They are the heretics who, on one hand accept that Christ is God, but on the other, do not admit that Christ became a man like us.  They reject Christ’s human nature.  They maintain that the body with which Christ appeared on earth was not real, but an imaginary one.  They think they are elevating Christ in this way, saying He did not have any relationship with human flesh.  They consider it degrading to say that Christ took on human flesh and became a real human being.

The heretics who rejected Christ’s divinity were the Arians, the ones who rejected Christ’s humanity were called Docetists.  The Church however fought both Docetism and Arianism.  St. John the Evangelist says, concerning those who reject the truth that Christ took on human flesh, that they have the spirit of Antichrist (II John 7).

Christ, who called Himself the Son of God, also referred to Himself as the Son of Man.  Eighty times in the New Testament, Christ is called the Son of Man; and He is called so to emphasize that, besides having a Divine Nature, Christ also has Human Nature, which came with His birth from the Virgin Mary.  He was made flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14).

Christ is perfect God, but perfect man as well.  The Gospels, which describe the details of His earthly life, show that He was a true man, similar to us, and not a ghost or a phantom like those seen in dreams.  As we can see in the sacred texts, Christ became hungry and thirsty, felt pain, cried and felt the need of rest and sleep – He slept on the deck of a ship and under the shade of trees;  His immaculate hands and feet were pierced by nails, His side by a soldier’s lance, and blood and water came out (John 19:34).

These things were written by eye-witnesses, the Evangelists.  They are not fantasies, but real events.  Over and over again, Christ, speaking about the time of His suffering, refers to Himself as “Son of Man”.  When asked where He lived, that he might be visited, Christ answered that even the wild beasts have their nests, but the Son of Man hath not where to put His head (Matt.8:20).  Christ lived like the very poor, and tasted the sorrows and sufferings of human nature.  He did not live outside the world, but in the midst of it with its suffering people, felt their pains and sorrows, and the “Son of Man” cried with them.

Christ is perfect man and perfect God.  This is the teaching of our Church, a teaching which is not arbitrary but based on the Holy Scriptures.  And whoever questions the divinity or humanity of Christ is outside both the letter and spirit of the word of God.

But unbelieving heretics, upon hearing this teaching about Christ, are scandalized and ask: “How is it possible to unite the divine and human natures?”  We reply that the union of the divine and human nature in the Person of Christ is truly a great mystery.  As Apostle Paul says “And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifested in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angles, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory” (I Tim.3:16).

An example will give us some faint image of this mystery.  We say that the two natures were united in Christ “unconfused, unaltered, unchanged, and indivisible”, but let us briefly look into every man and we will see the union of two dissimilar things.  One is the body, the other is the soul.  The first is perishable, the second imperishable; one is visible and the other invisible; one natural the other supernatural; one is material, the other  immaterial.  In spite of this, however, these are united  in man.  How? It is a mystery!  Therefore, as these are united I man, in a similar manner the two natures, divine and human were united in Christ.

Yes, Christ is a perfect man.  But how?  Wasn’t there a perfect man before Christ?  Our answer: the first man, Adam, was created without sin.  He was created with wonderful psychic powers, which, when used rightly would have given him continuous progress towards perfection and he would have become like God.  But as we all know, the first man, Adam, did not remain in the state in which God placed him.  He sinned.  He made bad use of his divine gifts, and instead of being elevated, he fell.  All men, who came from Adam, became corrupt, and their wickedness and bad habits, their crimes, impiety and unbelief began to conceal that beautiful image in man.  They cried and moaned for their corruption and felt the need of someone from heaven to restore the image, to save mankind.

The one for whom men and nations were waiting appeared.  He is Christ.  He is the New Man, the New Adam, the Son of Man.  Christ, with His virtues, appeared in the world, becoming the image – and not just an image, but the original image, namely the unique, excellent example of virtue, for people to look to and imitate.

