Bumpy way to Heaven

It is not the first time that Jesus decides to impart to his disciples the meaning of his real mission by asking a question: "Who do the people say I am?" None of their answers was correct, although not altogether wrong, as the reply they gave pointed to a person who was quite unlike all the rest and had some relevance to God's plan of salvation.

But soon afterwards he asks them a more direct and personal question. He was more interested in the answer to this question in view of the mission he was about to entrust to them: "But you, who do you say I am?" And Peter, quite enthusiastic as usual, answered: "You are the Christ of God".

The word 'Christ' stands for 'the Anointed One', or the expected 'Messiah', the person chosen and sent by God with the unique mission of freeing and saving the people from their bondage. So Peter's answer was correct, or at least partially so, as his knowledge about the Messiah was till that time quite incomplete, not to say erroneous.

I wonder what our reply would have been if Christ's question had been addressed personally to us. For most of us, I am sure, the answer would have sounded rather better than Peter's. As Christians, I suppose, we would have said that Jesus is the Son of God, the Saviour of all mankind, including ourselves. But in reality it is not what we say that counts, but what we think, what we believe, and especially to what extent we conform our actions to Our Lord's teachings.

Further down we read in today's Gospel Christ's reaction to Peter's confession which, as we have said, was quite incomplete. "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me". Jesus, as we see, does not at all mince his words. In today's world, when what is pleasant is in actual fact rapidly gaining the upper-hand over what is good and right, Christ's words are falling on deaf ears.

A short while ago many of us have gone to see Mel Gibson's film The Passion of the Christ. That was no doubt a most admirable spectacle, a film which however, not unlike all other presentations of Christ's life, was not altogether free from shortcomings.

Apart from the unrealistic presentation of Christ's flogging, which could not possibly have left even the toughest human body alive long before he could reach the crucifixion hill, the importance given to the Resurrection was conspicuous by its absence. True, the film was about the Passion. But stretching so much the description of the Passion without clearly projecting the Resurrection ends up by depriving Christ's sufferings of their real meaning Jesus has saved us not by suffering and dying for us, but by dying and arising back to life.

The same is with us. We do not win heaven by suffering for Christ, but by loving him, even if this love needs to be tested by sincerely accepting sufferings that are part and parcel of our human existence which, as we know, has been contaminated by sin. There is no better proof of the validity of the above than in the concluding words of Jesus in today's Gospel: "For whoever would save his life, will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake, he will save it".

It is in the light of the above that Our Lord's concluding words can best be understood: "For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake, he will save it".