SELF-DENIAL. - A disposition to sacrifice oneself for others, a disinterestedness that is realized in the renunciation of personal advantage.
1. The term does not exist in the classical languages; in decadent Latin abnegatio, in the rhetoricians and grammarians (Arnobius, Priscian), means negation. In ecclesiastical Latin abnegatio sui (St. Jerome) is the denying of oneself, "an idea unknown to the Romans and untranslatable into classical Latin" (H. Goelzer, Nouveau dictionnaire latin-fr., 5th ed. Paris, n.d., p. 9).
An exclusively Christian ethical term and concept, a. is founded on the well-known phrase of the Savior (Mt. 16:24; Mk. 8:34; Lk. 9:23): "Si quis vult venire post me, abnegat semetipsum et tollat crucem suam cotidie." Ἀπαρνεῖσθαι ἑαυτὸν is the synthesis, in the form of a paradox, of conversion or μετὰνοια, whose end (dedication to God) is supremely positive.
On this text St. John Chrysostom observes that the Christian, rather than deny his faith, must be ready to suffer martyrdom, to follow Jesus Christ even unto death. St. Gregory the Great insists on spiritual mortification under a threefold form: renunciation of sin, renunciation of all that separates one from the perfection of charity, spiritual configuration to Christ crucified for the salvation of souls. St. Thomas in his commentary on Mt. 16:24 shows that these various acceptations of the term derive from its primordial sense. A. is not precisely a special virtue; it is not found in the enumeration of the virtues studied by St. Thomas (Sum. Theol., 2ᵃ-2ᵃ). It is, however, a general disposition to practice various virtues in order to combat self-love, egoism, and to arrive at the perfect love of God and neighbor. The acts of a. therefore proceed from charity, which commands and inspires all the acts of humility, meekness, penance, and patience that involve a sacrifice of our interests for the glory of God.
2. Foundation. A creature essentially subordinate to God and to the plan of his providence, man must not make himself the center, but must regard himself as a means for the attainment of the common good, subordinating himself totally to the interests of the whole. (St. Thomas, Sum. Theol., 2ᵃ-2ᵃ, q. 26, a. 3; cf. 1, q. 60, a. 5; cf. P. Rousselot, Pour l'histoire du problème de l'amour, Münster 1908, p. 23 ff.; R. Garrigou-Lagrange, L'amour de Dieu et la croix de Jésus, I, Juvisy 1930, p. 111 ff.; J. de Guibert, s. v. in DSp, I, col. 103).
On the other hand, by truly loving the higher part of himself, man loves his Creator even more, and to cease willing his own perfection would be equivalent to turning away from God.
This foundation of a. also fixes its limits; something the Quietists did not see, who on the one hand neglected all mortification and on the other spoke of the sacrifice of eternal salvation in order to come to pure love (v.) fully disinterested. We cannot sacrifice our salvation, nor the means necessary to attain it, since this would mean sacrificing not only hope, but also charity itself, which tends to glorify God eternally. It follows, moreover, that every sacrifice made for a proportionate motive, for the love of God, will be compensated by the graces of sanctification that God will grant.
3. Necessity. A distinction must be made between the a. that is necessary for every Christian in order to avoid mortal sin and to diminish the number of venial sins, and that which is necessary to remove voluntary imperfections and to tend effectively toward the perfection of charity, given the loftiness of the supreme precept of the love of God to which every Christian must aspire according to his own condition.
A. and mortification are therefore both necessary because of the effects of original sin, of the consequences of our personal sins, of the infinite height of the supernatural end which is God himself, to be possessed eternally, and finally of the duty to imitate Jesus crucified in order to cooperate with him in the salvation of souls. To attain perfection one must possess, if not the practice, at least the spirit of the three evangelical counsels, that is, the spirit of detachment. Above all, the mortification of the dominant vice is necessary.
A. is therefore a fruit of the love of God already strong enough to impose such sacrifices upon us, and its generous practice is indispensable for attaining heroic love, true holiness, impossible without the holocaust. St. John of the Cross demonstrates this in particular, although he sees sacrifice less under the negative aspect of destruction than under that of liberation which leads to perfect love.
Bibliography22 works
R. Garrigou-Lagrange