To proclaim His perfect participation in our nature . In St. Gregory of Nyssa’s view, human nature is bracketed by two events: birth and death. He who participates in one but not the other cannot be considered to have participated in our nature. The saint says, “Why, that the death is rendered necessary by the birth, and that He Who had determined once for all to share the nature of man must pass through all the peculiar conditions of that nature. Seeing, then, that the life of man is determined between two boundaries, had He, after having passed the one, not touched the other that follows, His proposed design would have remained only half fulfilled … there was needed a lifting up from death for the whole of our nature, He stretches forth a hand as it were to prostrate man, and stooping down to our dead corpse He came so far within the grasp of death as to touch a state of deadness.”322
In Christ Jesus we fully partake of God, and no one can take us away from communion with Him. “If indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together” (Rom.
321 St. Irenaeus, Against Heresies 2.22.4 (ANF 1:391).
322 St. Gregory of Nyssa, The Great Catechism 32 (NPNF II/5:497).
8:17); if we die with Him, we will also rise with Him. In dying with Him our human weakness passes away and we enter into His life of victory over death. The apostle says, “For I am persuaded that neither death nor life … shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 8:38–39). No longer do we fear death, for we find our Messiah, who accompanied us our whole lives, waiting for us and welcoming us.