Love for life

What do "denying oneself" and "hating one's life" mean? These words, wrongly understood, have sometimes portrayed Christianity as a religion that humiliates man, whereas Jesus came so that man might have life and have it abundantly. The fact is that Christ, unlike the false teachers of the past and present, does not deceive. He knows the human creature in his depths and knows that, in order to attain life, he must go through a "passage", a "passover", from the slavery of sin to the freedom of God's children by renouncing the "old man" to make way for the new man, redeemed by Christ.

"He who loves his life loses it". These words do not express contempt for life but, on the contrary, authentic love for it: a love that does not want this fundamental good instantly and only for itself, but for all people and for all time, in sharp contrast with the mentality of the "world". In fact, it is by following Christ on the "narrow way" that we find life; those who choose the "broad" and comfortable way instead, exchange life for fleeting pleasures, disregarding their own dignity and that of others.

--Pope John Paul II, March 2001