Homily for Wednesday, 25 November

Saint: Catherine of Alexandria, Virgin, Martyr

Scripture: Lk 21:12-19

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If the gospel message is good news, then why do so many oppose it with hostility and even violence?

Jesus warns us that we’ll be confronted with persecution, evil, false teaching, and temptation. Of course, the Gospel’s real enemy is Satan – the one Jesus calls a "murderer" and "father of lies." And, believe me, brothers and sisters, Satan’s not some psychological construct; no, Satan is very real, and he uses fear and hatred to generate hatred toward those who follow Jesus Christ.

And how does Jesus respond to all this? With love, with truth, with forgiveness. Only God’s love can defeat bigotry, hatred and envy. Only God's love purifies hearts and minds of all that would divide and tear us apart.

God’s truth is essential too. Only God’s truth can overcome the evil and tribulation in the world. Satan deceives and sin blinds the heart and mind. Only God's truth frees us from error and spiritual blindness. The truth. That’s what the Gospel is, brothers and sisters, God's word of truth and salvation.

And that’s why Jesus tells his disciples to proclaim the gospel throughout the whole world, even in the midst of opposition and persecution. Jesus promises his disciples that if they endure to the end they will gain their lives – they will see God's salvation and inherit an eternal life of happiness with God. But such endurance – the ability to remain faithful in the midst of trails, temptations and persecution – doesn‘t come from human effort. Such endurance is a gift, a supernatural gift of the Holy Spirit, a gift strengthened by hope – the assurance that we’ll see God face to face and inherit His promises. In this as in all things, Jesus is our model: Jesus who endured the cross for our sake and salvation; Jesus who calls us to love, to die to ourselves.

Did you know the word martyr in Greek means witness? That’s right, true martyrs live and die as witnesses of the Gospel. The Book of Revelation calls Jesus “the faithful witness ...who freed us from our sins by his blood." Tertullian, a second century lawyer converted when he saw Christians singing as they went out to die at the hands of their persecutors. He compared the blood of the martyrs to seed, the seed of new Christians, the seed of the church. St. Augustine spoke of this too: "The martyrs were bound, jailed, scourged, racked, burned, rent, butchered – and they multiplied!" They multiplied because the martyrs witnessed to the truth; they witnessed to the joy and freedom of the Gospel; and they did so through the testimony of their lives and their deaths.

Our world today is plagued by terrorism, by those who would sacrifice their own lives simply to take the lives of others. They do so out of hatred, out of revenge for perceived wrongs, and out of a misguided belief that God actually wills such obscenities. Despite their beliefs, they are, of course, not martyrs. Their sacrifice is motivated by everything but God's merciful love and forgiveness, His truth and righteousness. True martyrs pray for their persecutors and love their enemies. In their suffering and deaths they witness the truth: "God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life."

And so we must remember that Jesus died on the cross for Jews and Greeks, Christians and Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists, agnostics and atheists. “God so loved the world…” He doesn’t love just part of it. No, He loves it all. He loves each of us. It can’t be otherwise because He created each human being in an individual act of love.

It’s through our witness as Christians that others recognize Christ’s victory on the cross, his power to overcome sin, fear and hatred, even death itself. When the world looks at Christians it has the right to find in them a reflection of the glory of the Trinity. The world has a right to discover in our faith, our hope, and our love a testimony to the presence of the Holy Spirit. The problems that have arisen in Christ’s Church over the centuries, and exist even now, are not caused by the Holy Spirit; they’re caused by the mediocrity of Christians. That mediocrity can turn people away from Christ. What brings others to Jesus Christ and His Church is seeing Christians loving their enemies; seeing Christians joyful in suffering, patient in adversity, forgiving of injuries, and showing comfort and compassion to the hopeless and the helpless.

This, brothers and sisters, is our calling.