Chapter 1. The Symbol for salvation: doxology and theology of the Nicene dogma - 2.1 Seeing Christ in all his greatness

22Nicaea allows us to ‘see Christ in all his greatness’.[33] The two dimensions that make him the unique mediator between God and humanity are marked by the mention of the two agents in the incarnation: “He became incarnate of the Holy Spirit and of the Virgin Mary.” He is fully God, coming from a Virgin by the power of the Spirit of God; he is fully human, born of a woman. He is homoousios with the Father but also with us, according to the later double statement of Chalcedon[34] - bearing in mind that the term homoousios cannot have a univocal meaning when it comes to relating the incarnate Son to the Father and to human beings. The Word made flesh is the Word of God itself, which assumes in a unique and irreversible way a singular and finite humanity. It is because Jesus was personally (hypostatically) identical with the eternal Son that he was able, by suffering human death in a tragic way, to remain in a living relationship with the Father and transform separation from God, sin and death (cf. Rom 6:23) into access to God (cf. 1 Cor 15:54-56; Jn 14:6b). It is because Jesus was a true human being – ‘in all respects like us, except for sin’ (Heb 4:15) – that he was able to bear our sin and pass through death. This double consubstantiality means that Christ alone can save. He alone can work salvation. He alone is the communion of human beings with the Father.[35] He alone is the Saviour of all human beings of all times. No other human being can be this before him or after him. The unheard-of perfect communion between God and humanity has been realised in Christ, beyond any form of realisation that human beings themselves can imagine.