THE SYNTHESIS OF THE PARADOX

Today, the profession of faith from the John prologue resounds powerfully in our assemblies:

and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14).

The Eternal enters time; but not only that: eternity and temporality meet in Christ, in the Christ event. What does this mean? That eternity, inserting itself into temporality through the Incarnation, does not eliminate it but re-signifies it. Man thus realizes the fullness of his vocation by participating in the divine life. This is why he was created. And it is precisely thanks to this encounter that the time of factuality, the time of becoming (kronos), is transformed into qualitative time (kairos), salvific time. The cyclical nature of time is thus broken, inaugurating a history no longer heavily conditioned by ananke or tuché, that is, by mere necessity and pure chance, but aimed at the Kingdom of God and therefore illuminated by the light of the Fatherland. In this project, God calls humanity, each of us, to collaborate creatively and responsibly in its fulfilment. It must not be forgotten that the Incarnation—the synthesis between eternity and time—is completed in the Resurrection. The Risen One has immersed time in eternity. Karl Rahner wrote: “An event has burst into the world and into life that has changed everything we call the world and our life and, alone, has given purpose and an end to everything, that has put an end to the nothing new under the sun of the ancient Ecclesiastes and to the grayness of the eternal return proclaimed by the modern philosopher.” The believer’s gaze—we repeat—focused on the hereafter is not an escape from the hereafter. On the contrary, reaching the afterlife requires fully embracing the here and now. And this is thanks to the Incarnate Word. Furthermore, if in Jesus Christ, as Hegel wrote, heaven came down to earth and took root there, living the following will mean expressing belonging to two worlds, celebrating fidelity to Heaven. and to the earth. But that’s not all. The annihilation of the Word in the darkness of the flesh was followed, according to the Fathers, by the annihilation of the Spirit in the darkness of the Church. The Spirit covers the Church, as he covered Mary at the Annunciation, making her the fruitful mother of a new offspring. This is Christmas, the grace of a new Christmas.

Commentary by b. Sandro Carotta, osb
Abbazia di Praglia (Italy)

Translation by f. Mark Hargreaves,
Prinknash Abbey