Question 6.101

6.101 The lack of comprehension seems to reach the level where even the philosophical heritage of Christianity is denied. For example, few thinkers recall the Church’s fundamental contribution to the establishment of humanism. In addition, are we not witnessing now the emergence of a humanism that no longer knows Christ?

Yes, indeed, the Christian religion put man at the center of all its concerns, unlike the pagan beliefs that preceded it. The hope for salvation proclaimed by Christ is addressed to all mankind. But only Christ Jesus, the God-man, fully manifests man to himself and reveals to him the sublimity of his vocation. And if it is true that Christ fully reveals man, then it is also fair to say that if we reject Christ, or if we obscure his face, the consequences appear a hundredfold in our confusion about what man is.

Sin blurs man’s face. Now Christ came not only to save mankind but also to repair what sin had broken, to snatch man away from everything that disfigures him, so as to restore to human destiny all its breadth and fulfillment.

Following Saint Irenaeus and Saint Athanasius of Alexandria, Saint Thomas Aquinas states that the only Son of God assumed our nature in order to divinize men. Athanasius says “in order to make us God”. A contrario, Enlightenment philosophy wanted to de-Christianize humanism. But the moment God is no longer creator, man is debased. In Genesis it says that God has a plan for man, to which the latter must be faithful. If man tries to liberate himself from God, he loses his trinitarian structure and becomes dehumanized. Humanism that tries to ignore Christ empties out its own substance and becomes merely materialism.

By preserving a few meager spiritual roots, materialism can sometimes create an illusion. But it no longer has anything in common with humanism that is shaped by Christianity, which is absolutely centered on the face of man, the unique reflection of God. Without a true humanism founded on Christ, man no longer understands himself. He cannot even love truly, or if he does love, he will do so with a lot of selfishness and difficulty.

In order for man to be fully actualized, he is, so to speak, ontologically connected to God by Jesus Christ. There is a vital relation with God. It is impossible from now on to separate man from Jesus, the God-man; this prompted Paul VI to say at the conclusion of the Second Vatican Council that the path to God goes by way of man. The discovery of God goes by way of the discovery of man. The service of God goes by way of the service of man.