Icon of the Father

Gospel Reflection for April 24th, 2024.

Courtesy of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception

“Whoever believes in me believes not only in me but also in the one who sent me, and whoever sees me sees the one who sent me.” John 12:44-45

One of the main themes in John’s Gospel is the equality of the Trinitarian Persons of God. It begins with the theologically rich Prologue where John identifies the Word as Christ who is both God and also with God at the same time.¹ In today’s Gospel, we have a continuation of that same theme where Christ is speaking to the people in response to their disbelief. Even after all of the signs that He has done, the people are still unbelieving. Christ implores them to faith citing His relationship to the Father.

This is the basis of what I want to concentrate on today. Jesus Christ is the revelation of the Father precisely because of this relationship to Him. Salvation History is a very slow process by which God continually reveals Himself to mankind over a long period of time. He does not do so all at once but steadily in accord with what His people can handle. Eventually, in the fullness of time, we are given the great miracle of the Incarnation where the Second Person of the Trinity becomes flesh and dwells among us.²

The Word becomes flesh so as to reveal the Father to us. This is the message of the Gospel today. When we hear the words of Christ, we are hearing the words of the Father. For the whole of Salvation History, we received the word of God through imperfect mediums, veiled in mystery. But at the climax of Incarnation, we have God Himself speaking to man, as man. When we hear Christ and look upon the face of the Lord, we see the Father. In this way, Christ truly is the icon of the Father. He is the visible icon of the invisible God.

This profound reality is what separates the Catholic Faith from any other world religion. Nowhere else will you find God becoming man in order to speak to man on His level. While we have many stories of the Greek gods appearing as men, they never took on human nature, it was merely a mask. In the Incarnation, human nature is assumed by the Divine Second Person of the Trinity, and through that action, human nature is elevated above the angels.

Christ reveals the Father because He is the only one who has seen the Father.³ The Eternal Son, who resides in the bosom of the Father⁴ comes to show the Father to us and then, through His death and resurrection, brings us to the Father. He is the bridge between heaven and earth and between God and man. He who unites the divine and human natures in His Person also unites God and man through Himself. At its core, this is the revelation of Jesus Christ. He has come to show us the Father and to bring us to that ineffable vision of the divine Godhead for all eternity.

1. Cf. John 1:1-14.

2. Cf. John 1:14.

3. Cf. John 6:46.

4. Cf. 1 John 1:18.