It’s to Die For

by Regis J. Flaherty

I normally hold the door for my wife even though she usually does not need me to do so. Some consider my action quaint and old-fashioned, but I do it for good reasons. I hold the door because I want to express love for my wife and I want to learn how to die.

Love and death are intimately connected. When I professed my wedding vows, I gave my life irrevocably to my wife. I told her, as all couples do in the sacrament of marriage, that I was giving my life so completely that I was ready to die for her.

I haven’t yet had to take a bullet for my wife, nor have I been struck by a car as I pushed her away from an oncoming vehicle. Nevertheless, my love for my wife has involved dying. I have had to forego what I wanted at times—I had to die to self—because covenant love demanded it. And my wife has often had to die to herself for me—and has done so with much more grace!

A love that lives and willingly dies for the other is covenant love—the full giving of self to the other. Covenant love says more than “I would die for my wife if the right opportunity comes along.” Covenant love says, “I will die for her.”

In Covenant with God

The covenant with my wife is not the only one into which I have entered. In Baptism I entered a covenant with God. In Confirmation I reaffirmed this covenant. This covenant, too, is based on love, and it, too, requires death. But my covenant with God has been far more one-sided. After all, Jesus died for me while I was yet a sinner (see Rom. 5:7–8). Even though God has given so much and I so little, it remains a covenant with all that entails. Love still makes demands. The willingness to die is part of the relationship. After all, God is my covenant partner, the divine Bridegroom.

On the Cross at Calvary, Jesus died for His Bride, the Church. In dying for the Church, He died for each of us. And Calvary was no isolated incident. Jesus’ earthly life was a continuing “yes” to love and to the death it entailed.

Jesus’ very incarnation was a dying. “Though he was in the form of God, [he] did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And . . . he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross” (Phil. 2:6–8).

And He died at Gethsemane as surely as He died at Golgotha. At the former, He told His Father, “Abba, Father . . . Remove this cup from me; yet not what I will, but what thou wilt” (Mk. 14:36, emphasis added). He consummated the death of Gethsemane at Golgotha when He said, “‘It is finished’; and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit” (Jn. 19:30).

Our Response

Baptism is a covenant sacrament. Through it, God puts His seal on us (see Catechism of the Catholic Church, nos. 1272–74). We are brought into His family and made citizens of His Kingdom. In the baptismal waters, we make our covenant plunge into the life and death of Christ.

Jesus’ salvific death is not so much a moment in time as it is all of time captured in a moment. Christ’s sacrifice still speaks for us in heaven and at every Mass. That timeless death on the Cross is covenant love offered for each of us every moment of every day, and it invites you and me to respond.

In the covenant of love in marriage, my wife and I seek to lay down our lives for each other. In the New Covenant, Christ has laid down His life for each of us. Shall we not do the same? Is it not what love demands?

Martyrdom is the fullest expression of love that we can possibly show for God. I don’t know about you, but I’m not 100 percent sure that I’m ready for that demand of love. I need more practice.

In this way, Lent makes great sense. It’s a call and an opportunity to practice covenant love. As holding the door for my wife both expresses my love and trains me in loving, so the penitential practices of Lent express my love and get me ready for the bigger tests of life and love. Little deaths make me ready for bigger ones. In the spiritual life these “little deaths” are known as mortification—in the Latin, literally to “make death” or “put to death.”

Mortification enriches my love and increases my freedom, helping me to choose the good and not be controlled by my appetites and passions. By it I say “no” to sin and “yes” to God. My flesh wants comfort, and that is not always evil. But my will is to be set on God. I want not only to avoid sin, but also to grow in love. So I die to self in little ways: fasting, morning prayer (even when I want a little more sleep), studying God’s Word instead of watching the latest episode of a reality show, getting to Mass more often and participating with greater attention and devotion. The possibilities are only bound by the desire and depth of my love. This is the daily living of covenant love. Surely it’s is a small response in relation to all God has done for me, but it is a response I can make to the demands of love, and Our Lord receives it as such.

Offer It Up

There is another phrase that we Catholics use when we speak of mortification and little sacrifices. We “offer it up.” It’s a good little phrase that is rich in covenant meaning. The covenant of the Old Testament required regular offerings to God. The Israelites sacrificed lambs, rams, goats, and birds in sin offerings, burnt offerings, thanksgiving offerings, and other sacrificial offerings. Do you remember the story in the second chapter of Luke that we know as the Presentation? Mary and Joseph came “to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the law of the Lord, ‘a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons’” (Lk. 2:24) These offerings and sacrifices were the response of the People of God’s to the God who had called, protected, and loved them.

