33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time This Week’s Martyrs Sitting here in the glorious peace of the early morning on the Capricorn Coast, it is not easy to be moved personally by the words of this Sunday’s Gospel. “Earthquakes” – we have gentle breeze, “famine” – we have excellent fresh foods, “revolutions” – our problem with elections is the boredom factor. But we are well aware that there are people throughout our world who would be suffering these terrors. I think of the people in Iraq who, attending an evening Eucharist recently, were stormed by Muslim militants, saw the priest shot immediately and in the subsequent incompetent release effort by Iraqi and American forces had over half of the congregation killed and many of the rest seriously wounded. Those people who attended that Eucharist knew that being Christian in their country is seriously dangerous. They paid for that commitment with their lives. Would they have been terrified? Certainly. But would they have had faith in Jesus Christ in the midst of their fear? Most certainly. And what is it to us? A great deal. When Jesus instructed his disciples in the temple on coming terrors, his overall theme was not to give them details of future events, a reverse history lesson, so to speak. His theme was to assure them that God would be with them in whatever happened in their lives. Those people who quietly left their homes to go to Eucharist knew that God was with them whether they returned home in peace or died by violence. We who live in peace can have our faith in Jesus Christ strengthened by the faith of those ordinary martyrs. On this Sunday let us ask them to pray for us, that we too may know ‘God with us’ in all the events of our lives.
Sr Kym Harris OSB |