Michael Mantzanas, professor at the Higher Ecclesiastical Academy of Athens, speaks to the Athens-Macedonian News Agency about Christmas and its timeless message. «The supernatural message of Christmas is imbued with a soteriological perspective, it is timelessly relevant and eternally true,» he emphasizes.
In fact, he points out, among other things, that «The God-man Jesus Christ is perfect God and perfect man. The two natures, divine and human, were united in the person or substance of God the Word. With his birth, the uncreated truth, the uncreated eternal reality, enters the world in time. The coming of the God-man Jesus Christ implies the uncreated truth of eternal life after death.».
Below is Professor Michael Mantzanas« detailed opinion on the subject of »Christmas and its timeless message."
«The birth of Jesus Christ, the God-man, is an irrefutable historical fact that brings salvific hope to believers. Jesus Christ, the God-man, was born for the salvation of mankind from the corruption of evil and death. The incarnation or humanization of the Son and Word of God, according to Orthodox Theology, took place supernaturally through the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary during the Annunciation. The supernatural message of Christmas is imbued with a soteriological perspective, is timelessly relevant and eternally true. The God-man Jesus Christ is perfect God and perfect man. The two natures, divine and human, were united in the person or hypostasis of the Word of God. With his birth, the uncreated truth, the uncreated eternal reality, enters the world in time. The coming of the God-man Jesus Christ implies the uncreated truth of eternal life after death. The uncreated truth of the God-man Jesus Christ is an objective reality. With his birth, the God-man Jesus Christ, and with his Resurrection, defeated the material, created decay of death and gave the privilege of salvation to the faithful man. The timeless fact that the God-man Jesus Christ divided history into two parts, before Christ and after Christ, is worthy of attention, unquestionable acceptance, and objective scientific observation.
The message of the birth of Jesus Christ, the God-man, at a time when, according to Heraclitus and P. Bourdieu, reality does not exist, but is merely the field of an endless struggle to define reality, highlights the need to redefine our lives and transition from the illusory power of confrontation, strife, conflict, division, and death to the truth of eternal life. The historical event of the birth of the God-man Jesus Christ instills believers with inner freedom and the saving truth of eternal life. The truth that gives meaning to the birth of Jesus Christ, the God-man, is the transcendence of our obsession with the created and the material, and marks the transition to the uncreated and the spiritual, which bring about the salvation of mankind.
- Michael K. Mantzanas is a university professor (AEA), lecturer in the Postgraduate Studies Program (PSP) of the Department of Philosophy – Philosophy School of the National Kapodistrian University of Athens, and deputy director of the Laboratory of Philosophical Counseling and Philosophy of Self-Knowledge of the Philosophy School of the National Kapodistrian University of Athens.
