Sunday 24 (B-2006):
Consequential Faith
Peter’s answer to the question of Jesus is correct. Jesus is
indeed the Christ.
But Peter did not really understand what that
meant.
He thought it meant power and glory. He saw Jesus
as a super-emperor, greater than Caesar and David rolled into one.
But Jesus corrected Peter’s mistake. To
be the Christ means instead rejection, torture, murder and then, only then, resurrection, but to a new kind of life which
makes this life seem nothing.
Peter had to lay aside his idea of Christ and accept Christ’s idea of Christ.
Peter had to undergo a mental and spiritual revolution.
He had to understand that Jesus had come not to
crush the “gadfly” called Caesar, but the three-headed dragon called sin, death and Devil. His was not a battle
of swords but of spirits.
For anyone who says with Peter, “Jesus, you are the Christ,”
there are consequences which must affect how we live in this life if we wish to reach eternal life.
Those consequences are not defined by us, because
we, like Peter, are inclined to limit ourselves to the here and now, to what suits our manifold addictions of mind, heart
and body.
The consequences of believing in Christ are instead
determined by Christ himself.
If I truly believe in Christ, I will not thereafter
trust my own judgment, nor set my own agenda for my life or for the world.
I will not care about my own comfort, priorities,
preferences or plans.
Indeed, I will be desperate to be rid of all of
these if only I might receive from him the light to see his path for me, if only I might live as he lives, as he would have
me live.
Because only that will give ultimate sense to
my passing life, whatever it may hold. Only Christ’s meaning for me will matter.
If Christ is just one more figure in my life,
then, in truth, he is not truly Christ and I do not truly believe in him.
If Christ is just one hero among others, he is
not truly Christ, and there is no reason why I should listen to him.
But the moment I truly believe in Christ as the only Christ, the only
Son of God, then everything changes.
Everything must
change and everything must change.
In human life, not all decisions we make are of
the same value.
The choice of fruit is not the choice of career,
nor is this the choice of spouse.
The deeper the decision, the more it embraces
not just what I do or what I experience, but who I am and who I become.
The deeper the choice, the more it defines my
very self, my “I.”
If I spend my life choosing to steal, I become a thief.
If I make a willful habit of being unfaithful,
I become an adulterer; if I scheme and calculate how to cheat, I become a fake.
But if I choose what is truly good, I become good. If I love sincerely and constantly, I become a lover,
indeed I become love itself to some degree.
The choice to believe in Christ ought
also to lead to the same conclusion: I become a Christian.
But I will be
truly a Christian only to the degree that my faith in Christ is a profound and personal
choice which involves the depths of my being.
Like Peter, however, I may say, “You are
the Christ” to Jesus, yet resist the consequences of that faith, and be startled to hear Jesus say, “Get behind
me, Satan.”
For, just as there are consequences for Christ
in being the Christ (rejection, torture, murder and resurrection), so there are consequences for the one who truly and consciously wants to follow Christ.
And what are those consequences?
“Whoever wishes to come after me must deny
himself, take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for
my sake and that of the gospel will save it.”
“Whoever wishes to save his life will lose it”: what does
that mean?
We misunderstand Jesus if we think he is saying
we should not look after our lives and defend them legitimately.
What he means is that if a person’s fundamental
attitude in life is one of self-centered enjoyment, one of a jealous grabbing of things for oneself, with no sincere concern
or love for anyone else, then that person will, in the end, lose the very self to which they have been clinging, because that
self is false.
And why is that?
Because the very structure, the very nature, the
very truth of the human person is one of gift, not of grab!
You possess your true self only in giving your
true self and in denying your false self, the self who is a grasping egocentric.
The human person is a gift of God, a gift which can only find its own truth and fulfillment in giving, in self-giving.
The authentic fundamental attitude of being a
human person is to give.
Not to give yourself is to be lost to your true
self.
To give yourself is to be found to your true self.
Denial of the false self is simply the flip side
of the gift of the true self.
The words of Jesus are therefore a straightforward
statement of the fundamental truth of human existence.
But they go farther, because they reveal to us the ultimate destination
of that gift we make of ourselves or of our refusal to make that gift.
Other human beings cannot save us from death,
no matter how fully we give ourselves to one another.
But Jesus says, “Whoever loses his life
for my sake and that of the Gospel will save it” (remember: Jesus is the Gospel).
Losing life here means giving it, i.e. loving
without reserve.
In other words, the truest and deepest motivation
for giving ourselves, that way of giving which alone can give us life, is to give ourselves for the sake of Jesus and the
Gospel.
In the end, if we give ourselves to others for
Jesus’ sake, we give ourselves to Jesus.
We return to the Giver, our Creator, the gift
of our very selves and find in him our roots, our home, our bliss.
Alas, the opposite is also true. Whoever fails
to give himself, but clings jealously to himself, will eventually lose himself, for the true self is not to be found in oneself
but only in the other and, ultimately, in that Other who is Christ.
The total, radical surrender of ourselves to Christ
in absolute trust is what faith means!
To believe in Christ, then, must eventually lead
to a total union and intimacy with him.
This is, of course, a gift of grace for which
we must pray, but it is also a task at which we must work every day.
To believe in Christ is no mere intellectual exercise;
nor is it just some pious and passing thought.
It is a full-time occupation and preoccupation
of mind, heart and body.
It is total and all-embracing as no other cause,
relationship or goal can be.
Its goal is to lead to such interior union with
Christ that I become constantly aware of him whatever is happening in me or around me.
If I try to exclude Christ from some dimension
of my life, then my faith is as yet not what Christ wants it to be.
If only we Christians would accept this incredible
gift of faith with simplicity and openness of heart, Christ would transform our lives, the Church and, yes, the scarred and
muddied face of this beautiful earth!
O Catholic Christian, where is your faith in Christ?
Pray for it!
Labor for it!
Suffer for it!
And, yes, for the sake of Christ our Beloved and
his Gospel, be ready to die for it!
Msgr.
Peter Magee
Sunday
September 17th, 2006
Annunciation,
DC: 5.30 pm Vigil & 7.00 am
