Feast of Saint Stephen, first martyr
Saint Stephen is a shock every year right after Christmas. This deacon who preached Christ’s coming, passion, and resurrection and who receives a violent death from those who hear. His end seems so far from the beginning of Christ’s life, resting in the manger. Yet, why has Christ come? For us! And how have we come to know this goal of His coming? Because He has sent messengers to announce it to each generation throughout the world.
Peace incarnate commissions witnesses, and sends them to so many who are in such great need of peace. Christ our Head makes His peace incarnate in us, the members of His Body. He extends His peace to an unsettled world through those whom He has made sharers of His peace, of Himself. In certain extreme times and places, the most radical witness is given as we see first with Stephen, who continues to commend himself and his persecutors to Christ even in his last minutes. This martyr calls us to consider those insistent messengers of peace has Our Lord sent to us in our lives. Whose love and sincerity and humility and honesty have we rejected when we were not peaceful, only to reflect later and repent and so receive the peace they were sent to share?
Today, let us ask Saint Stephen to pray for us, that we may fix our eyes on Christ as he did, and so insist on sharing His peace with someone in our life who needs it, even if we must face rejection. Let us place ourselves and our neighbors in the hands of Christ who was born for us and for them. “...whoever endures to the end shall be saved.” (Mark 10:22)