Comments on: The Specificity of the Person of Christ http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2012/07/13/the-specificity-of-the-person-of-christ/ A First Things Blog Mon, 20 May 2013 23:25:14 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 By: david c http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2012/07/13/the-specificity-of-the-person-of-christ/comment-page-1/#comment-67005 david c Mon, 16 Jul 2012 15:59:51 +0000 http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/?p=45162#comment-67005 Jordan Almond,

I may be missing something here, but in reading your quote from your RCIA teacher,I have to say that either you are leaving something out, or s/he was simply not stating received Christian orthodoxy. I hope what he or she meant was that Jesus was never nor shall ever be “only” or “merely” human. But any denial of the full humanity of Christ is sub-Christian at best.

I understand why (for a variety of reasons) teachers, preachers, theologians– all of us really, may tend to want to emphasize His divinity over His humanity, or vice versa, but the temptation s to do is ultimately a denial of the right understanding of Jesus. The “hypostatic union” is a mystery to be sure… much more to be affirmed by faith rather than confirmed by reason, but it’s mysteriousness and difficulty cannot become excuses to abandon the doctrine. It is essential to any orthodox Christian understanding of Jesus.

]]> By: Jordan Almond http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2012/07/13/the-specificity-of-the-person-of-christ/comment-page-1/#comment-66953 Jordan Almond Sat, 14 Jul 2012 13:14:40 +0000 http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/?p=45162#comment-66953 A very wise RCIA instructor in our diocese begins every introductory class hammering home one point, or one dogma: Jesus Christ never was, is not now, and never will be a human person. About half of each classes jaws drop open, but as he continues to instruct, his students find that much confusion is banished as they learn the faith. When I learned this dogma many years ago, the Catholic Faith just came together for me. And I was easily able to see through people (especially priests) whose doctrine leaned to the squishy or modernist side. So, the next time some priest says in his homily that the real miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes is that everyone shared them, you can picture a large red gong ringing over the priest’s head warning you that he is at least implicitly denying the Divine Personage of Jesus Christ. A Divine Person does not have to rely on people sharing something to qualify as a miracle. The Divine Person who is Jesus Christ can feed five thousand, or fifty thousand, or fifty million with just a few loaves and fishes.

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