I think the Incarnation is an essential issue in life. But it is also essential that this be a personal issue and not merely historical dogma that one has been imprisoned by. The issue is always, “What does this mean to me?”

One meaning of “coming down from above” and “dwelling on the earth” (i.e. “incarnation”) is to stop living in my head and to start living in my body. And though this is most obviously applicable to a pointy-headed pseudo-intellectual cerebrotone male, I think it is applicable to the human race. Our task as we evolve, individually and collectively, is to follow the advice of Fritz Perls and “Let go of our mind and come to our senses.” W. H. Auden described it as “flesh and mind being delivered from mistrust.”

And, how is this done? Why don’t I just do it? Well, I wish it was that easy. I actually think it is a life-long process, that it is the actual experience of “working out our own salvation with fear and trembling.” And, that process is underway here in some paltry fashion. That is why I can borrow the words of Leonard Cohen again today and humbly pray, “Oh bless this continual stutter of the Word being made flesh.”