Dead In Christ

Mens itaque bona , si rationi intendat: sed parum perfecta, nisi habeat gubernacula Christi. Venit enim Dominus Jesus, qui nostras passiones cruci suae affigeret, peccata donaret: in cujus morte justificati sumus, ut totus mundus ejus mundaretur sanguine. Denique in morte ipsius baptizati sumus. Si igitur in illius morte dimittuntur nobis peccata, etiam paccatorum nobis passiones in illius morte moriantur, illius crucis clavis affixae teneantur. Si in illius morte mortui sumus, quid iterum tanquam viventes ad ea quae sunt mundana revocamur? Quid nobis elementis hujus mundi? Quid cum cupiditatilius? Quid cum luxuria atque lascivia quibus cum Christo mortui sumus? Quod si simus in Christo mortui, in Christo resurreximus; cum Christo igitur versemur: cum Christo superiora quae sunt, non quae corruptibilia et terrena quaeramus. Christus resurgens, a mortuis veterem hominem affixum cruci reliquit, novum resuscitavit. Sanctus Ambrosius Mediolanensis, De Jocob Et Vita Beata, Liber I, Caput V Source: Migne PL 14.606 b-c

Thus the mind is good if it is directed to reason, but it lacks perfection unless it has the guidance of Christ, The Lord Jesus came who nailed our passions to his cross, to forgive sin, in whose death we are justified, that the whole world might be cleansed with His blood. Then in His death we were baptised. If therefore in His death we are forgiven our sins, the passions for our sins in us die the death, being held with nails to his cross. And if in His death we have died, why again as ones living are we recalled to worldly things? What to us are the elements of the world? Why have we do to with base desires? What is luxury and lasciviousness to those who have died with Christ? For if we are dead in Christ, in Christ we have arisen, by which, therefore, we are turned to Christ, with Christ seeking things above, not things corruptible and mundane. 1 When Christ rose from the dead He left the old man nailed to the cross and lifted up the new man. Saint Ambrose, from On Jacob and the Good Life, Book 1, Chapter 5  1 Col 3.1-2