Costly Reconciliation

“What greater mercy is there than this, which caused to descend from heaven the maker of heaven; which reclothed with an earthly body the one who formed the earth; which made equal to us the one who, from eternity, is the equal of the Father; which imposed ‘the form of a servant’ on the Master of the world – such that the Bread itself was hungry, Fullness itself was thirsty, Power itself was made weak, Health itself was wounded, and Life itself was mortal?  And that so that our hunger would be satisfied, so that our dryness would be watered, our weakness supported, our love ignited.  What greater mercy than that which presents to us the Creator created; the Master made a slave; Redeemer sold; the One who exalts, humbled; the One who raises the dead, killed?”

Augustine, Sermon 207, cited in Albert Verwilghen, Christologie et Spiritualite selon Saint Augustin (Paris: Beauchesne, 1985), pp. 287-88