Saint Catherine of Siena:
'I therefore earnestly request, as a special grace, the exercise of that supreme charity which prompted you to make man in your own image and likeness. What inspired You, or who persuaded You, to grant men such dignity? It was love alone which made You care for Your creature; You were, so to speak, possessed by love. I see clearly that man deserved to lose that dignity which You accorded him. Such depths of charity cannot be plumed. What heart is so hard that it can maintain its independence, virtually unmoved, when it contemplates the descent of God's grandeur into the depths of that dejected condition which is the measure of our humanity'
Comment: With the Psalmist (8:4), we wonder, 'What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?' Man rises up to God as He is the source of our being and only in Him can we shout for joy and take our rest. Yet, what has God to gain from our exaltation? What did He lack that He was forced by a law of necessity to bring us forth from nothing? No such motive compelled Him. So how can we answer this problem? The answer is simple: Divine love. In the Trinitarian life, God is subsisting perfection, relying on nothing outside of the divine essence. He receives His source from nothing, but He communicates that divine life to us. We may marvel at this great act of love, but how greater was the descent of the Logos to assume flesh and suffer a most horrendous death so that we may have abundant life? What could we offer to God in return, but ourselves? After all, our exaltation will be simply the Lord crowning His own gifts.
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