The following and imitation of Christ

During his earthly life Jesus created interest in the people around him. Many wanted to know more about him. “Where are you staying?” (John 1:38) asked the first disciples after they met Jesus. Zacchaeus “ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him” (Luke 19:4). People went to deserted places and risked even to stay without food in order to see him (cf. Matthew 14:13 f.; Mark 6:34 f.; Luke 4:42 f.).  After his death the interest in him, instead of declining continued to increase. 

Probably Christ is the person who created the most interest and controversy throughout the history of the world. And one could ask, why all this interest in the carpenter of Nazareth who ended up being crucified.  Probably this is because as Christ himself apparently have said to Teresa of Avila (cf., Poems, n. 8.), human beings unconsciously know that in Christ one could discover who one really is.

This is because Christ “is the paradeioma (type) and prototypos (model) for every human being“.He is the “image of the invisible God” (Colossians 1:15), the “perfect man” (Gaudium et Spes, n. 22. 38. 41. 45), the reason for one’s existential reality, being, and ultimate destination (cf. Colossians 1:15-18). 

Hopefully this series of articles will serve as a resource through which the followers of Christ today, individually and within the community of believers will continue to be inspired by this divine model who “has done everything well” (Mark 7:37), to thread the way he, Christ himself indicates: a life within the Church his body on earth, attentive to the Guidance of the Holy Spirit and ready to do the will of the Father in all things.

An uninterrupted tradition

The practice of following and imitating Christ is part of an interrupted tradition of the Christian faith.

The same commission, further explainins:

“No less than his words, Jesus’ actions are exemplary. This is especially true of his will to serve (cf. 13:15), and by the offer of his own life (15:13). Jesus’ authority makes his actions a model for imitation and the foundation of a moral obligation. Equally basic is the commandment, which he puts forward as the criterion of the disciple’s love (‘They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me’ 14:21). The high point of imitation is the mission under­taken by disciples in imitation of Jesus (20:21) as proof of love of the Lord (21.19). The Johannine parenesis takes Jesus as a norm for all conduct, in accordance with the teaching of Jesus himself “Whoever says, ‘I abide in him,’ ought to walk just as he walked” (1 John 2:6).” The Pontifical Biblical Commission, The Bible and Morality, n. 50.

The first Christians

This practice the practice of imitation started by the first Christians. Here are some exhortations that promote this practice in the New Testament.

“Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 2:5)

 “live in love, as Christ loved us” (Ephesians 5:2)

“Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in his steps” (1 Peter 2:21)

Christ’s teachings

It is a practice which originates in Christ’s own teachings and lived uninterruptedly all through Church History in various forms.

“learn from me” (Matthew 11:29)

“I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you” (John 13:15)

“love one another as I have loved you” (John 15:12)

A practice prompted from within by the Holy Spirit to actualise the will of the Father

This practice of imitating Christ, “is not possible for man by his own strength alone. He becomes capable of this only by virtue of a gift received” (Veritatis Splendor, n. 22). It is prompted from within by the Holy Spirit (Galatians 4:6) which aims to assist the completion of the Father’s plan that we “be conformed to the image of his Son” (cf. Romans 8:29).

A practice that acknowledges Christ as revealer but also as a human and spiritual model

The practice of following and imitating Christ, also acknowledges that Christ who “has done everything well” (Mark 7:37), “is not only the revealer but also the model” (The Bible and Morality, n. 101). This is not just an “outward imitation” (Veritatis Splendor, n. 21) of an excellent person, but an imitation of “He Who is ‘the image of the invisible God’ […], the perfect man” (Gaudium et Spes, n. 22) the reason for our existential reality, being, and ultimate destination. Consequently, we are called to live in Christ, with Christ, and according to Christ in order to reach one’s fullness as a person.

“The man who wishes to understand himself thoroughly—and not just in accordance with immediate and even illusory standards and measures of his being—he must with his unrest, uncertainty, and even his weakness and sinfulness, with his life and death, draw near to Christ. He must, so to speak, enter into him with his whole self, he must “appropriate” and assimilate the whole of the reality of the Incarnation and Redemption in order to find himself. If this profound process takes place within himself, he then bears fruit not only of adoration of God but also of deep wonder at himself” (Redemptor Hominis, n. 10).

An imitation of He who already dwells within us through faith

The practice of following and imitating Christ is also an imitation of He who already dwells within us through faith (cf. Ephesians 3:17), a dwelling that according to Irenaeus of Lyons “might accustom man to perceive God and to accustom God to dwell in man” (Irenaeus of Lyons, Adversus Heresies, Chapter 3, Book 20, v. 2).

“Following Christ is not an outward imitation, since it touches man at the very depths of his being. Being a follower of Christ means becoming conformed to him who became a servant even to giving himself on the Cross (cf. Philippians 2:5-8). Christ dwells by faith in the heart of the believer (cf. Ephesians 3:17), and thus the disciple is conformed to the Lord. This is the effect of grace, of the active presence of the Holy Spirit in us” (Veritatis Splendor, n. 21).

An effort to seek oneself in Christ, and to seek Christ within oneself

The practice of following and imitating Christ is also an effort—as Christ himself apparently have said to Teresa of Avila—to seek oneself in Christ, and to seek Christ within oneself.

“Soul, you must seek yourself in Me, and in yourself seek Me” Teresa of Avila, Poems, n. 8.