Dear Brothers and Sisters,
In the Upper Room, on the eve of his Passion, the Lord prayed
for his disciples gathered about him. At the same time he looked
ahead to the community of disciples of all centuries, "those who
believe in me through their word" (Jn 17:20). In his prayer for
the disciples of all time, he saw us too, and he prayed for us.
Let us listen to what he asks for the Twelve and for us gathered
here: "Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you
sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And
for their sake I consecrate myself, so that they also may be
consecrated in truth" (17:17ff.). The Lord asks for our
sanctification, sanctification in truth. And he sends us forth
to carry on his own mission. But in this prayer there is one
word which draws our attention, and appears difficult to
understand. Jesus says: "For their sake I consecrate myself".
What does this mean? Is Jesus not himself "the Holy One of God",
as Peter acknowledged at that decisive moment in Capharnaum (cf.
Jn 6:69)? How can he now consecrate -- sanctify -- himself?
To understand this, we need first to clarify what the Bible
means by the words "holy" and "consecrate -- sanctify". "Holy"
-- this word describes above all God's own nature, his
completely unique, divine, way of being, one which is his alone.
He alone is the true and authentic Holy One, in the original
sense of the word. All other holiness derives from him, is a
participation in his way of being. He is purest Light, Truth and
untainted Good. To consecrate something or someone means,
therefore, to give that thing or person to God as his property,
to take it out of the context of what is ours and to insert it
in his milieu, so that it no longer belongs to our affairs, but
is totally of God. Consecration is thus a taking away from the
world and a giving over to the living God. The thing or person
no longer belongs to us, or even to itself, but is immersed in
God. Such a giving up of something in order to give it over to
God, we also call a sacrifice: this thing will no longer be my
property, but his property. In the Old Testament, the giving
over of a person to God, his "sanctification", is identified
with priestly ordination, and this also defines the essence of
the priesthood: it is a transfer of ownership, a being taken out
of the world and given to God. We can now see the two directions
which belong to the process of sanctification-consecration. It
is a departure from the milieux of worldly life -- a "being set
apart" for God. But for this very reason it is not a
segregation. Rather, being given over to God means being charged
to represent others. The priest is removed from worldly bonds
and given over to God, and precisely in this way, starting with
God, he is available for others, for everyone. When Jesus says:
"I consecrate myself", he makes himself both priest and victim.
Bultmann was right to translate the phrase: "I consecrate
myself" by "I sacrifice myself". Do we now see what happens when
Jesus says: "I consecrate myself for them"? This is the priestly
act by which Jesus -- the Man Jesus, who is one with the Son of
God -- gives himself over to the Father for us. It is the
expression of the fact that he is both priest and victim. I
consecrate myself -- I sacrifice myself: this unfathomable word,
which gives us a glimpse deep into the heart of Jesus Christ,
should be the object of constantly renewed reflection. It
contains the whole mystery of our redemption. It also contains
the origins of the priesthood in the Church.
Only now can we fully understand the prayer which the Lord
offered the Father for his disciples -- for us. "Sanctify them
in the truth": this is the inclusion of the Apostles in the
priesthood of Jesus Christ, the institution of his new
priesthood for the community of the faithful of all times.
"Sanctify them in truth": this is the true prayer of
consecration for the Apostles. The Lord prays that God himself
draw them towards him, into his holiness. He prays that God take
them away from themselves to make them his own property, so
that, starting from him, they can carry out the priestly
ministry for the world. This prayer of Jesus appears twice in
slightly different forms. Both times we need to listen very
carefully, in order to understand, even dimly the sublime
reality that is about to be accomplished. "Sanctify them in the
truth". Jesus adds: "Your word is truth". The disciples are thus
drawn deep within God by being immersed in the word of God. The
word of God is, so to speak, the bath which purifies them, the
creative power which transforms them into God's own being. So
then, how do things stand in our own lives? Are we truly
pervaded by the word of God? Is that word truly the nourishment
we live by, even more than bread and the things of this world?
Do we really know that word? Do we love it? Are we deeply
engaged with this word to the point that it really leaves a mark
on our lives and shapes our thinking? Or is it rather the case
that our thinking is constantly being shaped by all the things
that others say and do? Aren't prevailing opinions the criterion
by which we all too often measure ourselves? Do we not perhaps
remain, when all is said and done, mired in the superficiality
in which people today are generally caught up? Do we allow
ourselves truly to be deeply purified by the word of God?
Friedrich Nietzsche scoffed at humility and obedience as the
virtues of slaves, a source of repression. He replaced them with
pride and man's absolute freedom. Of course there exist
caricatures of a misguided humility and a mistaken
submissiveness, which we do not want to imitate. But there also
exists a destructive pride and a presumption which tear every
community apart and result in violence. Can we learn from Christ
the correct humility which corresponds to the truth of our
being, and the obedience which submits to truth, to the will of
God? "Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth": this word
of inclusion in the priesthood lights up our lives and calls us
to become ever anew disciples of that truth which is revealed in
the word of God.
