Innate, Substantial, Uncreated Sanctity
and the Fullness of Created Grace
 

Taken from Our Savior and His Love for Us
by
Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O. P.

"And we saw His glory, the glory as it were of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." -----John 1:14

Let us therefore consider the radical perfection of Jesus which permeates His entire soul and which shines forth in all His faculties and virtues. We refer to His sanctity and to the fullness of grace that He has received.

As St. Thomas shows  [IIa IIae, q. 81, a.8.] holiness in general has two essential characteristics: first, absence of all stain, of all sin, and of all directly or indirectly voluntary imperfection; and second, a firm union with God. The latter is, in fact, the principal trait of sanctity, from which the former derives. For it is in the measure that one is firmly united to God that one avoids directly or indirectly voluntary sin, sins of commission as well as sins of omission or negligence. These two aspects of supernatural perfection have often been expressed as follows: Sanctity is separation from all that is impure, from all that is earthly in the pejorative sense of the word,  [In Greek ayios (holy) comes from the related phrase meaning unattached to earth.] and it is also the immutable and fundamental consecration of the soul to God. This separation and this consecration are perfected in heaven, but they exist to a lesser degree here below, sometimes even in children who have the sanctity of their age, such as St. Tarcisius and Blessed Imelda.

But where shall we find here below perfect sanctity? A Greek philosopher once asked: "Where shall we find the ideal man?" We have the answer in the life and death of Jesus.

Let us contemplate these two aspects of sanctity as they exist in Jesus. Whereas in us, who come from below, a progressive separation from the world leads to union with God, in Jesus, who comes from above, it is the personal union of His humanity to the Word which leads to a separation of all that is impure or even merely less perfect.

The better to understand this radical perfection of the Savior, let us progressively rise from our earthy regions toward those where He dwells. Let us first inquire what the absence of sin and of imperfection means with relation to Him. We shall then be better able to grasp the most positive characteristic of His sanctity and its uniqueness.

Jesus Was without Sin

Unbelievers are forced to admit on the basis of the history of Christ's life that no man as perfect as He ever walked the earth. Even those who, like Renan, spent their lives denying the Divinity of Jesus-----something terrible in its consequences-----even they have been obliged to concede that He is incomparably superior to all the pagan sages, that the virtue of Socrates pales before His goodness, His patience in tribulation, His gentleness toward His tormentors. Several rationalists have gone so far as to say: There will never be any higher moral perfection on earth; Jesus will always remain the unequaled model, the ideal man of wisdom. [A young woman who did not have the faith but who was seeking truth began to read Renan's Life of Jesus upon the advice of her unbelieving father. The result was the opposite of what her father expected. In reading what Renan had been forced to say about the greatness of Jesus in order not to contradict the truth too obviously, she received a great interior light, believed at once in the Divinity of the Savior, and from that day became an excellent Christian and a soul of prayer. She finally obtained the conversion of her father.]

In actual fact, no one was able to discover any sin or imperfection in Jesus. Certain mealy-mouthed humanitarians have reproached Him with His anger against the Pharisees and the money-changers in the Temple, but it is clear that this anger was the holy indignation of zeal. Only those can disapprove who through their egoism have become totally indifferent to the rights of God and to the salvation of souls.

Not only has it been impossible to discover any fault in Jesus, but even before His birth Heaven was gathering testimony in favor of His absolute innocence.

Isaias announced: "And His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, God the Mighty, the Father of the world to come, the Prince of Peace." [Isa. 9: 6.] And: "Behold My servant, I will uphold Him: My elect, My soul delighteth in Him: I have given My spirit upon Him, He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not cry, nor have respect to person, neither shall His voice be heard abroad. The bruised reed He shall not break, and smoking flax He shall not quench: He shall bring forth judgment unto truth. He shall not be sad, nor troublesome, till He set judgment in the earth." [Ibid., 42:1-4.]

Later, on the day of the Annunciation, the Archangel Gabriel said to Mary: "The Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God."  [Luke 1:35.]

