The Mystery of Godliness

I received this message as a Christmas greeting from dear friends, and just had to share it with you.

This is the great Mystery
Which we are now celebrating,
Of which mercy is the beginning,
And sanctity the end.
He who is purity came to an impure race
To raise them to His purity.
He, the brightness of God's glory,
Came in a body of flesh,
Which was pure and holy as Himself.
He needed not a human nature for Himself.
He was all-perfect in His original Divine nature,
But He took upon Himself what was ours for the sake of us.
He came in that very nature of Adam,
In order to communicate to us that nature as it is in His Person,
To make us partakers of the Divine nature;
To sow the seed of eternal life in our hearts;
And to raise us to that immaculate purity
And that fulness of grace which is in Him.

- Sermon 7, The Mystery of Godliness
Venerable John Henry Newman