanity is real.
Yet He freely submits His human will in perfect obedience to the Father’s saving plan.
“Not my will, but yours, be done.”
There is no sin in that human anguish.
There is perfect love and obedience.
And on the Cross, the Son of God truly suffers and dies according to His human nature.
His divine nature does not cease to exist.
God does not stop being God.
But the suffering is truly the suffering of the divine Person who has become man.
The death is truly His human death.
That is why the Cross has such extraordinary significance.
It is not merely the death of a brave man.
It is the self-offering of the incarnate Son of God.
The One who dies for us is truly man.
The One who saves us is truly God.
And His sacrifice is the supreme revelation of divine love.
The Cross is not God giving up on humanity. It is God going to the very depths of human suffering in order to redeem humanity.
14. The Incarnation does not end at the Resurrection
This is another important truth.
Sometimes people imagine that Jesus became human temporarily.
As though He borrowed a human body for thirty-three years, completed His work, and then returned to being only God.
That is not Catholic teaching.
The Son of God truly assumed human nature.
And He remains the incarnate Son for ever.
Jesus did not abandon His humanity after the Resurrection.
He rose bodily.
He appeared to His disciples.
He showed them His wounds.
He ate with them.
He ascended into heaven in His glorified humanity.
He remains truly God and truly man.
This is astonishing.
Our humanity, assumed by the eternal Son, is now glorified in heaven.
Jesus Christ, the one Mediator, lives for ever.
The Incarnation is not a brief visit from God.
It is an enduring union of God and human nature in the Person of Christ.
We will consider the Resurrection more fully in our next session.
But for now, remember this.
The child born at Bethlehem is the same Lord who died on Calvary.
The same Lord who rose from the tomb.
The same Lord who ascended to the Father.
And the same Lord who will come again in glory.
One Jesus Christ.
True God.
True man.
For ever.
15. How the Incarnation changes Catholic life
The Incarnation is not simply a doctrine to be studied.
It changes how we live.
First, it changes how we see God.
God is not distant or indifferent.
He has come close to us in Jesus Christ.
Secondly, it changes how we see ourselves.
Human nature is not something worthless.
God created it good.
And the Son of God assumed it.
Our bodies matter.
Our choices matter.
Our suffering matters.
Our relationships matter.
Our eternal destiny matters.
Thirdly, it changes how we pray.
We do not pray to a God who has never entered human life.
We pray through Jesus Christ, who is truly man as well as truly God.
He knows hunger.
He knows grief.
He knows suffering.
He knows rejection.
He knows the weight of human life.
And He brings our humanity before the Father.
Fourthly, it changes how we treat other people.
If God became man, we cannot despise human life.
We cannot treat the poor as disposable.
We cannot treat the weak as burdens.
We cannot treat the sick as useless.
We cannot treat children as interruptions.
We cannot treat the elderly as people whose value has passed.
Every person possesses dignity because every person is created in the image of God.
And the Incarnation gives us an even deeper appreciation of that dignity.
Fifthly, it changes how we understand worship and the sacraments.
We have already considered that Christ gives grace through visible signs.
This makes sense within a faith centred on the Incarnation.
The Son of God really entered our material world.
And He continues to reach us through the sacramental life of His Church.
The Incarnation does not make the sacraments less mysterious.
It helps us understand why God would choose to give spiritual grace through the material world He made.
And finally, the Incarnation changes how we understand holiness.
We do not need to flee ordinary human life in order to follow Christ.
We need to live ordinary human life in communion with Him.
A mother caring for a child.
A father working faithfully.
A young person resisting temptation.
An elderly person offering prayer.
A sick person trusting Christ.
A parishioner visiting someone lonely.
A priest celebrating Mass reverently.
A Catholic quietly persevering in faith.
These ordinary things can become holy through grace.
Because the Son of God has entered human life.
He has not made ordinary life meaningless.
He has opened it towards heaven.
16. How to answer this simply
So if someone asks:
“Why did God become man?”
You might say:
“God became man to save us from sin, reveal His love, show us how to live, and bring us into communion with His divine life.”
If someone asks:
“Was Jesus really God?”
You can say:
“Yes. Jesus is the eternal Son of God, true God from true God. He became truly man without ceasing to be God.”
If someone asks:
“Was Jesus really human?”
You can say:
“Yes. He had a real human body, soul, mind, and will. He experienced genuine human life, suffering, and death, but without sin.”
If someone says:
“Surely God cannot become a man?”
You can say:
“God did not cease to be God or change His divine nature into a human one. The eternal Son freely assumed a complete human nature, remaining truly God.”
If someone asks:
“Why did Jesus need to die?”
You can say:
“Christ freely gave His life to reconcile us with God. His Cross reveals both the seriousness of sin and the greatness of God’s love.”
If someone asks:
“Why didn’t God just send another prophet?”
You can say:
“Because Jesus came to do more than teach. He came to save. He is not merely another messenger from God. He is God the Son made man.”
If someone asks:
“Why do Catholics call Mary the Mother of God?”
You can say:
“Because the child she bore is Jesus Christ, who is truly God. Mary is not the origin of His divinity, but she is truly the mother of the divine Person who became man.”
If someone asks:
“Did Jesus stop being human after the Resurrection?”
You can say:
“No. Jesus rose bodily and ascended into heaven. He remains true God and true man for ever.”
Simple answers are often best.
We do not need to explain every theological detail in a single conversation.
