I. Of The Mystery Of The Incarnation Or Of The Word Made Flesh
I. OF THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION OR OF THE WORD MADE FLESH
What is meant by the mystery of the Incarnation or of the Word made flesh?
It is that truth, absolutely incomprehensible for us on earth, according to which the second Person of the Most Holy Trinity, viz., the Word or the only Son of God, existing from all eternity together with the Father and the Holy Ghost, the same, one, and only true God, the Creator and Sovereign Master of all things, came, in time, upon this earth by His Incarnation in the womb of the Virgin Mary of whom He was born: lived moreover our mortal life and evangelized the Jewish race in Palestine to whom He was personally sent by His Father; was rejected by this people, was betrayed and delivered up to Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor; was condemned and put to death on a cross; was buried, and descended into hell, and rose again from the dead the third day; ascended into heaven forty days afterwards; sits at the right hand of God the Father, from whence He governs the Church established by Him on earth, and to which He sent the Holy Ghost, who is His as well as the Father's; sanctified this Church by the sacraments of His grace, so preparing it for His second coming at the end of time; at the last day He will judge the living and the dead, having made the latter rise from their tombs; and this in order to make the final separation of the good from the bad; the good He will take with Him into the Kingdom of His Father, and the bad He will curse and condemn to everlasting punishments.