The virgin birth: how God is born in every soul, and not in Mary alone

THE VIRGIN BIRTH

Ave, gratia plena, dominus tecum (Luc. 1, 28). Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee! The Holy Ghost shall descend into thee from above, from the lofty light-throne of the eternal Father.' Here there are three things to be understood. First, the radiant nature of the angel; secondly, that he knew himself unworthy to behold God's mother; thirdly, that he was speaking not alone to her but to a goodly multitude, to every virtuous soul desiring God.

I say: had Mary not borne God in ghostly fashion first, he never had been born of her in flesh. The woman said to Christ, Blessed is the womb which bare thee.' To which Christ replied, Blessed not alone the womb which bare me: blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it.' It is more worth to God his being brought forth ghostly in the individual virgin or good soul than that he was born of Mary bodily.

This involves the notion of our being the only Son whom the Father has eternally begotten. When the Father begat all creatures he was begetting me; I flowed out with all creatures while remaining within in the Father. Like what I am now saying;

it springs up within me, then I pause in the idea, and thirdly I speak it out, and all of you receive it: but really it is in me all the while. So am I abiding in the Father. In the Father is the exemplar of all creatures. This exalted nature has its intellectual prototype in God. And not merely intellectual but intellect itself. The best God ever did for man was to be man himself. I will tell you a story to illustrate my point. Once upon a time there was a rich man and his wife. The lady by mischance did lose an eye whereat she grieved excessively. Then came her lord to her and said, O wife, why so distressed?' Quoth she, My lord, 'tis not my eye I mourne; I mourne for fear lest you should love me less.' -- Nay wife, I love thee,' he replied. Afterwards, not over long, he put out one of his own eyes, and going to his wife he said, Lady, so you may know I love you I have made myself like you: now I too have only one eye.'

According to the philosophers, creatures are all striving to bring forth and emulate the Father. Another doctor says that every active cause works solely for the sake of its result, to find rest and peace in its end. This is mankind, who scarce could credit God's great love for him till God did put out one of his own eyes by taking human nature. This was made flesh.

Said our Lady, How shall this be?' The angel replied, The Holy Ghost shall come down into thee from on high, from the lofty throne of the Father of eternal light.' In principio. Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given.' Child in his frail humanity. Son in his eternal deity. One philosopher declares that creatures are all striving after their primitive pure nature, after their supreme perfection. Fire as fire does not burn: it is too intangible, too pure to burn at all; it is the fire-nature which will burn, infusing into the dry wood its nature and its light according to its own most high perfection. God has done the same. He has made the soul according to his own most perfect nature, pouring into her the whole of his own light in all its pristine purity, while he himself remains all undefiled.

Now you must know that I lately said: When God created all creatures he had surely gotten first something uncreated setting forth the general idea of creatures: to wit, the spark, which is so nearly God that it is a single, impartible one, bearing the form of all creatures, formless and above form.

Yesterday in the schools there was a theological discussion. I said I was astonished at no one being able to give the solution of my question: If I am the only Son whom the Father has eternally begotten, have I eternally been Son? I say, yea and nay. Son, yes, inasmuch as the Father has eternally begotten me; not Son in my unbegotten nature. In principio. We are given to understand that we are the only Son whom the Father has been bringing forth for aye out of his arcane understanding of the eternal mystery of the first beginning of his primitive light-nature which is the end of all perfection. There I have been at rest for aye, asleep in the dormant understanding of the eternal Father, immanent, unspoken. I trow, seen in that light, any bit of stick would be an angel and would be intelligent, and not alone intelligent: it would be pure intellect in that first pure nature which is the perfection of enlightenment. Out of his light-nature he has been eternally begetting me his one begotten Son in the express image of his eternal Fatherhood to the end that I may be the Father and beget him of whom I am begotten. Like one who stands before some lofty peak hailing, Art there?' And echo answers back, Art there?' He cries, Come forth!' -- Come forth!' the voice replies. This is what God does: he begets his Son into the summit of the soul. By the fact of his bearing his Son into me I bear him back into the Father. It was nothing else, God's virgin birth, than his getting his Son back again.

I used to wonder (it is many years ago) whether I should be asked why one blade of grass is so unlike another; and as it happened I was asked why they are so different. I said, it is more marvellous they are so much alike. One philosopher says that the blades of grass are all different owing to the superfluity of the goodness of God which he pours out abundantly into all creatures the more to show his majesty. I said it is more wonderful how much the grass-blades are alike, explaining that just as all the angels are the same in their original pure nature so all the grasses are the same and all things are identical.

I was thinking as I came along that one might here in time succeed in mastering God. Supposing I were up on high and told him, Come up hither,' that would be difficult. But if I said, Bide down below,' that would be very easy. That is what God does. If a man is lowly God is unable to withhold his goodness; he is obliged to sink himself, to pour himself, into that lowly soul, on the lowest of the lowly bestowing himself most of all and bestowing himself wholly. What God bestows is his nature, and his nature is his goodness and his goodness is his love. All joy and sorrow come from love.

I was thinking on the way as I was walking here, I should not have come were I not prepared to get wet for friendship's sake. If you have all got wet let me get wet too. Good and ill both come from love. Man should not be afraid of God. Some fear is harmful. The right sort of fear is the fear of losing God. It behoves man to love God since God loves man consummately. The masters say that all things are in travail, labouring to beget themselves in the image of the Father. They talk of earth as fleeing from the heavens; of her fleeing down and reaching heaven downwards; of her escaping upwards to encounter the lowest of the heavens. Earth has no escape from heaven: flee she up or flee she down heaven still invades her, energising her, fructifying her whether for her weal or for her woe. God treats man the same: weening to escape him we run into his arms, for all corners are exposed to him. God will give birth to his Son in thee whether thou like it or loathe it; whether thou sleepest or wakest God goes on with his work. That we have no sense of it is because our tongue is furred with the slime of creatures and possesses not the salt of divine affection. If we had godly love we should savour God and all the works God ever wrought and receive all things from God and be doing the same work as he does. In this sameness we are all his only Son.

God created the soul according to his own most perfect nature that she might be the bride of his only-begotten Son. He knowing this full well decided to go forth out of the private chamber of his eternal Fatherhood where he has slept for aye and be proclaimed abroad while inwardly abiding in the first beginning of his primitive light-nature. So lifting up the tent of his eternal glory the Son proceeded out of the Most High to go and fetch his lady whom his Father had eternally given him to wife and restore her to her former high estate. For this reason he went forth and comes leaping like a love-impassioned swain. He came forth only to return again into his chamber, into the silent darkness of his mysterious Fatherhood. He proceeded out of the supreme in order to go in again accompanied by his bride and show her the hidden mystery of his secret Godhead, where he is at peace with himself and with all creatures.

In principio signifies, in the beginning of all things. It also means the end of all things, since the first beginning is because of the last end. I trow that God himself is not at rest as being the first beginning: he is at rest where he is the end and cessation of existence, not that existence is then brought to naught: it is brought to its ultimate perfection. What is the last end? It is the mystery of the darkness of the eternal Godhead which is unknown and never has been known and never shall be known. Therein God abides to himself unknown, and the light of the eternal Father has been shining there for aye, and the darkness does not comprehend the light. May we find this truth, So help us the truth whereof we speak. Amen.