An Angel said to Joseph : "Fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife, for that which is conceived in her, is of the Holy Ghost. And she shall bring forth a son: and thou shalt call His name Jesus. For He shall save His people from their sins."  [Matt. 1:20 fF.] Jesus, virginally conceived in the womb of Mary, was thus exempt from Original Sin; and it was in prevision of His merits that His Mother was preserved from this stain.

The aged Simeon, Divinely enlightened, saw in the child Jesus "the salvation . . . of all peoples: a light to the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of Thy people Israel." [Luke 2:30-33.]

St. John the Baptist at first refused to Baptize our Lord, and said to Him: "I ought to be Baptized by Thee, and comest Thou to me?" Jesus answered him: "Suffer it to be so now. For so it becometh us to fulfill all justice." And that day the Holy Ghost descended upon Jesus in the form of a dove, and a voice from Heaven was heard to say: "This is My beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased." [Matt. 3:14-17.]

Later on, the Pharisees spied upon our Lord, seeking some excuse to make an accusation against Him. Jesus, with supreme dignity which equaled His humility, answered them: "Which of you shall convince Me of sin? . . . He that is of God heareth the words of God. Therefore you hear them not, because you are not of God." [John 8:46 ff.]  In defense of the woman taken in adultery, who was about to be pitilessly stoned, Jesus said: "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her." But no one felt himself pure enough to cast that first stone, and so they "went out one by one." [Ibid., 8:7-9.]

During the Passion, Pilate declared: "I find no cause in Him." [Ibid., 18:38.]  He washed his hands before the crowd, saying: "I am innocent of the blood of this just man: look you to it." [Matt. 27: 24.]  The Jews could say only one thing: "We have a law; and according to the law He ought to die, because He made Himself the Son of God." [John 19:7.]

The centurion, seeing Jesus' gentleness toward His persecutors during the crucifixion and the signs which accompanied His death, cried out: "Indeed this was the Son of God."  [Matt. 27: 54.]

Finally, Christ's resurrection is the glorious manifestation of His sanctity, as the Apostles never tire of proclaiming. St. Peter, calling attention to one of Isaias's prophecies, wrote in his First Epistle: "Christ . . . suffered for us . . . Who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth . . . Who His Own self bore our sins in His body upon the tree: that we . . . should live to justice: by whose stripes you were healed." [1 Pet. 2:21-24]

The Epistle to the Hebrews tells us: "For it was fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners, and made higher than the heavens; who needeth not daily [as the other priests] to offer sacrifices first for His own sins, and then for the people's: for this He did once, in offering Himself."  [Heb. 7:26 fF.]

All these testimonials from Heaven and earth attest that Jesus is without sin. He was never grazed by Original Sin, and He never committed even the slightest personal sin.

Far more, not only did our Savior never actually commit sin, but He was absolutely impeccable. As is commonly taught by the Fathers and by theology, our Lord was impeccable on three grounds: by reason of His Divine personality, by reason of the inamissible plenitude of grace that is His, and by reason of the immediate vision He had of Supreme Goodness, from which He could not turn away. Just as a mass of red-hot iron which is kept in the fire cannot grow cool, so it was that Jesus' soul, personally and indissolubly united to the Word and thereby enriched with the fullness of grace, and always illumined by the light of glory, could not sin.

It is absolutely impossible to attribute sin to the Word made flesh. That would amount to saying: God has sinned. He could die for our salvation, but not sin. God cannot turn away from Himself, outrage Himself. This is crystal clear.

Likewise, a soul which has received the fullness of grace in an inamissible manner cannot sin; for this would involve losing this plenitude, or at least diminishing it.

Finally, a soul which sees God immediately, as do the Saints in Heaven, cannot turn away from Him or cease for a single moment to love Him.

