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This book provides a Spiritual Commentary on Saint Paul's Letter to the Romans. Father Raniero Cantalamesa, O.F.M., Cap., authored it while he was the preacher to the Papal Household.

The book is as inspiring as it is fascinating and enlightening. Probably the part of it that influenced me the most was Chapter 4, "He Was Put to Death for Our Trespasses." This was his own meditation on the Passion of Jesus. Father Cantalamesa greatly elaborates on Saint Paul's words, "Christ, while we were still helpless, yet died at the appointed time for the ungodly. [That] God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us. ... Since we are now justified by his blood, we will be saved through him from the wrath. While we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son" (Rom 5:6-11).

Father says that in the past, "Christian piety dwelt much more on the bodily suffering than on the spiritual suffering of Christ." However, he states that if we put together all the pain suffered by all who lived throughout the centuries, it would be greater than the pain Jesus endured, whereas, from the moral point of view all the suffering and sorrows together of all peoples will never equal the Passion of the Redeemer's soul. Saints and mystics, by living Christ's Passion themselves help us to realize that if God's love is "a never-ending ocean, bottomless and shoreless," so too is God's sorrow. The following are only a few excerpts from which I hope you can grasp at least some of what Father Cantalamesa describes Jesus experiencing in his Passion--for you and me. He tells us that Jesus was not simply suffering and expiating those sins, though remaining detached and untouched by sin. No, Sin was in him.
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... he bore it because he had freely "taken it on to himself": "He himself bore our sins in his body" ("body" meaning here his very person) (1 Pt 2:24). He felt he was in some way the sin of the world. For once, let us give a name to the reality of sin so that it will not remain something abstract to us. Jesus bore all human pride, all rebellion against God, all lust, all hypocrisy, all injustice, all violence, all untruth, and all hatred, which is such a terrible thing. (Let him who has ever been the victim of this dreadful sentiment and experienced its effects on himself, think of that moment and he will understand).

What would happen if the whole physical universe with its billions and billions of celestial bodies rested on only one point, like an immense, overturned pyramid? What pressure that point would have to bear! Well then, the whole moral universe of sin, no less boundless than the physical universe, weighed on the soul of Jesus at that moment. The Lord has "laid" on him the iniquity of us all (Is 53:6); he is the Lamb of God who takes "away," or better "upon himself" the sins of the world (Jn 1:29). Sin was the real cross, that Jesus took upon his shoulders and which he carried all the way to Calvary and to which he was eventually nailed!
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Also, Jesus was God. He was infinite. He therefore did not face the same limits that we do. Father Cantalamesa stresses that, yes "Jesus lived what we call today a "limit-situation," but the "limit" he reached was not a relative one, but the absolute limit of any possible human experience." Therefore, he insists, that Jesus:
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expiated all the abuse we have made and continue to make of our freedom; this freedom we want no one to touch and which is nothing other than slavery to ourselves.

On the cross, Jesus experienced the ultimate consequence of sin, which is the loss of God. He has become the godless one, the atheist. The word atheist can have either an active or a passive connotation. It can indicate someone who refuses God, but also someone who is refused by God. In this second significance the word applies to Jesus on the cross. His atheism was one of pain not of guilt. It expiated all the culpable atheism that exists in the world and in each one of us under the form of rebellion against God and of indifference to God. Truly, "upon him was the chastisement that made us whole" (Is 53:5).

Certain Doctors of the Church and certain mystics say that Jesus experienced in himself the suffering of the damned which consists in being deprived of God and in unexpectedly realizing that God is all things and that without him you can neither live nor die and that you have lost him for all time.
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Father Cantalamesa tells us that no one will ever know or be able to describe what all of this meant to Jesus, because it would be impossible for anyone to know the Passion of the Son except the Father.

This is stuff we need to reflect and meditate upon. This was done for one reason, an incredible love for each and every one of us. This book can help us to do this--to crack open this mystery a little more--to be able to pause a little and try to get a better overall view of the whole Passion of Christ's soul and see what new things have been fulfilled in the world because of it. Through his Passion, Jesus fulfilled the great "mystery of piety" (cf. 1 Tim 3:16). Through this piety, Jesus transformed all the impiety, thus creating our new state before God which we now call "salvation."

There's lot's more! This was simply one of the big highlights that Father Cantalamesa gives us!

The phrase "inspirational literature" is often a euphemism for optimistic platitudes and shallow theology, but Life in Christ, though intended for a general audience, is inspirational in a deeper sense.

In a series of homiletic meditations, Fr. Raniero Cantalamessa, the preacher to the papal household, explores the main themes of St. Paul's famous epistle in a creative yet orthodox manner. His emphasis is on going beyond intellectual assent to Christian dogma to a lived relationship with God through Christ in the Holy Spirit.

To explain and amplify St. Paul's message, Fr. Cantalamessa draws heavily on other New Testament texts, Patristic theologians, and Catholic saints and mystics, but his sources are also ecumenical and modern. For example, Martin Luther, John Wesley, and Soren Kierkegaard are quoted approvingly.

Throughout the Church's history the Letter to the Romans has served as a kind of refresher course in the essentials of the faith. With its winning enthusiasm and spiritual depth, Life in Christ is quite refreshing, too.

Enlightening, but not an easy read. Great regardless of denominational persuasion...for me, this is a study lead by an EPC Presbyterian pastor. A compilation of basic truths essential for Children of the Most High God presented in a discussion that will warrant having a good dictionary at times. Fortunately, the initially perplexing terms are used throughout and their meaning reinforced for those who have ears to hear.

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Well written. Great content. It makes one stop and rethink what Paul is truly saying to the Romans.

I am now reading this a second time. Fr. Cantalemessa presents some very helpful and inspirational information on St. Paul's letter to the Romans.

Father Cantalamessa is one of my very favorite speakers and authors on spiritual matters. And this is one of his best books to date! Christians of all stripes will enjoy his exciting elucidation of the Book of Romans and the uplifting message it holds for us all!

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