Man is a marvelous creation of God, a little bit less than the angels, and is divided into man and woman.  Man and woman are equal.  They have the basic characteristics of human personality, reason, conscience, will and the rest.  They do possess differences, but the differences between man and woman does not reduce, but rather enhance the admiration due to humanity.  They add beauty and charm, making human life a pleasant thing.  Since the first man until now, billions of people have been born.  Of these billions of people, men and women, there have been some who have tried to destroy the grandeur of humanity by their criminal acts, they tried to degrade the human personality and put the human race to shame.  Mankind fell from the lofty height of honor and dignity into the slime of dishonorable passions, and became like the wild beasts.  Reading history and seeing contemporary reality, one shudders and is ashamed of mankind’s horrible crimes and shameful acts.  Among billions of people, however, there are still some who, by their acts and virtues, have honored and continue to honor humanity, demonstrating that we were created for a higher purpose, making us aspire for heaven, for the blessed life which man lived in Paradise before the Fall.

If someone should ask which human being of all the billions of human beings who have lived on earth reached the highest point of moral grandeur, in other words, who is the greatest of all Saints, we would answer not on our own authority, but would give the answer to the Church, which is the pillar and ground of the truth (II Tim.3:15).  Our Church, having the Holy Scriptures as a foundation, answers that, after Christ, who is not a mere man, but the God-Man and a Saint in the absolute sense, comes a woman.  She is the All-Holy Virgin Mary.
The Virgin Mary, by God’s grace and through her virtues, came to such a high state of holiness that she surpassed not only every human being, but even the angels and the archangels.  The spiritual height and depth of the Virgin, to use the word of the Akathist Hymn, are unattainable: “Hail Height insurmountable for the human mind; Hail Depth inexplorable to angelic eye.”

The Virgin, as our Church praises her, is ‘more honorable than the Cherubim and incomparably more glorious than the Seraphim’.  If mankind is a miracle of divine creation then the Virgin Mary is the most exceptional miracle of divine grace.
From the moment when the first woman, Eve, sinned and carried mankind along with her into the abyss of calamity, centuries and millennia had passed.  In the midst of this terrible darkness, one hope warmed souls, namely, that the situation would one day be radically different.  The ancient prophecy, the first prophecy after the Fall of the First Man and First Woman, the First Gospel as it was called, spoke about a woman, a woman whose son would fight and defeat satan, and would give the world new life.  From careful study of this prophecy, it is apparent that this woman would not give birth in the usual way women give birth.  This woman would give birth without knowing man.  She would bear as a virgin.  This prophecy about the virgin is repeated more precisely and with different symbols in the Old Testament.  The Book of Isaiah gives the clearest prophecy: “Behold, a virgin shall conceive in the womb, and shall bring forth a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel” (Isaiah 7:14).  Eight hundred years before the star of Bethlehem shone, Isaiah saw the Virgin and her son Emmanuel.

The Virgin gave birth to her only-begotten son, our Lord Jesus Christ.  But how did the Virgin give birth?  Unbelievers of every century have argued against this and will continue to do so.  What do we answer?  We say: “which is a greater miracle – a Virgin to give birth or the world to be created from nothing?”  Certainly, the greater is the creation of the universe from nothing, and if this greater one took place, why not a lesser miracle, the Virgin Birth?

The all-holy Mother of God was a virgin before giving birth, during birth, and remained a virgin after giving birth.  Our holy Lady is ever-virgin.  Our Church preaches this as a revealed truth, and we proclaim this truth each time we recite the Symbol of Faith, saying: “and was incarnated by the Holy Spirit and of the Virgin Mary, and became man.”

We Orthodox do not deify the Virgin, as some heretics like Protestants and Jehovah’s Witnesses accuse us.  We do not believe that the Virgin is a Goddess, but we say that the Virgin is superior to the angels, and that is why we call her Most Holy – that God selected the Most holy Mother in order to take flesh and be born.  For this reason we call her Theotokos, God-birthgiver.  Because of her exceptional virtues she is the perfect example of Woman.
But while the Holy Scripture and the Church in its teaching elevate the Virgin to ineffable heights, and angels and archangels bow before her, we have in our own country many nominal Christians who open their foul mouths and blaspheme her worse than heretics and unbelievers!