Jesus Free from All Imperfections

Apart from sin, there was never in Jesus the slightest involuntary disorder of the emotions, nor any moral imperfection. There was never in Him a focus of covetousness and lust such as exists in us as one of the consequences of Original Sin. Indeed, He was not exempt from the attacks of the world and the devil. He even allowed temptation to rise up against Him, in order to teach us how to conquer it." [Jesus ] was led by the Spirit into the desert, for a space of forty days; and was tempted by the devil." [Luke 4: 1 f. ]  These were temptations of vainglory and pride, to which He made answer with words from Scripture and acts of humility.

There was no moral imperfection in our Savior which might have diminished His sanctity. He was never unfaithful or slow to respond to the slightest inspiration from His Father. "He that sent Me, is with Me, and He hath not left Me alone: for I do always the things that please Him." [John 1:29.]   He never had any other purpose than to "glorify God" by saving souls, in accordance with the fullness of His mission. [Cf. John, chap. 17.]

Such is what is sometimes called the negative aspect of Christ's sanctity: the absence of all sin. But since sin is itself a privation, a disorder, this aspect-----that is, the absence of disorder-----is already very positive and it manifests to us to a certain extent the intimate union with God which formally constitutes the sanctity of Jesus.

Before entering upon this great subject of the holiness of Jesus, with particular emphasis on the aspect of separation from the spirit of the world, from the spirit of covetousness and pride, let us come back to what we mentioned at the beginning of this chapter: namely, the difference between the Savior who comes from Heaven and ourselves who come from below.

The sacred soul of Jesus is separated from the spirit of the world by His very elevation, because He comes from above, because He is the Word made flesh, come down from Heaven to save us. It is His inward greatness that separates Him from all that is inferior. He cannot become attached to these things. By reason of His very elevation He is detached from earthly pleasures, from honors, from worldly affairs. He is a perfect model of poverty: He "hath not where to lay His head." For the same reason He was detached from the pleasures of the world, and He was free from family responsibilities because He came to found a universal family, the Church. Hence He is the perfect model of religious chastity. His elevation also separates Him from any spirit of willfulness. When He was twelve years old He declared that He had come to tend to His Father's business, [Luke 2:49.] and He obeyed even unto death, and to the death of the Cross. St. Thomas tells us that He had no need to make the three vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience because from the first moment of His conception His will was strengthened and immutably fixed not only upon the good, but upon the best.

Since our Lord comes from above, it is His greatness which separates Him from all that is inferior, not to isolate Him but so that He may act upon the world from a great height, and so that in consequence His action may be more universal and more profound. Such is the action of the sun upon the earth when it is at its zenith, at the highest point above the horizon. Because our Lord was by His very elevation free from the bonds that attach men to earthly goods, to their family, to their own little ideas, to their own will, He was able to act not only on the men of one nation or of one era, but upon the whole human race, to whom He has brought eternal life. It is because of the greatness of the Savior that the Gospel is accessible to all, even the most humble, while at the same time surpassing the understanding of the greatest geniuses. It is for the same reason that the Gospel has never grown old and that it will always be timely with an immutable timeliness, superior to that of the fleeting moment.

Jesus was not of the world, but He was given to the world by God's infinite mercy that He might redeem it. This is brought out by the first aspect of His sanctity, freedom from all sin and imperfection.

There is a vast difference between our Lord and ourselves in this respect. Since He comes from above, He is separated by His very elevation from all that is inferior, evil, or less good. As for us, we come from below, from the world of sin, of lies, of covetousness and pride. So we have to separate ourselves progressively from the spirit of the world, from all that is disorderly in it, and progressively rise toward God. This is the meaning of the Commandments and of the three evangelical counsels.

At this point some may at times be tempted to think that in this work which is so hard for us we have more merit than our Savior. This is an aberration, for our merits would not exist without the grace which comes from Him. Besides, this would be forgetting that by reason of His very elevation our Lord suffered more acutely from sin than we shall ever suffer from it. The fullness of grace increased considerably in His soul the capacity of suffering from the greatest of evils, namely, mortal sin, about which we are not sufficiently grieved because the disorder which it involves is too deep-seated for us to perceive. Our Lord suffered because of sin in the measure of His love for His Father whom sin offends, and in the measure of His love for our souls which sin ravages and kills.

