22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time (year A)

(Mt 16:21–27)

Matthew 16:24 Then Jesus said to his disciples: ‘If anyone wishes to come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow me.’

‘Then Jesus said to his disciples: “If anyone wishes to come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow me.”’ To follow Jesus means to accept and make one’s own the way of life of the suffering Messiah, integrating it into one’s own life and ensuring that the way of this suffering Messiah becomes the disciple’s new mindset. Jesus is speaking to his disciples, that is, to those who had already made a choice for him. This, however, was not the idea of the Messiah that Israel was awaiting. But it is precisely because the address is directed at the disciples and them alone that a radical change in their way of thinking and in following Jesus is required.

His words begin with a conditional phrase: ‘If anyone wishes to come after me’. Following Jesus is an act of freedom and choice (“if anyone”); it is an invitation – one may choose not to. No one is obliged. But for those who do follow him, the question is: how does one move from the way of thinking of men to that of God? Only an inner transformation can enable one to think about the things of God rather than those of men.

Jesus says: ‘Let him deny himself’. This does not mean rejecting oneself or one’s own way of being, which would lead to inevitable psychological and existential conflicts, with harmful consequences for oneself and others. God needs people in the fullness of their human maturity. Denying oneself is not a masochistic form of self-humiliation, but it means that we must not believe what appears right to our reason. It means abandoning all those ideas and ideologies that have shaped us; we must change our mindset and reshape our way of being.

Denying oneself also means being willing to renounce one’s most cherished possessions and affections; it means stripping off the old self and putting on the new, recognising the need to walk a continuous path of conversion towards God, so that God’s way of thinking may also become our own. Denying oneself means shifting the focus away from one’s own ‘I’ in order to make space for and centre one’s life on the Word of God, as the foundation upon which to reorient one’s life. In practical terms, we all have a false ‘self’ that must be denied, as it is based on false worldly standards. Our true struggle is against ourselves. 

In the historical context of the early Church, this meant self-denial and the refusal to compromise, which inevitably led to social and religious conflict, persecution, imprisonment and the tearing apart of families themselves. In that context, denying oneself meant setting aside one’s legitimate needs for security and peace of mind to make way for God’s demands, which sometimes required a bloody witness.

This first rule is the beginning of everything. Without this first rule, there can never be true discipleship of the Lord Jesus.

The expression ‘to take up one’s cross’, which is very widespread in the Christian world, was already known in the Jewish world due to the tragic experience endured by the Jews under the reign of the Hasmonean King Alexander Jannaeus (103–76 BC), who had 800 of his opponents crucified. This act caused a great stir, as it violated every ethical principle of the Old Testament.

In the Gospels, the cross is not given by God, but is taken up voluntarily by those who wish to follow Jesus. Note that the invitation is not to take up the cross of Jesus but the disciple’s own cross; that cross which arises not so much from the difficulties of daily life, common to all people, but from being with Jesus, from believing him to be the Son of God and true God, and from bearing witness to him as the crucified Messiah. Taking up one’s cross means accepting deprivation and suffering, and even the sacrifice of one’s life for the sake of Jesus. Jesus says: ‘If you are not willing to be treated as I am, do not even think of following me.’

Let us not imagine that this was easy for the Jews of that time, for believing in these things meant abandoning tradition, making enemies, provoking hostility and causing no small number of conflicts within one’s own family, risking denunciation by one’s own relatives or so-called friends; it meant being expelled from the synagogue and ostracised. This is the cross to which the true disciple is called: not a triumphant path towards power and the establishment of a glorious kingdom of Israel, but a path rooted in the daily reality of a suffering witness, which not infrequently ended in death.

The verse begins with the conditional ‘If anyone wishes to come after me’ and ends with the exhortation ‘let him follow me’. The Greek verb ‘akoloutheítō’ conveys much more than mere following. It means to keep up with, to walk together, to allow oneself to be guided, to imitate, and implicitly contains the concept of serving and devoting oneself. In this context, the discipleship desired by Jesus is not merely a leisurely outing amongst friends, but a total existential dedication, a self-giving that can even be extreme.

All the verbs in Jesus’ words in verse 24 are in the present indicative, to indicate the immediacy of such a demanding form of discipleship, which challenges every disciple, who must give, now, their existential response so that their discipleship may be authentic.   

 Argentino Quintavalle, author of the books 

- Revelation – an exegetical commentary 

- The Apostle Paul and the Judaizers – Law or Gospel?

Jesus Christ, true God and true Man, in the mystery of the Trinity

Jesus’ prophetic discourse (Matthew 24–25)

All Generations Will Call Me Blessed

Catholics and Protestants Compared – In Defence of the Faith

The Church and Israel According to St Paul – Romans 9–11

(Available on Amazon)