“AND WAS MADE HUMAN“
(Wednesday, January 8)
“…Who for us humans and for our salvation came down from heaven, and was incarnate (σαρκωθέντα, incarnatus est) of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and was made human (καὶ ἐνανθρωπήσαντα, et homo factus est);” (Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed)
This season, we’re celebrating several historical events that draw our attention to the Great Fact of the incarnation (that the Son of God homo factus est or was made human), including the Lord’s Birth in Bethlehem and Baptism in the Jordan. The other Great Fact we are celebrating is that these events were made possible also thanks to the priestly ministry of merely-human beings, most notably of the Theotokos and John the Baptist.
Through her agreement or “Let it be,” (after initially being disturbed and asking, How can this be? etc.), the Theotokos is overshadowed or ordained by God’s grace to receive and to bring into this world the Son of God. She herself became God’s house or temple, as well as the main “housekeeper” of His temple, and one who brings out of the Most Holy Place the greatest Gifts of God – the Body and Blood of Christ, – in her priestly ministry. John the Baptist also agrees to his priestly ministry to Christ, (after initially being disturbed and asking, I need to be baptized by You, and are You coming to me?), but Christ’s words bless John to accept what needed to be done by his merely-human hands; to immerse or baptize the Son of God in the Jordan, bringing the rest of us the Epiphany or manifestation of the Triune God.
That which is humanly-done, made or performed, called in Latin a “factum,” is often regarded in modernity as something secular or religiously neutral. But the great “facts” of biblical history, ever since human beings were created and ordained in God’s image and likeness to be the “housekeepers” of the garden, elevate and connect both human being and human doing to the Author of our author-ized creativity, in our vocations. In the era of the Church, we are “authorized” in Holy Baptism to take up this new creativity, receiving a new life, a new name, and new responsibilities and privileges, as the priestly housekeepers of God’s “house.” Let me let that sink in today, although it’s a lot to take in, this beautiful season.