Thus, whereas we must struggle and suffer in order to free ourselves from sin, our Lord has suffered from it infinitely more than we, in the measure of His purity and of His love.

To understand better this most consoling aspect of the sanctity of Jesus, let us repeat the beautiful prayer recommended as a thanksgiving after Holy Communion: "Soul of Christ, sanctify me. Body of Christ, save me. Blood of Christ, inebriate me. Passion of Christ, fortify me. O good Jesus, hear me. Hide me in Thy sacred wounds. Never permit me to be separated from Thee. Defend me from the evil spirit. At the hour of death, call me and command me to come to Thee, so that in the company of Thy saints I may praise Thee for all eternity. Amen."

Let us now enter the sanctuary of the Savior's soul and contemplate the most positive aspect of His sanctity, which constitutes it formally.

The Innate, Substantial, Uncreated and Inamissible Sanctity of Jesus

Through its personal union with the Word, the soul of Jesus has an innate, substantial, uncreated sanctity which is in consequence absolutely perfect and inamissible. This sanctity is constituted especially by the grace of union with the Word and it infinitely surpasses the sanctity of even the greatest servants of God. [Cf. St. Thomas, IIIa, q. 6, a. 6: "The grace of union is the personal being that is given gratis from above to the human nature of the person of the Word." Ibid., IIIa, q. 22, a. 2 ad 3; q. 24, a.1 f., on whether Christ was predestined to be the Son of God; q. 26, a. 1 f.,. on Christ as Mediator. Cf. John of St. Thomas, De incarn., disp. 8, a.; Gonet, De incarn., disp. 11; Billuart, De incarn., disp. 8, a. 1.]

 No doubt, when we read the lives of these privileged beings, the Saints, we are struck by the splendor of their virtues, of their goodness, of their generosity, of their ardor in sacrifice. Next to them, the most radiant integrity is dull, and the lives of pagan heroes seem external and without depth.

The outstanding trait of the Saints is that they have given themselves not merely to an earthly ideal of the intellectual or moral order, but they have given themselves fully to God, they are taken and possessed by Him, and they live only for Him and for the sake of saving souls. They interpret the counsels of God's love as commands, and they allow themselves to be guided by Divine inspiration, even when it leads to the greatest sacrifices. And, the more they abandon themselves to God, the more the Lord showers His gifts upon them; and the more they receive, the more they give, bringing life to their fellow men.

Withal, this sanctity of the greatest of God's servants is infinitely inferior to that of the Savior. The sanctity of the Saints gradually frees itself from many imperfections; it is not an innate perfection; it is the crowning of a long and painful effort, the fruit of the workings of grace and of their merits. It is the end of a slow ascent during which even the guides sometimes stumble, as did Peter during the passion of his Master. It is easier of course to walk in the plain on the beaten paths than to make this ascent, especially where there is no trail to follow and no firm footing. Sometimes one turns back. It seems as if one is lost and will be caught without shelter in the darkness and cold. As St. John of the Cross remarks, there are ups and downs in this ascent. For three steps forward one makes two backward, but one advances none the less; and after long periods of tribulation during which the servant of God is not free from committing sin, he progressively arrives under the illumination of faith to union with God. His sanctity, alloyed now with impetuosity and again with cowardice, is a slow and laborious task, the work of grace and of personal cooperation, and it has still many signs of human fragility, as we see in the lives of the greatest Saints, namely, the Apostles. [Although the just can avoid each venial sin taken individually, they cannot avoid them all taken as a whole or continually. To do that, they would need the very special grace received by the Blessed Virgin.]

Besides, the holiness of the servants of God is in their case an accidental perfection, in the sense that it is superadded to their being. It consists in the higher degree of sanctifying grace which they have received and in the charity that has blossomed in them. This perfection is also accidental in the sense that while still here below they can lose it, as Adam lost it for himself and for us. Finally, it is a perfection which always leaves room for a greater perfection, for a deeper understanding of the mysteries of God, and for a more burning charity, the fruit of greater graces and greater efforts.

