Friday, November 10, 2023

Leo the Great: “The Dispensation of Compassion…”

November 10: Pope Saint Leo the Great, Father of the Church, Bishop of Rome from 440-461.

It is not enough to know the Son of God in the Father's nature only, unless we acknowledge Him in what is ours without withdrawal of what is His own. For that self-emptying, which He underwent for man's restoration, was the dispensation of compassion, not the loss of power. For, though by the eternal purpose of God there was 'no other name under heaven given to men whereby they must be saved' (Acts 4:12), the Invisible made His substance visible, the Intemporal temporal, the Impassable passable: not that power might sink into weakness, but that weakness might pass into indestructible power… In our nature, therefore, the Lord trembled with our fear, that He might fully clothe our weakness and our frailty with the completeness of His own strength" (Saint Leo the Great).