At these words, all bow...
You may have noticed that, as we pray the Creed, the
missalette reads: [At the
words that follow up to and including and became man, all bow.] This insertion is followed by the line, and by the
Holy Spirit
was incarnate of
the Virgin Mary, and became man.
So why
do we bow here? Tradition has it that we
owe the gesture to King Louis IX (Saint Louis) of France, who would
genuflect during the Creed in honor of the Incarnation. The act of bowing is thus related to the
celebration of Christmas, which is first and foremost a celebration of the Incarnation of our Lord, God-made-flesh,
the divine becoming human and dwelling on earth. We bow during this part of the prayer, then,
to honor this gift from God that is central to salvation history, an act that
we are called to hold in our hearts; the bow marks our deeply held belief in
the Incarnation. As our words proclaim
that belief, we join to those words a gesture that marks our profound reverence
for Jesus’ coming to earth, to live, and die, as a man.
Image source: Andrea Mantegna, Adoration of the Shepherds, 1450-1451
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