The sanctity of Jesus, on the other hand, did not progressively free itself from manifold imperfections: it is innate in Him. Jesus was born holy. He was holy even from the first moment of His conception, by the personal union of His humanity with the Word. Thus His soul was from the start sanctified by the Divinity of the Word, by the grace of personal union with the only-begotten Son of the Father. It is therefore incomparably better consecrated than a chalice, than the soul of a priest marked with the sign of priesthood. Jesus is above all others the "Anointed of God."  [Ps. 44:8.] He is given exclusively to His Father's "business," as He said at the age of twelve when He was found among the doctors. His sacred soul was supremely pleasing to the Father from the first moment; within it the kingdom of God is realized in its absolute fullness.

The sanctity of Jesus is thus innate and anterior even to His birth. And, by reason of His merits, His mother, the Virgin Mary, received the grace of innate sanctity through the grace of the Immaculate Conception.

But what belongs to Christ alone and what is not to be found in any other human soul or in any angel is the fact that His sanctity is not merely innate, but substantial and uncreated. This is not an accidental perfection, superadded to His being. It is the sanctity of the eternal Word that substantially sanctifies the soul of Jesus in giving it subsistence. The sanctity of the Word thus penetrates His soul in the highest degree possible. If the Saints are beings taken by God, possessed by Him, how much more so is "the Anointed of God," Who has received the fullness of the Divine unction and who subsists by it? For, as we have seen, there is in Jesus only one subject of attribution, a single person, and thus a single subsistence or personality, that of the Word, and a single existence, by reason of which He said: "Before Abraham was made, I am." [John 8: 58.]

That is the same as saying that the sanctity of Jesus, like the grace of union with the Word, is not only substantial, but it is uncreated. For it is formally constituted by the uncreated personality of the Word, which has united itself for all eternity with the soul of the Savior, so that in Jesus the two natures exist through the uncreated existence. This is what makes it possible for Him to say: "I am the truth and the life" or "I am who am." [Cf. St. Thomas, IIIa, q. 6, a. 6: "The grace of union is the personal being that is given gratis from above to the human nature of the Person of the Word, and is the term of the assumption. Whereas the habitual grace pertaining to the spiritual holiness of the man is an effect following the union." IIIa, q. 17, a. 2: "Whether there is only one being in Christ."]

Isaias spoke of Jesus when he said: "I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne high and elevated . . . Upon it stood the seraphims: the one had six wings, and the other had six wings: with two they covered His face, and with two they covered His feet, and with two they flew. And they cried one to another, and said: Holy, holy, holy, the Lord God of hosts, all the earth is full of His glory." [Isa. 6:1-3.]

St. John likewise records these words in the Apocalypse: "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, who was, and who is, and who is to come." [John 4:8.]

This substantial and uncreated sanctity of Christ is therefore the most perfect sanctity conceivable, the most intimate, and the most steadfast. Because of it He is the Saint of Saints. Can a Divine person be more intimately and indissolubly united to a soul, to a created nature, than by communicating to it Its own subsistence, or personality, and Its existence? A greater sanctity than this cannot be conceived. In fact, we can say that while the apostles Peter and Paul are Saints, Jesus is sanctity itself, just as He is God Himself and the Deity. This sanctity is therefore inamissible, for Christ cannot cease being Christ, the Anointed of God. This He will always be, in aeternum. By the same token He is a priest for all eternity.

In a word: the sanctity of Jesus is constituted above all by the grace of uncreated union, which consists in the possession forever of the Savior's humanity by the person of the Word.

