This story comes to us from a monastery. A woman had begun visiting the monastery, and, over the years and after many conversations with the abbot, sensed a call to become a nun. So she took the first formal steps to do so, and with those steps came the traditional attire a nun wears: long, black robe and a black covering that covers the entire head except for the face. When she put on the attire for the first time, after years of participating in the community, the abbot looked intently at her face and said, “There’s the person I’ve been waiting for.” He did not mean that she wasn’t a person before she became a nun; he meant that something new was revealed in her and from her when just her countenance was present.

It’s a paradox. After she covered herself, her true self emerged, concentrated in her countenance, her face, her eyes, her expression.

In the current spirit of the age, it is believed that personhood is expressed in just the opposite way. Self-expression is associated with uncovering, with immodesty, as if the more flesh we see, the more person we see. In another view, however, so much identity and depth and singularity lingers in the immediacy of the countenance.

There is a reason why, when those receiving Holy Communion in the Orthodox tradition come forward to the chalice, the priest utters your name. In that moment of the most urgent immediacy between you and your Lord, you are not nameless or faceless. You are not just the next person in line. Instead, only here are you most you. You are that deep place within you that no other human being can touch, that hidden man of the heart, as the Scriptures say, where only you and the Lord can dwell together.

When receiving the Eucharist, you are all countenance. You have the full attention of the Lord, and the Lord looks lovingly at your face as if to say: There’s the person I’ve been waiting for.

There is a reason why a priest typically does not look directly into the eyes of the person receiving Holy Communion, and it’s because that place is already taken—by your Lord.

Biblically, names matter. When Adam was commanded by God to name the animals, he entered into a new relationship of stewardship over them. They became, in a sense, his brothers. When applied to a human being, a biblical name could convey certain clues about a person’s identity. The name “Moses,” for example, literally means “to draw out,” a fitting name for him, considering how he was fished out of a river to live a life of greatness. Isaac’s name means “laughter,” after the sudden burst of joy that came forth from his mother, Sarah. Abimelech, the son of Gideon, would never forget the standard to which he was expected to rise, because his name means “my father is king.”

And then, of course, there is the greatest name of all. In the gospel of Matthew, an angel of the Lord appears to a doubtful Joseph in a dream and says, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” Here the name itself reveals the purpose. Jesus is Savior. And we notice that the infant formed in the womb of Mary did not become Jesus at birth, nor did he become Jesus at the age of accountability nor at the age of reason, nor at some bar mitzvah. No, he was the Christ from the very moment of conception.

There are three conceptions celebrated on the liturgical calendar of the Orthodox Christian Church. Christ, whose conception is celebrated on March 25 at the feast of the Annunciation; the Virgin Mary, whose conception is celebrated on December 9; and John the Baptist, whose conception is celebrated on September 23. When we listen to the Church services that commemorate those events, we are edified by what we do not hear. Christ does not suddenly become the Christ at birth. Mary does not become Mary at the Annunciation. John does not suddenly become John at the Baptism of the Lord. Instead, the Church proclaims that Christ in the flesh, and Mary, and John—just like you, just like me—possess their full personhood and identity at the moment they came into being. They were full persons, known by God, at their conceptions. This is the Christ who takes away the sins of the world. This is Mary who bears God in the flesh. This is John who baptizes in the Jordan the Son of the Father.

At the moment of conception, new flesh is infused with a new soul, and a new person comes into being. As St. Basil the Great says about life in the womb, although way back in the fourth century, “We do not distinguish between formed and unformed.” It was Abraham Lincoln who said, “Whatever is morally wrong can never be politically right.” Let it be said to all those in the world who may be confused on the subject of when life begins: the Church unreservedly states her teaching that life begins at conception. And to all those, female and male, who have been involved in any way, directly or indirectly, in the ending of that life, the Church unreservedly extends her mercy. Her mercy. In fact, the Church is often more merciful on the grieving than the grieving are on themselves.

Here we all share a united brokenness. Don’t we all need to know that there is no sin, no mistake, no blemish, no wound, no past, no choice that cannot be redeemed? Not only is God in the business of new beginnings, he delights in them. Jesus said, “Fear not, little flock, for it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” Nothing in this world is more important than being right with God. When we open our hearts to God and turn to him, we are using well the life given to us. And when we are right with God and turn to him, we also will face well the death that comes to us all. For then, when we see him face to face, we shall not be nameless or faceless. Instead, he will say to each of us, “There’s the person I’ve been waiting for.”