Home Study of Medaille

CONCLUSION

A JUNGIAN COMMENTARY ON THE LIFE OF CHRIST

"What happens in the life of Christ happens always and everywhere."
(C.G. Jung, Psychology and Religion)

Much like Father Médaille and all the great spiritual masters of the past, the gifted psychologist of this century, C.G. Jung, tried to rescue the spiritual treasures of the past and give us a fresh interpretation of the Christian myth. He wrote that "the drama of the archetypal life of Christ describes in symbolic images the events in the conscious life - as well as in the life that transcends consciousness - of a man who has been transformed by his higher destiny." He came to see that "the life of Christ, understood psychologically, represents the vicissitudes of the Self as it undergoes incarnation in an individual ego and of the ego as it participates in that divine drama. In other words the life of Christ represents the process of individuation." (C.G Jung, The Christian Archetype, A Jungian Commentary on the Life of Christ, by Edward F. Edinger)

Throughout this study of Father Médaille's contemplations on the mysteries of the life of Christ we have seen how he invited us to superimpose our present life situation with a similar one of Christ's. Was he intuitively aware of the same insight Jung named in this century? The birth of the holy divine child in each person undergoes "an incarnation" and each individual ego-self finds itself caught up in that divine drama until it reaches individuation: "I live, now not I, but Christ lives in me." (St. Paul) Jesus Christ, in his humanity, is that "meritorious", "exemplary" and "vital" cause of our spiritual transformation. We must make connection with His life and process as we undergo all the vicissitudes of our journey.

Carl Jung transfers the symbolism of the life of Christ to the individual. He referred to it by the term "continuing incarnation". The author of the book, The Christian Archetype, has chosen nodal points of Christian art and experience to express the essential stages in the life of Christ and illustrated them in what he calls "The Incarnation cycle: The Christian myth begins and ends with the Descent of the Holy Spirit:

This is how he describes his illustration:

"Pentecost is a second Annunciation. Just as the first Annunciation is followed by the birth of Christ, so the second Annunciation is followed by the birth of the Church. The Church as the body of Christ is then destined to live out collectively the same sequence of images as did Jesus. According to Hugo Rahner, "The earthly fate of the Church as the body of Christ is modelled on the earthly fate of Christ himself. That is to say the Church, in the course of her history, moves towards a death." The death of the Church as a collective carrier of the process transfers its symbolism to the individual."

In this "continuing incarnation" going on within individuals at all times, we are all passing through these various images. Some may be undergoing their "flight into Egypt", others may be in their "Gethsemane hour"; still others are coming forth from their "entombment" into "resurrection/rebirth".

"Insofar as this cycle represents what happens to a man/woman it pictures the process of the ego's coming to consciousness. But, insofar as it represents what happens to God incarnated in man/woman, it pictures the transformation of God. This twofold process has now entered the range of the conscious experience of individuals. Once again the Holy Spirit descends, this time to bring about a "Christification of many." For the individual this means not an "imitation of Christ" but its exact opposite: an assimilation of the Christ-image to his/her own self... It is no longer an effort, an intentional straining after imitation, but rather an involuntary experience of the reality represented by the sacred legend."

(The Christian Archetype, A Jungian Commentary on the Life of Christ, p. 17-18)

If our Father Médaille were alive today to witness this emerging consciousness - "the Christification of many" - I'm confident he would rejoice and exclaim: "Jesus Christ is the same today as he was yesterday and as he will be for ever." (Hebrews 13:8) Mystic and psychologist come to the same truth, three centuries apart.

"Blessed be God!"