Jesus continually lives, therefore, in an order superior to that of nature, and to that of grace, that is, of supernatural created sanctity. His soul lives in a special order, the order of the hypostatic union, the order of the personal and substantial life of God, wherein He is placed by the grace of His union with the Word. [The Virgin Mary touches this hypostatic order by reason of the grace of her Divine maternity, inasmuch as she is the Mother of God, or the mother of Jesus Who is God. That is why she is entitled to the veneration of hyperdulia.]

The Saints, especially those who are in Heaven, enjoy the ecstasy of knowledge and of love. Their intelligence and their will are, as it were, lost in God, taken away by the Divine object. The blessed soul of Jesus, on the other hand, enjoyed from the first moment of its creation an ecstasy superior to that of contemplation and of love. It enjoyed, as we have said, the ecstasy of being or of existence, an habitual, tranquil, permanent ecstasy. For the soul of the Savior subsists only by the personality and by the uncreated existence of the Word. [As the soul separated from the body subsists after death and will on the day of resurrection communicate its existence to the body which it will once again vivify, so the Word communicated His uncreated existence to the humanity of the Savior at the moment of the Incarnation.]

Such is the innate, substantial, and uncreated sanctity of Jesus, formally constituted by the personal union of His humanity to the Word. Taking up this affirmation by the Church that the sanctity of Christ is innate, some unbelievers have said that in consequence His sanctity is without difficulties and without merit. Though Jesus' sanctity is not the fruit of merit, it is the source of all His merits and of ours as well. [As St. Thomas explains (IIIa, q. 19, a. 3), it is true of Christ as of ourselves that it is nobler to have something through merit than without merit. Thus Jesus merited the glory of His body, His Resurrection, His Ascension, the exaltation of His name, and the salvation of our souls. But we must make one exception to this principle if the temporary deprivation of something would diminish our Savior's perfection more than the merit which presupposes this deprivation would increase His perfection. Thus Jesus did not merit the beatific vision, for the temporary deprivatIon of this vision would diminish His perfection more than the merit would increase it. Christ could merit only what was in Him the principle of merit: His Divine personality and the fullness of grace.]

 Besides, if anyone has faced here on earth hardship, contradiction, combat, it was our Savior. Shall we say that the Saints, endowed with special graces from their childhood, have less merit than we? The principle of merit is charity or love of God. Therefore he who has a greater love of God has more merits, and he also suffers much more than others from the greatest of all evils, namely, sin. We can see, therefore, that we cannot even surmise how much our Savior suffered. His innate, substantial, and uncreated sanctity considerably increased the capacity of His soul to suffer here on earth from sin, which is an offense against God and which brings us death by turning us away from Him.

The Fullness of Created Grace

From His substantial and uncreated sanctity our Lord derived created sanctifying grace, and this He received in its fullness. And from grace derive the supernatural virtues and the gifts of charity, wisdom, piety, humility, patience, meekness in a proportionate degree, which is far superior to that of the Saints and to that which was realized within the soul of Mary.

Was it possible that the soul of the Savior, which was united in the highest degree possible to God, the source of all grace, should not have been full of grace? Was it possible that His soul, which was to make us participants of all the supernatural gifts, should not itself have been adorned with all of them? [Cf. St. Thomas, IIIa, q. 7, a. 9.]

Created grace is a participation in Divine nature which, like a second nature, increases the stature of our souls to produce connaturally [That is to say: as if it were naturally.] supernatural and meritorious acts. It is like a Divine graft in us which elevates us to a superior life. The soul of Jesus received this grace in its absolute plenitude. That is what St. John meant when he wrote: "And we saw His glory . . . full of grace and truth."  [John 1:14.] A few great saints, such as St. Stephen the first Martyr, and above all Mary, received a relative plenitude of grace, proportioned to their mission in the Church. Thus the archangel Gabriel said to Mary: "Hail, full of grace." [Luke 1:28.]  Jesus, however, received grace in its absolute fullness, that is to say, in its supreme degree.

According to the actual plan of Providence, this grace cannot be any loftier, for it is morally proportioned to the highest dignity, that of the person of the Word made flesh. [St. Thomas, IIIa, q. 7, a.,9 ad 3; a. 12 ad 2.]

