Confused about christmas prayer

[jesusmademe]

O God, who wonderfully created the dignity of human nature
and still more wonderfully restored it,
grant, we pray,
that we may share in the divinity of Christ,
who humbled himself to share in our humanity.
Who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.
R. Amen.

What does restoring dignity refer to?
Did we loose some of our human dignity after the fall? I am confused. What is going on?

 

[po18guy]

In the fall from grace, our dignity was heavily damaged. We were then capable of things beneath us. God, via the offering of His Son as our Redeemer, has restored us to grace - if we accept His most generous offer.

 

[jesusmademe]

So there are different degrees of human dignity?
I thought you either had human dignity or you didnt.

 

[po18guy]

If you have no dignity, then how can it be a sin to humiliate, violate or even kill you? Dignity is not like virginity in that you either have it or do not. From the Catholic Dictionary:

DIGNITY. The excellence that deserves recognition and praise in a person or thing. Highest in dignity is God, whose superiority over all creation is the basis for adoration. (Etym. Latin dignitas , dignity, worthiness, worth.)

In mankind’s fall from grace, our “excellence” was diminished. This is related to concupiscence.

CONCUPISCENCE. Insubordination of man’s desires to the dictates of reason, and the propensity of human nature to sin as a result of original sin. More commonly, it refers to the spontaneous movement of the sensitive appetites toward whatever the imagination portrays as pleasant and away from whatever it portrays as painful. However, concupiscence also includes the unruly desires of the will, such as pride, ambition, and envy. (Etym. Latin con- , thoroughly + cupere , to desire: concupiscentia , desire, greed, cupidity.)

However, since I am but a layperson, best to ask Father for a clarification of this.

 

[Rob2]

The dignity of human nature is restored through the Incarnation , the perfect union of the human and Divine in the person of Jesus . We see in Jesus the fulfillment of God’s desire to live in a relationship of love with every human person.

 

[Francis]

@jesusmademe

What does restoring dignity refer to?
Did we loose some of our human dignity after the fall? I am confused. What is going on?

It means Man made in the image and likeness of God has lost his dignity by his disobedience ,being a child of God he lost the grace which was freely given him ,since man himself was to restores it Phi 2:1-11 ,But he can’t, so Jesus became Man to restore that grace John 1:16 From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17 The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. Psalms 8:4 what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them?5 Yet you have made them a little lower than (Angles)God, and crowned them with glory and honor.

Jesus restored the dignity by being a child of God in the image and likeness of god as he was little lower than the angles has now become a like angles or companion Revelation 22:9 but he said to me, “You must not do that! I am a fellow servant with you and your comrades[ the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God!”

Catechism of the Catholic Church

[1700] The dignity of the human person is rooted in his creation in the image and likeness of God ( article 1 ); it is fulfilled in his vocation to divine beatitude ( article 2 ). It is essential to a human being freely to direct himself to this fulfillment ( article 3 ). By his deliberate actions ( article 4 ), the human person does, or does not, conform to the good promised by God and attested by moral conscience ( article 5 ). Human beings make their own contribution to their interior growth; they make their whole sentient and spiritual lives into means of this growth ( article 6 ). With the help of grace they grow in virtue ( article 7 ), avoid sin, and if they sin they entrust themselves as did the prodigal son1to the mercy of our Father in heaven ( article 8 ). In this way they attain to the perfection of charity.

 

[jesusmademe]

I read in a book by John Paul II that our dignity lies in the conscience. So what the prayer is refering is the fact that Jesus restored the law or whatever the correct terminology is???

 

[guanophore]

I read in a book by John Paul II that our dignity lies in the conscience.

The conscience is the human function through which we perceive God’'s will and discern the morality of our actions. It is where the image of God in which we are created manifests itself in our daily lives.

It is making moral choices, governed by what God has revealed to us as consistent with His will, that we most fully reflect the dignity in which we were created.

So what the prayer is refering is the fact that Jesus restored the law or whatever the correct terminology is???

No, Jesus fulfilled the law and in doing so, restored us to the freedom in which we were created. He delivered us from the slavery to sin, so that we are, by grace, now able to choose the good that our conscience informs.

 

[jesusmademe]

But it is true that we humans had the same dignity before and after the Incarnation? I mean, did the Incarnation really made murder wrong? No, i dont think so.

Then what does “restoring dignity” mean?
We dont seem to be better people today than in the OT times! Just watch the news on telly.
So what really happened to the law in our hearts after the Incarnation? Not !uch it seems but I am not the expert.