In the New Covenant, Jesus became the offering. Instead of the blood of sheep and goats, the very blood of the God-man was shed. The sacrifice and offerings of the Old Testament became unnecessary, for the sacrifice that they foreshadowed had been offered by Christ. As the Book of Hebrews tells us, “[Christ] has no need . . . to offer sacrifices daily . . . he did this once for all when he offered up himself” (Heb. 7:27).

But this ultimate sacrifice is not the end but really the beginning. Christ brings us into covenant with His Father. With and through Christ we continue to live the demands of the covenant. “Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name. Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God” (Heb. 13:15–16).

To find something to offer, we don’t need to look for the truly difficult. The “hair shirt” and other intense mortifications of medieval monks are not necessary. The difficulties and struggles of daily life provide ample matter for little sacrifices that we can willingly bear and offer to God. Smiling at that unpleasant clerk, patiently waiting in that long line, willingly answering the eighth request from one of the children, joyfully going about our duties—all these daily inconveniences can be “offered up” to God’s glory for the well-being of our family and friends and for our sanctification. This is particularly true when we prayerfully join our small sacrifices to that ultimate sacrifice of Calvary. This “offering up” is effective, just as our prayers are effective, and provides a channel of grace for us and for those for whom we pray.

Is This Morbid?

Some of our friends and associates may ask: “Isn’t this mortification thing just a little too morbid? Isn’t this focus on dying depressing?” Love says “no!” Mortification involves acts, attitudes, signs, and decisions all made for love. And they lead us to union with the One we love.

Christ’s mortification on the Cross led to the Resurrection. When we freely embrace the crosses in our lives and join them to Christ, we can hope to share also in His Resurrection. What an honor to join our sacrifices, small as they are, to those of Christ, and what a joy it is to know that as we do so—as we die in those small ways—we draw near to Him in His Resurrection.

Life Giving

Fasting, abstinence, and other little sacrifices we make, especially during Lent, may seem very quaint and old-fashioned to some people. But we know otherwise. We know that they are opportunities to love God, and die to sin and self.

Spiritual writers tell us that mortification and self-denial promote greater self-mastery and train us for spiritual battle. Indeed, the way to perfection for a Christian always “passes by way of the Cross” (Catechism, no. 2015)—both His and ours. The ashes that we receive to begin Lent remind us of the shortness of this life and the need for ongoing repentance and conversion.

But mortification—dying to self and living for Christ—is also a joyful way to perfection. This way of the Cross is sweet. How sad it would be if we had no way to love Our Lord! When a slave denies himself for his master, there is no merit. That is simply what a slave must do.

We, however, are not slaves. Jesus calls His disciples friends (Jn. 15:14). A friend can show real love. A friend can inconvenience himself for your benefit. A friend can give up something that she likes and instead give it to you. A friend can choose what you prefer instead of what he prefers. And it’s a joy to be able to do so! It cements and deepens the relationship, as well.

When we do His will, we are Christ’s friends, and when we do those small acts of self-denial and practice mortification in thought, word, or deed for Him, we express real love. Those penitential practices of Lent cement and deepen our relationship with God.

Yet sometimes we fail as disciples. We struggle with our sins and failings. But there is a relationship that is at the very foundation of who we are as Christians. Baptism has made us children of God.

My refrigerator is full of pictures that the grandchildren have done. And what joy and excitement they have when they give them to me. By these pictures they express their love. I’ve watched many a child concentrate intently to keep inside the lines, the crayon clutched in chubby fingers and the tongue slightly sticking out. A child’s ability is limited, and what he can give is small, yet I find the offering to be the greatest of treasures.

God does not need our acts of self-denial. If we give up sweets, it fills no need of His. When we struggle to stay awake and pray, it does not increase His glory. All our mortifications are far less than even a child’s drawing.

Yet in another and very real sense, when we live Lent, when we die to self, when we make sacrifices and practice mortification, we are responding to the demands of love and bring pleasure to our heavenly Father. We are living our covenant commitment, which will continue eternally when we see God in His glory. And that, my friend, is something to die for!

Regis J. Flaherty is editor-in-chief of Emmaus Road Publishing. He has written numerous books and articles, including Last Things First (about the four last things) and The How-To Book of Catholic Devotions (co-authored with Mike Aquilina).

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