But we should know what the Church teaches.
And we should be able to speak about it calmly and confidently.
17. What this asks of us
If God became man, then the Incarnation should affect the whole of our Christian life.
It should deepen our faith in Jesus.
It should increase our gratitude.
It should strengthen our trust.
It should make us more reverent towards human life.
It should make us more serious about sin.
It should give us greater hope in suffering.
It should draw us towards prayer and the sacraments.
And it should inspire us to imitate Christ.
Each of us can ask:
Do I truly believe that Jesus Christ is God made man?
Or do I sometimes treat Him as merely a good teacher?
Do I believe that He came personally to save me?
Do I understand that His humanity was real?
Do I trust Him with my suffering?
Do I recognise His humility?
Do I seek to imitate His obedience, charity, and holiness?
Do I treat other human beings with the dignity that belongs to them?
Do I remember that God has called me not merely to be respectable, but to share His life through grace?
And perhaps one question matters most of all.
If the Son of God humbled Himself to become man for my salvation, how can I refuse to humble myself before Him?
God did not consider our salvation beneath Him.
He came to us.
He entered our world.
He shared our life.
He gave Himself for us.
The proper Christian response is not merely admiration.
It is faith.
Repentance.
Gratitude.
Worship.
Obedience.
Love.
And the desire to become holy.
Conclusion
So why did God become man?
The Catholic answer is extraordinary.
The eternal Son of God became truly human without ceasing to be truly divine.
He was conceived by the Holy Spirit.
Born of the Virgin Mary.
He lived a real human life.
He experienced human weakness without sin.
He revealed the Father’s love.
He showed us perfect holiness.
He entered our suffering.
He gave Himself for our salvation.
He reconciled us with God.
He opened the way for us to become children of God through grace.
And He remains our incarnate Lord and Saviour for ever.
God did not become man because humanity was already holy.
He came because humanity needed salvation.
God did not become man merely to give us better information.
He came to give us new life.
God did not become man simply to show us that He understood human suffering.
He came to redeem us through His death and Resurrection.
And God did not become man to make us gods by nature.
He came so that, through grace, we might share in His divine life.
So we do not say:
“Jesus was merely a good teacher.”
We say:
“Jesus Christ is the eternal Son of God made man.”
We do not say:
“God only appeared to be human.”
We say:
“He became truly man, like us in all things except sin.”
We do not say:
“Jesus came simply to improve the world.”
We say:
“He came to save the world.”
And we do not say:
“The Incarnation is only a Christmas story.”
We say:
“The Incarnation is the mystery of God’s love entering human history for our salvation.”
To summarise, remember these three simple answers.
Why did God become man?
Because humanity needed a Saviour.
Because God wished to reveal His love and show us the way of holiness.
Because through Christ we are invited to share in the very life of God.
If you remember nothing else, remember this:
The Son of God became man so that humanity might be saved, healed, and brought into communion with God.
And perhaps each of us should ask:
Do I really understand what God has done for me in Jesus Christ?
Because at the heart of our faith is not merely a message from heaven.
It is the Lord of heaven Himself.
Born of Mary.
Crucified for us.
Risen in glory.
And calling us to eternal life.
Amen.
Q&A after Session 17
- What does Incarnation mean?
- Why did God become man instead of simply forgiving humanity from heaven?
- Was Jesus God before He was born?
- How can Jesus be fully God and fully man?
- Did Jesus have a human mind and human will?
- Why was Jesus without sin?
- Why do Catholics call Mary the Mother of God?
- What does it mean that Jesus is the new Adam?
- Why does the Incarnation lead to the Cross?
- Did Jesus remain human after the Resurrection?
- What does it mean to share in the divine nature?
- How should belief in the Incarnation change our daily lives?
Closing Prayer
Lord Jesus Christ,
eternal Son of the Father,
You became man for us and for our salvation.
You humbled Yourself
to share our human life.
You came not merely to teach us,
but to save us.
You revealed the Father’s love,
showed us the way of holiness,
and opened the path to eternal life.
Increase our faith in Your divinity.
Deepen our gratitude for Your humanity.
Teach us to follow Your humility,
to imitate Your obedience,
and to love as You have loved.
May the Holy Spirit unite us more deeply to You,
so that, through Your grace,
we may become the children of God
You came to make us.
Amen.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
Scripture and Catholic Teaching for Further Study
Sacred Scripture
- John 1:1–18 — The eternal Word became flesh.
- Luke 1:26–38 — The Annunciation and the Virgin Mary’s consent.
- Luke 2:1–52 — The birth and childhood of Jesus.
- John 14:9 — Christ reveals the Father.
- Romans 5:12–21 — Adam and Christ.
- Philippians 2:5–11 — The humility and obedience of Christ.
- Galatians 4:4–7 — God sent His Son so that we might receive adoption.
- Hebrews 2:14–18 — Christ shared our humanity to overcome death.
- Hebrews 4:14–16 — Christ is like us in all things except sin.
- 2 Peter 1:4 — Sharing in the divine nature.
Catechism of the Catholic Church
- §§456–460 — Why the Word became flesh.
- §§461–463 — The Incarnation.
- §§464–469 — True God and true man.
- §§470–478 — The true humanity of Christ.
- §§484–511 — Conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary.
- §§512–534 — The mysteries of Christ’s earthly life.
- §§599–618 — Christ’s saving death and sacrifice.
