Jesus Christ, The Son Intimately United With The Father

"No one knows the So except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and any one to whom the Son chooses to reveal him" (Mt 11,27 and Lk 10,22).

The Son, therefore, reveals the Father as he who "knows" him and has sent him as Son to "speak" to mankind through him (cf. Heb 1,7) in a further and definitive way.

Indeed, it is precisely this only Son whom the Father "has given" for the salvation of the world, so that in him and through him man might attain eternal life (cf. Jn 3,16).

Jesus insists on making known to his disciples that he is united to the Father by a special bond. "All mine are thine, and thine are mine" (Jn 17,10).

He then asks for unity for his present and future disciples in relation of such union and "communion" with that which exists only between the Father and the Son: "that all may be one as you, Father, are in me, and I in you; that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that you sent me " (Jn 17,21-23).

This reciprocal compenetration - the expression of the communion of persons - reveals the measure of the reciprocal belonging and the intimacy of the reciprocal relationship of the Father and the Son.

In the Cenacle Jesus says to the apostles, "No one comes to the Father but by me. If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. . . Philip said to him, Lord, show us the Father, and we shall be satisfied'. Jesus said to him, 'Have I been with you so long, and yet you do not know me, Philip?' He who has seen (sees) me has seen (sees) the Father'. . . 'Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me?'" (Jn 14,6-10).

"He who sees me sees the Father." The New Testament is completely marked by the light of this Gospel truth. The Son is the reflection of his (the Father's) glory, he is "the very stamp of his nature" (Heb 1,3).

He is the "image of the invisible God" (Col 1,15). He is the epiphany of God. When he became man, taking on "the form of a servant" and "becoming obedient unto death" (cf. Phil 2,7-8), at the same time he became for all those who accepted his teaching "the way", the way to the Father, whereby he is "the Truth and the Life" (Jn 14,6).