Radical following, unconditional journeying with Jesus means: leaving everything behind, placing no limiting conditions, betting everything on a single card, going after Jesus – simply and literally – without knowing where it will lead us. What the first disciples do is a decisive, albeit certainly not meticulously thought-out obedient consent to Jesus' instruction. It is something that is in line with the perfect yes of the "handmaid of the Lord"... If Mary had limited her yes, she would have placed obstacles in the way of God's Word... And so it is with the yes of the disciples, who leave everything behind, initially a literal, unequivocal yes, as corresponds to the verbal form of Jesus' call. Only this starting point allows and justifies the "spiritual" interpretation: even those who earn money, who possess earthly wealth, should behave as if they owned nothing, that is, as if they obediently put all their possessions into the service of the Lord.
(Hans Urs von Balthasar /1905–1988/, excerpt from the text Priesthood Spirituality)
