'Let us love, because He first loved us.' We did not yet love Him: by loving we are made beautiful... our soul, my brethren, is ugly because of sin: by loving God it becomes beautiful... He first loved us, Who is always beautiful; and what were we when He loved us, but foul and ugly? But not to leave us foul; but to change us, and from deformity make us beautiful. How shall we become beautiful? By loving Him who is always beautiful. In as much as love grows in you, in so much beauty grows; for love is itself the beauty of the soul.
'He had no form of comeliness that we should look at Him.' The deformity of Christ forms you. For if He had not wished to be deformed you would not have received back the form that you lost. Therefore, He hung deformed upon the cross, but His deformity was our beauty.
The Bridegroom made Himself ugly for the sake of the ugly Bride, in order to make her beautiful.
'He had no form of comeliness that we should look at Him.' The deformity of Christ forms you. For if He had not wished to be deformed you would not have received back the form that you lost. Therefore, He hung deformed upon the cross, but His deformity was our beauty.
The Bridegroom made Himself ugly for the sake of the ugly Bride, in order to make her beautiful.
Why do you seek beauty O soul? That your Betrothed may love you; for you displease Him by your ugliness. First let your deformity displease you and then you will deserve beauty from Him... For He who formed you will reform you.
His Bride, His beautiful one, but by Him made beautiful; ugly before, because of sin, after forgiveness and grace, beautiful.
That you might know that Christ, Who is loved, is beautiful, the Prophet says, 'Fairer in beauty than the children of men,' His beauty surpasses that of all men. What is it we love in Christ - His crucified limbs, His pierced side, or His love? Love is loved. He loved us, that we might in turn love Him; and that we might return His love He has given us His Spirit.
There is a beauty in righteousness... it seeks men's eyes and inflames its lovers. For this, the martyrs, treading underfoot the world, shed their blood. What did they love when they renounced everything? For were they not lovers? He who does not love is cold, is dead... Let us love, but that beauty which seeks the eyes of the heart... Men exclaim, they cry aloud, they say everywhere, How good! How excellent! What do they see? Is it righteousness they see, in which an old man bowed down is beautiful...?
St Augustine
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