The Word Was Made Flesh
December 25, 2006

Readings for the Solemnity of Christmas (Mass During the Day)

Reading 1: Is. 52:7–10

Responsorial Psalm: Ps. 98:1, 2–3, 3–4, 5–6

Reading 2: Heb. 1:1–6

Gospel: Jn. 1:1–18

Link to Readings

By Father Wade Menezes, C.P.M.

Aim: (1) to explain “the Word” as the Second Person of the Trinity; (2) to explain the theological meaning of Christmas and the benefits for our life of the Incarnation.

Today’s liturgy for the solemnity of Christmas places a profound emphasis on the Word being made flesh. The Word is God the Son, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity Who, as the Gospel tells us, “was in the beginning,” “was with God” and “was God.” We are also told in the Gospel that “through him all things came to be,” “that no one thing had its being but through him” and that “all that came to be had life in him.” These words reveal to us the reality that the Word—the Divine Person of Jesus Christ—literally entered into creation. In the human nature He assumed, He came to be among the very “things” He had created.

In summing-up the Incarnation of Christ (the word is derived from the Latin in caro, meaning “in flesh”), St. Thomas Aquinas states that “What he was he remained; what he was not he assumed.” What St. Thomas is describing here are the two natures of Christ which both co-exist within His one divine Personage. Christ who is God Incarnate is one divine Person, subsisting with two substantially united but really distinct and unconfused natures: the nature of God and the nature of man.

Why did the Word do this? To dwell among us. As put by St. Augustine: “God became man so that man may become like God.” Man is called to perfect beatitude, to ultimate and eternal union with God, and the nativity of our Lord is the first real “tangible,” “fleshy” and “material” proof of this which brings man “face to face” with God as alluded to in the first reading from the Prophet Isaiah.

These theological meanings of Christmas, and the benefits of the Incarnation for our own lives are numerous. Even in the Eucharist, we see that “the Word dwells among us” in His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity. Mother Teresa once called the Eucharist the “continuing Presence of the Incarnation.” This connection is seen in the fact that “Bethlehem,” in Hebrew, means “House of Bread.” Just as Our Lord was placed in a manger in Bethlehem, so is the Blessed Sacrament placed in the tabernacle, a gilded House of Holy Bread. In this regard, our sanctuary lamp, too, burning brightly and continuously to signify the Real Presence, is seen as analogous to the Star that hovered over Bethlehem to guide the way of the shepherds.

Father Wade L. J. Menezes, CPM, is a member of the Fathers of Mercy, an itinerant missionary preaching order based in Auburn, Kentucky. He is an occasional contributor to Lay Witness magazine.

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