Catechism Part 1, Section 2, Chapter 2, Article 3: He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit, and born of the Virgin Mary (456-

Paragraph 1: The Son of God Became Man (456-483)
Jesus became a man so we can be reconciled to God, that we may know God's love, to be our model of holiness, and to make us partakers of the divine nature.  The Church calls the Word becoming flesh the Incarnation, the fact that the Son of God assumed a human nature in order to accomplish our salvation in it.  the belief in the true Incarnation of the Son of God is the distinctive sign of the Christian faith.  Jesus was not a mixture of God and man nor part God and part man; he was fully God and fully man,. During the first centuries , the Church had to defend and clarify this truth of faith against the heresies that falsified it. The first heresies denied not so much Christ's divinity as his true humanity(Gnostic Docetism). From apostolic times the Christian faith has insisted on the true incarnation of God's Son. But already in the third century, the Church in a council at Antioch had to affirm against Paul of Samosata that Jesus Christ is Son of God by nature and not by nature and not by adoption. The first ecumenical council of Nicaea in 325 confessed in its Creed that the Son of God is begotten not made of the same  substance as the Father, and condemned Arius, who had affirmed that the Son of God came to be from things that were not  and that he was from another substance than that of the  Father. The Nestorian heresy regarded Christ as a human person joined to the divine person of God's Son. Opposing this heresy St. Cyril of Alexandria and the third ecumenical council at Ephesus in 431 confessed " that the Word, uniting to himself in his person the flesh animated by a rational soul, became man." Christ's humanity was no longer a subject that the divine person of the Son of God , who assumed it and made it his own, from his conception. For this reason the Council of Ephesus proclaimed in 431 that Mary truly became the Mother of God by the human conception of the Son of God in her womb" Mother of God, not that the nature of the Word or his divinity received the beginning of its existence from the holy Virgin, but that since the holy body, animated by a rational soul, which the Word of God united to himself according to the hypostatis was born from her , the Word is said to be born according to the flesh."  The Monophysites affirm that the human nature had ceased to exist as such in Christ when the divine person of God's Son assumed it. Faced with this heresy, the fourth ecumenical council, at Chalcedon in 451 confessed: Following the holy Fathers, we unanimously teach and confess one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ: the same perfect in divinity and perfect in humanity, the same truly God and truly man, composed of rational soul and body; consubstantial with us as to his humanity; like us in all things but sin. He was begotten from the Father before all ages as to his divinity and in these last days for us and for our salvation, was born as to his humanity of the virgin Mary, the Mother of God. We confess that one and the same Christ, Lord and only-begotten Son, is to be acknowledged in two natures without confusion,change, division, or separation. The distinction between the natures was never abolished by their union , but rather the character proper to each of the two natures was preserved as they came together in one person and one hypostasis. After the Council of Chalcedon, some made of Christ's human nature a kind of personal subject/ Against them , the fifth ecumenical council at Constantinople in 553 confessed that " there is but one hypostasis[or person], which is our Lord Jesus Christ, one of the Trinity." Thus everything in Christ's human nature is to be attributed to his divine person as its proper subject, not only his miracles but also his sufferings and even his death: " he who was crucified in the flesh, our  Lord Jesus Christ, is true God, Lord of glory and the Holy Trinity. The Church thus confesses that Jesus is inseparably true God and true man. He is truly the Son of God who, without creasing to be God and Lord, became a man and our brother. Because human nature was assumed not absorbed in the mysterious union of the Incarnation, the Church was led over the course of centuries to confess the full reality of Christ's human soul, with its operations of intellect and will, and his human body. The Church has to recall on each occasion that Christ's human nature belongs , as his own, to the divine person of the Son of God , who assumed . Everything that Christ is and does in this nature derives from one of the Trinity. The Son of God therefore communicates to his humanity his own personal mode of existence in the Trinity.In his soul as on his body, Christ thus expresses humanly the divine ways of the Trinity. The Son of God worked with human hands , he thought with a human mind. He acted  with human will, and with a human heart he loved. Born of the Virgin Mary, he has truly been made one of us like to us in all things except sin. Apollinarius of Laodicaea asserted that in Christ the divine Word had replaced the soul or the spirit. Against this error the Church confessed that the eternal Son also assumed a rational , human soul. This human soul that the Son of God assumed is endowed with a true human knowledge. As such, this knowledge could not in itself be unlimited: it was exercised in the historical conditions of his existence in space and time. But at the same time, this truly human knowledge of God's Son expressed the divine life of his person. The human nature of God's Son, not by itself but by its union with the Word,knew and showed forth itself everything that pertains to God. Such is first of all the case with the intimate and immediate knowledge that the Son of God made man has of his Father. The Son in his human knowledge also showed the divine penetration he had into the secret thoughts of human hearts.At the sixth ecumenical council, Constantinople III in 681, the Church confessed that Christ possesses two wills and two natural operations, divine and human. They are not opposed to each other , but co-operate in such a way that the Word made flesh willed humanly in obedience to his Father all that he had decided divinly with the Father and the Holy Spirit for our salvation. Christ's human will does not resist or opppose but rather submits to his  divine and almighty will.


Christ's body is finite, allowing images to be portrayed of his face. At the same time the Church has always acknowledged that in the body of Jesus " we see our God made visible and so are caught up in love of the God we can not see. The individual characteristics of Christ's body express the divine person of God's Son. He has made features of his human body  his own, to the point that they can be venerated , when portrayed in the holy image, for the believer " who venerates the icon is venerating in it the person of the one depicted. Jesus knew and loved us each and all during his life, his agony, and his Passion and gave himself up for each one of us. He has loved us all with s human heart . For this reason , the Sacred Heart of Jesus , pierced by our sins and for our salvation, is quite rightly considered the chief sign and symbol of that ... love with which the divine Redeemer continually loves the eternal Father and all human beings without exception.