Furthermore, in the soul of Jesus this grace cooperates in supernatural and meritorious acts which are, by reason of the personality of the Word, of infinite value.

Finally, this grace possesses the maximum of extension, for it corresponds to the most universal of all missions, that of the Savior of all men. It extends to all supernatural effects, and it contains within itself in an eminent degree, as a superior well-spring, all the graces necessary to the Apostles, the Martyrs, the confessors, and the virgins of all lands and of all times. As St. Thomas tells us, [Ibid., a. 9-12.] the soul of Jesus received habitual grace just as the sun receives light, with the greatest intensity and radiance. And since there is probably in the physical world a center of light of even greater intensity and radiance than the sun, let us use it as a feeble symbol of the fullness of created grace within the soul of our Savior. This is to say that the habitual grace within the soul of Jesus surpasses in intensity and splendor that of all the Saints and Angels together, as the light of the sun excels that of the planets and their satellites.

Christ received this fullness of grace from the first moment of His conception, for it is an immediate consequence of the personal union with the Word. And even in this first instant He received it freely; for His holy soul was created as were those of the Angels not in a state of sleep but in a waking and freely acting state. [Cf. Ibid., q. 34, a. 3. Thus the justified adult freely receives Sanctifying grace, the principle of merit. Likewise the Angels were created in the state of grace. Cf. St. Thomas, Ia, q. 62, a. 3.]

This plenitude was so perfect even from the first moment that it could not increase during the course of the earthly life of our Lord. [The Second Ecumenical Council of Constantinople (553) defined, in opposition to Theodore of Mopsuestia, that the blessed soul of Christ was not subject to the passions and that it did not become better through progress in virtue and good works: "ex perfectu ope rum non melioratus est Christus." (Cf. Denzinger, no. 224.)]

 But with the same degree of grace, He accomplished works that were ever more perfect as He grew in years, until the consummation of His mission on the Cross. [Cf. St. Thomas, IIIa, q. 8, a. 12  ad 3.] Thus we might say that the sun's light, while maintaining an unchanging degree of intensity, lights and warms the earth more as it approaches the zenith, the highest point in the sky. [In Mary, on the contrary, there was an increase in grace and in charity, from the initial plenitude at the moment of the Immaculate Conception until the moment of final plenitude at her death, before the Assumption.]

This plenitude of grace was from the first moment of Jesus' life the source of the virtues and gifts which are reconcilable with the beatific vision and with personal union to the Word. [Cf. Isa. 11:1; "And there shall come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of his root. And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him: the spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the spirit of counsel and of fortitude, the spirit of knowledge and of godliness. And he shall be filled with the spirit of the fear of the Lord."]

 And these virtues and gifts proceed from it in a proportionate degree, that is, the supreme degree. [Cf. St. Thomas, IIIa, q. 71 a. 2.] This fact gives us an insight into the charity of Christ, even from the first moment, and into His love for His Father and for souls, His wisdom, His prudence, His piety, His justice, His fortitude, His patience, His humility, His meekness.

From the first moment of His earthly life, He possessed in the supreme degree all the virtues excepting those which fundamentally admit of an imperfection that cannot be reconciled with the Beatific Vision. For He received the Beatific Vision from that first instant. Thus it was that He had neither faith nor hope, both of which will disappear in us to make way for the vision of God.

[From this it follows that there was never faith or hope greater than Mary's. Her heroic faith and hope, especially at the foot of the cross, far surpassed the faith and hope of the angels while they were still in their transitory state.] Nor did He have contrition, which presupposes personal sin, but He took upon Himself the punishment which our sins demanded.  [For the same reason Mary did not have contrition, although in union with her Son she bore the punishment for our sins.]

This shows us the falsity of saying that Christ, having received so, much, could not suffer. Quite the contrary. As we have already remarked, the fullness of grace in Christ's soul greatly increased His capacity for suffering here on earth from the worst of all evils, namely, sin. The nobler and purer a soul is here on earth, the more it suffers from mortal sin, the radical disorder that turns souls away from God, their final end.

