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The redemptive goal of the Incarnation  

"The Creator exercises his Providence over the Universe; hence there is no room to attack or to debate the basis for the plan of the Lord. In fact, it was fitting for the Architect of the Universe, who gave being to all that came to exist, to disdain a humanity tending toward damnation. After all, he made the whole visible world for that same humanity. The earth is the home of human beings and the heaven is their roof; air, sea, rivers, springs, clouds, morning dew and the winds, fruit trees and those that give no fruit, animals that walk the earth, birds of the air, living things in the sea, the flora and fauna, and even the minerals of the earth have been placed at the disposition of the human race. So too with the sun and the moon which mark the division of time into equal parts as well as the countless stars. The sun gives light to the day and invites all to work while the moon with the stars illumines the nights. Hence, the Lord did not think it right to leave the one for whom all these creatures were made in sin or to deliver him, as a prisonner, to death. That is why he took on human form and covered his invisible nature with a visible one. He kept his visible nature away from sin and preserved the integrity of his hidden nature. His invisible nature, in fact, has no part with the weakness of the flesh nor did the flesh contract the stain of sin.   

It would have been easy for the Lord to bring about human salvation without this covering of flesh and to destroy the reign of death by willing to do so; likewise he could have made sin, the source of death, disappear completely and expel the devil, the author of sin, forever. ... But he preferred to show the justice of his providence... Also, later, when he wanted to bring the remedies of salvation to all people, it was neither the ministry of angels nor of archangels to which he turned; nor did he proclaim salvation from the height of heaven in a voice that everyone could understand. Rather he built a human residence in a virginal womb, from which he came forth, a man that one sees and the God that is adored: this one who came from the substance of the Father before the centuries and who received from the Virgin what is seen, is both new and eternal."

Theodoret of Cyr, Therapy for pagan ills (cfr. VI, 74 ... 79)  

 

Prayer  

Let me seek you, O Lord, even while I am calling upon you and call upon you even as I believe in you; for to us you have indeed been preached. My faith calls upon you, Lord, this faith which is your gift to me, which you have breathed into me through the humanity of your Son and the ministry of your preacher. - Conf. 1,1

 

By Ateneo Pontificio Augustinianum

 

        

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