Paragraph 2: Conceived by the Power of the Holy Spirit (484-511)

The Virgin Birth is the fulfillment of God's promises.  The mission of the Holy Spirit is always conjoined and ordered to that of the Son. The Holy Spirit is sent to sanctify the womb of the Virgin Mary and divinely fecundate it, causing her to conceive the eternal Son of the Father in a humanity drawn from her own. The Father's only Son , conceived as man in the womb of the Virgin Mary , is Christ that is to say anointed by the Holy Spirit , from the beginning of his human existence, through the manifestation of this fact takes place only progressively: to the shepherds, to the magi, to John the Baptist, to the disciples.God sent forth his Son, but to prepare a body for him, , he wanted the free cooperation of a creature. For this , from all eternity God chose for the mother of his Son a daughter of Israel, a young Jewish women of Nazareth in Galilee. The Father of mercies willed that the Incarnation should be prepared by assent on the part of the predestined mother, so that just as a women had a share in the coming of death, so also should a women contribute to the coming of life. Throughout  the Old Covenant  the mission of many holy women prepared for that of Mary.At the very beginning there was Eve; despite her disobedience, she receives the promise of a prosperity that will be victorious over the evil one, as well as the promise that she will be the mother of all the living. By virtue of this promise , Sarah conceives a son in spite of her old age. Against all human expectation God chooses those who were considered powerless and weak to show forth his faithfulness to his promises: Hannah, the mother of Samuel; Deborah;Ruth;Judith and Ester; and many other women. Mary stands out among the poor and humble of the Lord, who confidently hope for and receive salvation from him. After a long period of waiting the times are fulfilled in her , the exalted Daughter of Sion and the new plan of salvation is established. In order for Mary to be able to give free assent of her faith to the announcement of her vocation, it was necessary that she be wholly borne by God's grace.   Throughout the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary full of grace through God, was redeemed from the moment of her conception. This is what the Immaculate Conception confesses as Pope Pius IX proclaimed it in 1854. The splendour of an entirely unique holiness by which Mary is enriched from the first instant of her conception comes wholly from Christ: she is redeemed , in a more exalted fashion, by reason of the merits of her Son. The Fathers of the Eastern tradition call the Mother of God the All Holy and celebrate her as free from any stain of sin , as though fashioned by the Holy Spirit  and formed as a new creature. By the grace of God Mary remained free of every persons sin her whole life long. At the announcement that she would give birth Mary respond in obedience of faith. Giving consent to God;s word , Mary becomes the mother of Jesus. Accepting the divine will for salvation wholeheartedly, without a single sin to restrain her, she gave herself entirely to the person and to the work of her Son; she did so in order to serve the mystery of redemption with him and dependent on him, by God's grace. St. Irenaeus explains this further. The Church confesses that Mary is truly the Mother of God. From the first formulations of her faith the Church has confessed that Jesus was conceived solely by the power of the Holy Spirit  in the womb of the Virgin Mary , affirming also the physical aspect of this event  : by the Holy Spirit without human seed. The Fathers see in the virginal conception the sign that it truly was the Son of God who came in a humanity like our own. St. Ignatis of Antioch at the beginning of the second century confirms this. The gospel accounts understand the virginal conception of Jesus as a divine work that surpasses all human understanding and possibility. The Church see the fulfilment of Isaiah's prophecy in the gospel accounts.   People are sometimes troubled by the silence of St. Marks Gospel and the New Testament Epistles about Jesus virginal conception. The Churches answer is found in St. Ignatius of Antioch answer " Mary;s virginity and giving birth , and even the Lord's death escaped the notice of the prince of this world: these three mysteries worthy of proclamation were accomplished in God's silence. The liturgy of the Church celebrates Mary as Ever -Virgin as the birth of Christ sanctified his mothers virginity. Jesus is Mary;s only son, but her spiritual motherhood extends to all men whom indeed he came to save. Jesus became the New Adam who inaugurates the new creation. By his virginal conception Jesus , the New Adam ushers in the new birth of children adopted in the Holy Spirit through faith. Mary is a virgin because her virginity is the sign of her faith and her undivided gift of herself to God's will. Mary is more blessed because she embraces faith in Christ than because she conceives the flesh of Christ. Mary is the symbol and the most perfect realization of the Church: the Church indeed ... by receiving the word of God in faith becomes herself a mother. By preaching and Baptism she brings forth sons, who are conceived by the Hoy Spirit and born of God, to a new and immortal life. She herself is a virgin, who keeps in its entirety and purity the faith she pledged to her spouse. Through the Virgin Birth, the Father anointed the Son by the Holy Spirit. The Father wanted the Virgin Mary to freely assent to her role as the mother of Jesus. Mary stands out among the poor and humble through whom God works. She was borne by God's grace through the conception and thus redeemed, and she responded by obedience of her faith. The Church confesses Mary to be the Mother of God. Jesus was conceived without human seed, a divine work that surpasses human understanding. The Church believes Mary to be forever a virgin, whose only son is Jesus. By the Virgin Birth, God the Father was Jesus' only father, and was a new creation, the new Adam. Mary's virginity is the sign of her doubtless faith, and the symbol of the perfect realization of the Church.