I believe that we can advance another step in the interpretation
of these words. Did not Christ say of himself: "I am the truth"
(cf. Jn 14:6)? Is he not himself the living Word of God, to
which every other word refers? Sanctify them in the truth --
this means, then, in the deepest sense: make them one with me,
Christ. Bind them to me. Draw them into me. Indeed, when all is
said and done, there is only one priest of the New Covenant,
Jesus Christ himself. Consequently, the priesthood of the
disciples can only be a participation in the priesthood of
Jesus. Our being priests is simply a new way of being united to
Christ. In its substance, it has been bestowed on us for ever in
the sacrament. But this new seal imprinted upon our being can
become for us a condemnation, if our lives do not develop by
entering into the truth of the Sacrament. The promises we renew
today state in this regard that our will must be directed along
this path: "Domino Iesu arctius coniungi et conformari,
vobismetipsis abrenuntiantes". Being united to Christ calls for
renunciation. It means not wanting to impose our own way and our
own will, not desiring to become someone else, but abandoning
ourselves to him, however and wherever he wants to use us. As
Saint Paul said: "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who
lives in me" (Gal 2:20). In the words "I do", spoken at our
priestly ordination, we made this fundamental renunciation of
our desire to be independent, "self-made". But day by day this
great "yes" has to be lived out in the many little "yeses" and
small sacrifices. This "yes" made up of tiny steps which
together make up the great "yes", can be lived out without
bitterness and self-pity only if Christ is truly the center of
our lives. If we enter into true closeness to him. Then indeed
we experience, amid sacrifices which can at first be painful,
the growing joy of friendship with him, and all the small and
sometimes great signs of his love, which he is constantly
showing us. "The one who loses himself, finds himself". When we
dare to lose ourselves for the Lord, we come to experience the
truth of these words.
To be immersed in the Truth, in Christ -- part of this process
is prayer, in which we exercise our friendship with him and we
come to know him: his way of being, of thinking, of acting.
Praying is a journey in personal communion with Christ, setting
before him our daily life, our successes and failures, our
struggles and our joys -- in a word, it is to stand in front of
him. But if this is not to become a form of self-contemplation,
it is important that we constantly learn to pray by praying with
the Church. Celebrating the Eucharist means praying. We
celebrate the Eucharist rightly if with our thoughts and our
being we enter into the words which the Church sets before us.
There we find the prayer of all generations, which accompany us
along the way towards the Lord. As priests, in the Eucharistic
celebration we are those who by their prayer blaze a trail for
the prayer of today's Christians. If we are inwardly united to
the words of prayer, if we let ourselves be guided and
transformed by them, then the faithful will also enter into
those words. And then all of us will become truly "one body, one
spirit" in Christ.
To be immersed in God's truth and thus in his holiness -- for us
this also means to acknowledge that the truth makes demands, to
stand up, in matters great and small, to the lie which in so
many different ways is present in the world; accepting the
struggles associated with the truth, because its inmost joy is
present within us. Nor, when we talk about being sanctified in
the truth, should we forget that in Jesus Christ truth and love
are one. Being immersed in him means being immersed in his
goodness, in true love. True love does not come cheap, it can
also prove quite costly. It resists evil in order to bring men
true good. If we become one with Christ, we learn to recognize
him precisely in the suffering, in the poor, in the little ones
of this world; then we become people who serve, who recognize
our brothers and sisters in him, and in them, we encounter him.
"Sanctify them in truth" -- this is the first part of what Jesus
says. But then he adds: "I consecrate myself, so that they also
may be consecrated in truth" -- that is, truly consecrated (Jn
17:19). I think that this second part has a special meaning of
its own. In the world's religions there are many different
ritual means of "sanctification", of the consecration of a human
person. Yet all these rites can remain something merely formal.
Christ asks for his disciples the true sanctification which
transforms their being, their very selves; he asks that it not
remain a ritual formality, but that it make them truly the
"property" of the God of holiness. We could even say that Christ
prayed on behalf of us for that sacrament which touches us in
the depths of our being. But he also prayed that this interior
transformation might be translated day by day in our lives; that
in our everyday routine and our concrete daily lives we might be
truly pervaded by the light of God.
On the eve of my priestly ordination, fifty-eight years ago, I
opened the Sacred Scripture, because I wanted to receive once
more a word from the Lord for that day and for my future journey
as a priest. My gaze fell on this passage: "Sanctify them in the
truth; your word is truth". Then I realized: the Lord is
speaking about me, and he is speaking to me. This very same
thing will be accomplished tomorrow in me. When all is said and
done, we are not consecrated by rites, even though rites are
necessary. The bath in which the Lord immerses us is himself --
the Truth in person. Priestly ordination means: being immersed
in him, immersed in the Truth. I belong in a new way to him and
thus to others, "that his Kingdom may come". Dear friends, in
this hour of the renewal of promises, we want to pray to the
Lord to make us men of truth, men of love, men of God. Let us
implore him to draw us ever anew into himself, so that we may
become truly priests of the New Covenant. Amen.
© Copyright 2009 -- Libreria Editrice Vaticana
© Innovative Media, Inc.
