In the ancient and popular prayer Anima Christi (Soul of
Christ), we say the words “O good Jesus, hear me....Let
me never be separated from you.”
St. Paul often speaks words that similarly express his
fierce union with Christ. In his Letter to the Galatians, Paul
declares, “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no
longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the
life I now live in the flesh I live
by faith in the Son of God, who
loved me and gave himself for me”
(2:19b-20).
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 Being One With Christ
In a similar vein, in his Letter to the
Ephesians, Paul reminds his gentile
audience that they who were once
separated from Christ because of not
being circumcised are now one with
Christ by being saved through his
blood. Paul writes, “[R]emember that
you were at that time without
Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth
of Israel, and strangers to
the covenants of promise, having
no hope and without God in the
world. But now in Christ Jesus you
who once were far off have been brought near by the blood
of Christ” (2:12-13). Although Paul’s writing style is often
circuitous and complicated, he keeps coming back to the
point that we have been made one in Christ.
A little later in his Letter to the Ephesians, Paul makes the
same point from another perspective: “I pray that...Christ
may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being
rooted and grounded in love. I pray
that you may have the power to
comprehend, with all the saints,
what is the breadth and length and
height and depth, and to know the
love of Christ that surpasses knowledge,
so that you may be filled with
the fullness of God” (3:16-19). One
who is “filled with the fullness of
God” is certainly not separated from
God or from the love of Christ.
On the way to Damascus, St. Paul
had met the Risen Jesus amid a great
flash of light. What Paul encountered
was more than a concept or a
new idea of God’s love. It was a blinding and overwhelming
experience of the love of God shining through the person
of Jesus Christ. For the remainder of his life, Paul, the
great evangelist, carried with him that experience of light and
love—transmitting it, by preaching and by letter, to all
those he would address.
Closer to the end of his life, Paul would write to the
Christians being persecuted and
imprisoned in Rome. He would tell
them about a good God whose burning
love holds nothing back and can
never be extinguished.
Paul was not speaking as a person
unfamiliar with suffering or persecution—or even death by the
sword. According to ancient tradition,
Paul was imprisoned in Rome
and probably faced martyrdom
around the years 62-64. In many
paintings of St. Paul, he is shown
with a sword at hand. This reinforces
the traditional belief that he was
beheaded during the persecutions
ordered by the Roman emperor Nero
(54-68).
Paul’s message, of course, was
meant for all of us. For are not the fears and anxieties of our
age very much like those of Paul’s?
“If God is for us,” Paul assures those suffering in Rome,
“who is against us? He who did not withhold his own
Son, but gave him up for us, will he not with him also
give us everything else?...Who will separate us from the
love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution,
or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or
the sword?...No, in all these things
we are more than conquerors
through him who loved us. For I am
convinced that neither death, nor
life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things
present, nor things to come, nor
powers, nor height, nor depth, nor
anything else in all creation, will be
able to separate us from the love of
God in Christ Jesus our Lord”
(Romans 8:31b-32, 35, 37-39).
Jack Wintz, O.F.M., is senior editor of this publication
and editor of Catholic Update. He is also
author of the e-newsletter Friar Jack’s E-spirations,
accessible at www.friarjack.org. |