This spiritual suffering began in our Lord's soul from the instant He knew of His mission as Savior. [St. Paul says: "Wherefore when He [Christ] cometh into the world, He saith: Sacrifice and oblation Thou wouldst not: but a body Thou hast fitted to Me: . . . Behold I come: . . . that I should do Thy will, O God" (Heb. 10:5-7).] It was then that He offered His first act of love, in union with those which were to follow until His death. From the start He offered up His whole life in an incomparably more perfect manner than does the religious when at his profession he promises obedience until death. [This explains why the first meritorious act of Christ, although of infinite value, did not render the succeeding acts superfluous. He offered up the first united to all the others, as destined to lead Him to the death of the Cross.]

This fullness of grace is manifested in the marvelous harmonizing of apparently opposed virtues. Harmony, which is unity in diversity, is all the more beautiful in the measure that there is a more profound unity in a vaster diversity, and that there is a deeper intimacy between widely separated elements.

In Jesus are admirably reconciled the loftiest supernaturality and the simplest and most spontaneous naturalness. But when we try to be natural, we often forget the exigences of grace and fall into the practical naturalism of indifference. If, on the other hand, we try to attain supernatural perfection without passing through the indispensable intermediaries, we fall into a state of arrogant rigidity, reminiscent of the Jansenists, or into a false supernatural exaltation which borders on eccentricity. In Jesus, nature and grace are wonderfully harmonized because He possesses the fullness of grace and because His nature is completely docile.

In Jesus also the most sublime wisdom and the most astute practical sense are also harmonized. As for us, we are usually either too abstract, lost in vague generalities, or, on the contrary, we put undue emphasis on details, without viewing things from a sufficient height.

Within Jesus are also united perfect justice and boundless mercy, whereas in us justice often turns to severity, and mercy to weakness. Let us call to mind our Savior's forgiveness of the adulterous woman: what firmness and yet what generosity!

Likewise in Him are harmonized a supreme dignity and the deepest humility. Among men, however, magnanimity is frequently accompanied by haughtiness, and souls that are naturally modest often remain pusillanimous and without energy .

Finally in Jesus are reconciled the most heroic strength and the greatest meekness, as witnessed by the smile of the Crucified praying for His executioners: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." [Luke 23: 34.]

Nowhere else can we find a loftier or deeper moral harmony, more far-reaching in its scope, or of greater splendor, couched in terms of such noble sobriety.

The Consequences for Us

Jesus is the sun of sanctity, eager to shower His splendors upon us. He received holiness as the universal principle of all graces, graces of light, of attraction, of power. He is not a vessel, a brook, or even a river of sanctity: He is its living source.

St. John tells us: "And of His fullness we all have received, and grace for grace." [John 1: 16.] Let us contemplate the radiation of this sanctity in the lives of the saints, of the Apostles, Martyrs, confessors, and virgins of all times, including our own.

Let us remember that when we were Baptized we received from the Savior the same emanation of supernatural life. If we have fallen back into the death of sin, we have been spiritually revivified by absolution, Christ's own pardon, and our souls have been placed once again beneath the living waters of grace, beneath the torrent of Divine mercies. If we face tribulation, let us remember that the grace offered to us is proportionate to the sacrifices demanded of us. Let us allow ourselves to be drawn to the Savior, to be illumined, warmed, and vivified by Him. Let us allow ourselves to be loved by His pure and powerful love, which will purify us more and more. If He makes us suffer, it is to make us like Himself, and to associate us with the mystery of the Redemption through suffering. Let us ever ask Him for new graces, including the grace of final perseverance. And, without resisting, let us allow these graces to inspire us to ever greater acts of generosity, for our own salvation, for that of our neighbor, and for the glory of Christ. Let us also pray for Saints who will tell the men of our time what they most need to hear, Saints who by their lives will reveal to them Christ's love for us.

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