RENUNCIATION (ASCETIC). - Ascetical detachment from earthly goods and joys insofar as they impede or slow down union with God.
In evangelical doctrine, self-denial (v.) is a fundamental requirement (Mt. 16:24): renunciation, a preliminary requirement, is its indispensable propaedeutic; whoever wavers before the renunciations demanded by Grace will not succeed in following Christ on the path of self-denial (Lk. 14:33; 9:57-62). Indeed, self-denial, a "refusal" (ἀπόρνησις), opposed to the very person of the ascetic, that is, to his own will, to the desire for natural satisfaction, an entirely interior and spiritual exercise, practically presupposes the renunciation corresponding to the means of satisfying oneself, the "abdication" (ἀποταγή) of goods and pleasures that are in any way sensible.
From actual or effective renunciation, habitual or affective renunciation is distinguished. Actual renunciation contains within itself moral separation, or disappropriation (Acts 4:37), and physical separation (ἄρσαις): the latter is active when it depends on a free determination, and passive when it comes from the providential order (Mt. 4:20; 19:27; Heb. 10:32-34). Habitual renunciation consists in the permanent readiness to carry out every actual renunciation demanded by Christ (St. Ignatius, Es. spir., nos. 149-55).
The first degree of renunciation, necessary for salvation, is the readiness to sacrifice everything rather than commit a mortal sin. The second degree, proper to fervent souls sincerely longing for perfection, places man without reserve at Christ's disposal to fulfill His every desire. The third and supreme degree meets even the most burdensome renunciations with joy and spiritual ardor: St. Ignatius attributes these degrees to humility because of the will for one's own diminutions and subordinations that inspires them (Es. spir., nos. 164-67).
Renunciation, an exercise of the evangelical "hatred" (Lk. 14:26), does not imply contempt for the proper value of created goods, but spiritual indifference (v.) of the will regarding them in comparison with the will of God loved "above all things," and mortification of the passions: one cannot be ready to abandon what he continues to desire and decisively will. The prototype of evangelical renunciation can be seen in the obedience of Abraham as he goes up to sacrifice Isaac (v.), the son of the Promise (Gen. 22:1-19).
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Michele Ledrus