Reading Love Alone is Credible

I am struggling with a dense little book by Hans Urs von Balthasar called Love Alone is Credible.

While toodling around the 'net for some helpful essays about the book I found this by Fr. John R. Cihak:

Balthasar argues that the beautiful is the first point of insight by which one perceives God’s revelation. God’s appearance in the world is analogous to the aesthetical encounter. Analogy is the only possible means whereby man may speak about God without depriving him of his absolute mystery, or the believer the possibility of articulating an explanation of divine revelation. Analogy neither distances nor compromises God’s absolute transcendence and love. What corresponds to "beauty" on the natural plane is the Lord’s "glory" on the divine plane.

The Father, Son and Holy Spirit have revealed themselves as one God in order to liberate man and bring him to live within the divine life of the Trinity. Man could never anticipate God’s astounding initiative in reaching out to save him.

The Form of the Cross

The pinnacle of this revelation, which Balthasar calls the "Christform", is Jesus nailed to the Cross. One may object, "How can the crucifixion of Jesus be the preeminent revelation of Beauty?" In the ugliest place of human existence (crucifixion and death) God reveals himself as absolute, total self-giving love. The Trinity is self-giving love. Being disguised under the disfigurement of an ugly crucifixion and death, the Christform is paradoxically the clearest revelation of who God is. This love can only be fully revealed in a world corrupted by sin through death, the ultimate expression of self-giving in this world.

And so this is the supreme moment of transcending beauty, a revelation of love visible in the world, yet pointing to a love beyond this world. As St. John so profoundly grasps in his Gospel, the concealment of the Son under the form of the Cross is his glory because it reveals a love to the absolute end. The glory of the Son does not come after the Cross. The Cross is his glory. Even in this ultimate form of beauty in self-giving love, God does not overwhelm human freedom. No one is forced to believe that this crucified man is the divine Son of God saving the world.

As in the aesthetical encounter, the form is Jesus nailed to the Cross. One must decipher the Christform which stands in history as a concrete sign (species). Anyone can stand before it and wonder, "Who is this?" God has disturbed history forever with his provocative sign of love. The perception of faith, however, is beyond the ability of man alone. What is required is a new light. Without this light man cannot see the depths of the form. In other words, the non-believer looks at the Cross and says, "I see just a man." God must awaken in man the capacity to recognize him.

Cool, eh? The book is definitely worth struggling with. Some amazing stuff. Cihak continues:

A consequence of Balthasar’s insight is that the divine love revealed on the Cross is meant to transform not just the non-believer but the apologist as well. He must also be marked by the Christform. As a believer, the apologist has been pulled by divine grace into the encounter of the form of Christ, and so his life must then take on the contours of the form. In this world, divine love is revealed in the suffering and death of the Son. For this reason the apologist can win a person to Christ and his Church only if he first loves that person and is willing to suffer, and even die, for him. The beauty of the apologist’s life will draw one to perceive God’s revelation.

Not only should parish churches be places of beauty and the celebration of Mass be beautiful and passionate, but most of all, the lives of believers must be beautiful. A believer’s life must radiate the beauty of divine love. The work of apologetics goes beyond winning arguments to being grasped by the Christform: "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me" (Gal 2:20).

I'm most interested in apologetics. But I'm much more interested in being a love letter from God and Christ's ambassador because He lives in me. So this is real, practical apologetics.