The Divinity of Jesus
The Data
Dealing with our desire for proof
Our minds are designed to seek the truth.
We hunger for certitude.
We don't want to be fooled.
We know that there are liars, cheats, thieves, perverts, and self-deluded or deranged people who claim to be "apostles."
We scorn those who are incapable of critical thinking.
We know that messages can get garbled in transmission.
We cannot worship what we do not believe to be true.
We cannot love what is wholly unintelligible.
If we do not have a logically prior conviction that there is a God, it is impossible for us to be convinced that Jesus is God the Son.
Our capacity for the proper act of faith--a reasonable act of intellect and will, not "blind faith"--is weaken by our culture's hatred of religion. We have been culturally conditioned to "think" (really, just to feel) that the way to truth is to doubt everything.
Gospel of John
17 But Jesus answered them, “My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.â€
18 For this reason the Jews tried all the more to kill him, because he not only broke the sabbath but he also called God his own father, making himself equal to God.
19 Jesus answered and said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, a son cannot do anything on his own, but only what he sees his father doing; for what he does, his son will do also.â€
The Dogma
The doctrine of the Trinity teaches us that Jesus is God, the Son.
He is one Divine Person.
In the Incarnation, that single Divine Person, Who always has existed and can never not exist, took on a second nature.
Taking on a human nature did not change Jesus' Divine nature nor did it change His human nature. He is one Person in two natures.
The Consciousness of Jesus
None of our business.
His problem, not ours.
Dogma: two wills in Jesus.
Speculation: two consciousnesses in Jesus.
He is "truly God" and "truly human."
Human beings grow in awareness of who we are.
- "And Jesus advanced (in) wisdom and age and favor before God and man" (Lk 2:52).
- Letter to the Hebrews: He learned from suffering.