“Everyone … is called to holiness.” This message that appears in the Vatican II Document Lumen Gentium sounds enticing to us, but how in the world do we achieve sanctity? We are all called to be saints, and it is in Christ’s life that we see a model for our own.
First, there are the ‘hidden years’ of Jesus’ early life. This is the time from his presentation until his public ministry, in which there is little written about Him. During these years, Jesus was formed in his humanity by his parents. He learned how to walk, eat, talk, work, communicate — human abilities like our own. He was also formed intellectually, whether it was learning the trade of carpentry or studying scripture. But most importantly, He was formed by his parents spiritually. He learned how to pray and how to worship from his father and mother. These ‘hidden years’ were a time of preparation for the next stage of his life.
Second, there is the period of his ministry. For Christ, this was his time of public ministry and the teaching of the Apostles and all of those who He encountered. During these years, Christ gave of Himself to the Proclamation of the Kingdom, with the goal of uniting all of those that He encountered to his Father. Christ oriented his life around bringing others to the Father through both his teaching and his actions. As important as this time of public ministry was, He was being prepared for an even more important stage of his life.
Lastly, there is the final trial: the crucifixion. Jesus was crucified and died for the salvation of the world. In fulfilling the ancient Passover meal, the heavenly lamb was sacrificed. God the Father offered his only Son as a sacrifice in reparation for our sins and to reconcile us into relationship with Himself. This is what Christ’s whole life had been leading up to: a complete, sacrificial self-gift for those that He loves.
“When Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end” (John 13:1).
The life of Christ can sometimes seem distant and inapplicable to our lives today, but that is not the case. The truth is, we are supposed to imitate Christ, and that means imitating his life. Granted, we likely will not be crucified, but what if we are called to suffer in a different way? Christ wants us to share in his cross, the sanctification of our soul, and there is no better way to see this than in some of our modern saints. One example is St. Maximillian Kolbe. He had the hidden years of his childhood and seminary in which he was being formed humanly, intellectually, spiritually, and pastorally. These years concluded with his ordination to the priesthood, and he entered his ministry. His ministry was focused on bringing people to God. During his years as a priest, he founded the “Militia of the Immaculata” which published a monthly magazine published for the entire country of Poland. He also founded a monastery in Nagasaki, Japan. This stage of St. Maximillian Kolbe’s life prepared him for the final trial that lay ahead of him. This last stage began as the Nazi SS arrested him and sent him to the Auschwitz Concentration Camp. There, St. Maximillian Kolbe demonstrated the sacrificial love that Christ showed us on the cross. For Fr. Kolbe, this meant volunteering to give his life for another prisoner in the starvation cells of Auschwitz, one of the most painful and cruel deaths that the Nazis had to offer.
St. Maximillian Kolbe exemplified the life of Christ in the way that God desired him to. The secret of his holiness, his imitation of Christ, was simply responding to God's grace as it was offered to him during his ordinary human life. We are not as different from him - or any saint - as we might think; we have our ordinary lives, and God has the grace to offer us. How will we choose to live the life of Christ?
Mr. Richter is a College III seminarian for the Diocese of Bismarck.