Christocentrism of Charism – Buggert - CarmelStream

suppose that it is impossible for there to be a man who precisely by being man in the fullest sense
(which we never attain) is God's existence into the world." cxxxi And again: "The less we merely think
of this humanity as something added on to God, and the more we understand it as God's very
presence in the world and hence ... see it in a true spontaneous vitality and freedom before God, the
more intelligible does the abiding mystery of our faith become, and also (the more it becomes) an
expression of our very own existence." cxxxii
For Rahner, it is only because the human is capax Dei that the incarnation ("The Word
became flesh" of Jn. 1:14) is, from the perspective of the human, possible. If the "flesh," i.e. human
nature itself, were not open to the infinite Word, the Word could not itself become enfleshed. It
could merely lie "alongside of" but not be one with the flesh, as is the case with the classical two-
nature Christology. cxxxiii
Hence according to this anthropological Christology, it is precisely Jesus as human, in his
"bare humanity" who is God's expression in history. Precisely, and only, as human, Jesus is the
primordial sacrament, exegesis or grammar of the divine. One need not nor must not look for the
divine in Jesus "alongside of" or "behind" the humanity. The human of Jesus is the historical
expression of the divine. "We must learn to see that what is human in Jesus is not something human
(and as such uninteresting for us in the world) and 'in addition' God's as well (and in this respect
alone important...). On the contrary, in this view the everyday human reality of this life is God's Ek-
sistence...; it is human reality and so God's, and vice versa." cxxxiv
Hence, against all heretical tendencies to skirt or downplay the humanity of Jesus and the role
of Jesus' human freedom, Rahner insists that the humanity of Jesus is not merely a passive puppet or
instrument through which God acts. For Rahner, Jesus in his human freedom does Jesus, as is true
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