Youcat commented through CCC - Question n. 77 – Part I.

YOUCAT Question n. 77 – Part I. What does it mean to say that Jesus Christ is at the same time true God and true man?

(Youcat answer) In Jesus, God really became one of us and thus our brother; nevertheless, he did not cease to be God at the same time and thus our Lord. The Council of Chalcedon in the year 451 taught that the divinity and the humanity in the one person Jesus Christ are united together “without division or confusion”.     

A deepening through CCC

(CCC 465) The first heresies denied not so much Christ's divinity as his true humanity (Gnostic Docetism). From apostolic times the Christian faith has insisted on the true incarnation of God's Son "come in the flesh". (Cf. 1 Jn 4:2-3; 2 Jn 7).  But already in the third century, the Church in a council at Antioch had to affirm against Paul of Samosata that Jesus Christ is Son of God by nature and not by adoption. The first ecumenical council of Nicaea in 325 confessed in its Creed that the Son of God is "begotten, not made, of the same substance (homoousios) as the Father", and condemned Arius, who had affirmed that the Son of God "came to be from things that were not" and that he was "from another substance" than that of the Father. (Council of Nicaea I (325): DS 130, 126).      

Reflecting and meditating 

(Youcat comment) The Church grappled for a long time with the problem of how to express the relation between the divinity and humanity in Jesus Christ. Divinity and humanity are not in competition with each other, which would make Jesus only partially God and only partially man. Nor is it true that the divine and human in Jesus are confused. God took on a human body in Jesus; this was no mere appearance (Docetism), but he really became man. Nor are there two different persons in Christ, one human and one divine (Nestorianism). Nor is it true, finally, that in Jesus Christ the human nature was completely absorbed into the divine nature (Monophysitism). Contrary to all these heresies, the Church has adhered to the belief that Jesus Christ is at the same time true God and true man in one Person. The famous formula, “without division or confusion” (Council of Chalcedon) does not attempt to explain something that is too sublime for human understanding, but rather draws the boundaries, so to speak, of the faith. It indicates the “line” along which the mystery of the person of Jesus Christ can be investigated.

(CCC Comment)

(CCC 479) At the time appointed by God, the only Son of the Father, the eternal Word, that is, the Word and substantial Image of the Father, became incarnate; without losing his divine nature he has assumed human nature.     

(This question: What does it mean to say that Jesus Christ is at the same time true God and true man? is continued)