According to St. Paul's reflection, Jesus died for us all so that we might no longer live for ourselves but for him who died for our sakes and rose again from the dead. To live no longer for ourselves: this is a very high ideal, and we may reflect whether Paul really believed that it was possible. This ideal of utter selflessness arising from Christian love was clearly a part of Paul's spirituality, since he repeats it in different forms elsewhere in his letters; thus he writes to the Philippians (2:3-4): "There must be no competition among you, no conceit, but everybody is to be self-effacing. Always think of the other person rather than of yourself, so that no one thinks of his own interests first, but everyone thinks of other people's interests instead." In our Christian understanding of religion, negative statements are always to be accompanied by a positive counterpart. Therefore not only are we asked to live no longer for ourselves but, more positively and more meaningfully, we are asked to live for Christ. All Christian penance and self-denial is aimed at helping us to come to a close union with God.