In his classic novella, The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka tells the bizarre story of Gregor Samsa, a salesman who one day woke up as a gigantic insect, without any explanation from the story! After his strange transformation, Gregor was treated differently by his family since he ceased to be its breadwinner. Despite his external appearance as a giant insect (in other translations, a cockroach), he retained his humanity within. Locked in a room and realizing he was unwanted and a burden in the family, he tragically died of starvation as he embraced his fate. At the end, the family was relieved of his death and moved on. Learning of Gregor Samsa’s death, his father said: “Well, now thanks be to God.”
Kafka’s The Metamorphosis in all its absurdity and surrealistic details is a modern parable of dehumanization. Once a human person loses his/her economic value or stops being “means to an end”, it’s easy to throw that person away. In fact, upon waking up as an insect the very first concern of Gregor was his job and the possible negative reaction of his strict manager. This thought speaks powerfully of how socio-economic structures dehumanize workers by reducing them into their labor.
Besides the socio-economic issue alluded to by Kafka, the inexplicable situation of Gregor reflects the fragility of human dignity. How other people perceive and treat us can change overnight. Stereotyping and rigidly categorizing people based on their words, actions, and looks is both damaging and fatal to one’s human dignity.
In the Philippines, for example, we had a former president who publicly denied the humanity of drug addicts. In his logic, these so-called “scourge of society” deserve to be killed for they don’t have the right to live. Human dignity is cheapened by violent rhetoric and prejudicial attitudes.
The celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ is a protest against dehumanization of all kinds. My favorite definition of Christmas comes from the Dominican theologian Edward Schillebeeckx. In one of his homilies, he called Christmas as “the feast of God’s humanity.” Our God is a God who is deeply human and humanizing.
With the human birth of Christ, God reveals the sanctity of human dignity. On Christmas day, we don’t just celebrate the humanity of our God, we also celebrate our very own humanity generously shared by God. “For the Son of God became human so that we might become God,” famously said St. Athanasius.
In the Spiritual Exercises, St. Ignatius of Loyola imaginatively describes how the incarnation occurred. In the “Contemplation on the Incarnation,” Ignatius envisions God gazing with great concern on the world filled with people who are diverse, sinful, and in need of salvation. Disturbed by the situation, God decided to be involved to “work the redemption of the human race.” (Spiritual Exercises n. 107)
The incarnation is the loving response of God to entire humanity. It is not merely out of human demand that God decided to come down to the world. The fundamental reason is God’s loving desire to save us by becoming truly human and concretely being with us. In the classic phrase of Schillebeeckx, God is “Deus Humanissimus” (exceedingly human God): “Through his historical self-giving, accepted by the Father, Jesus showed us who God is: a Deus humanissimus.”
Isn’t it paradoxical that God chose to come to the world by being born in a humble manger to a lowly Jewish woman from Nazareth named Miriam? Jesus did not come to the world as a mighty and powerful emperor or king. Jesus was born in ordinary circumstances. The first ones who saw the baby Jesus were shepherds treated as outcasts and unclean during their time.
The birth of the “Prince of Peace” was marked by violence and bloodshed. His birth angered King Herod who ordered the execution of infants in Bethlehem and the surrounding areas out of fear for the prophesied Messiah. The Holy Family needed to flee from this dangerous situation leading to their exile. The contrast between the reign of the Roman Empire and the reign of God embodied by Jesus is stark from the very beginning.
Indeed, the historical background of Jesus’ birth during the brutal rule of the Roman Empire sheds more light on the Johannine statement: “And the Word became flesh and lived among us…” (John 1:14 NRSV) The word “flesh” corresponds to our vulnerable human condition. Therefore, to “become flesh” means to be subjected to vulnerability, to come down “clothed in human weakness,” borrowing from the hymn O Come, Divine Messiah.
Citing a line from our Eucharistic Prayer IV prayed during the Mass, Jesus wonderfully “shared our human nature in all things but sin.” Since Jesus shared our broken human condition, “his flesh becomes visible in the flesh of the tortured, the crushed, the scourged, the malnourished, and the exiled… to be acknowledged, touched, and cared for by us,” said Pope Francis. In the spirit of divine solidarity, God entered our woundedness.
In the face of forms of dehumanization, Christmas reminds us that we are all made in the image of God. The declaration Dignitas Infinita released last April by the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of Faith teaches us that “the dignity of the human person was revealed in its fullness when the Father sent his Son, who assumed human existence to the full.” Through his Incarnation, Jesus “confirmed that each person possesses an immeasurable dignity simply by belonging to the human community; moreover, he affirmed that this dignity can never be lost.”
Miguel de la Torre explains that the gospel message of liberation is “to convince nonpersons of their personhood, their infinite worth because they, regardless of what the world tells them, are created in the very image of God (imago Dei).” It follows that “all humans, regardless of their faith or lack thereof, regardless of their race, ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation, and regardless of their immigration status, are created in the very image of God. All are created in God’s image, meaning all have dignity and intrinsic worth. Because every life contains the sacred, every life is sacred.”Jesus saves us from the forces and structures which oppress and threaten our human worth and dignity by becoming flesh. This is the meaning of the angelic message: “To you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.” (Luke 2:11 NRSV) As we celebrate Christmas, may we proclaim and defend the truth of the dignity of every human person.
– Rappler.com
