HOMILY FOR FRIDAY 33RD WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME – Year I (Memorial of Saints Andrew Dung-Lac and his companions).
THEME: Our attitude to witnessing!
By: Rev Fr Oselumhense Anetor (Uromi Diocese)
I Macc.4:36-37,52-59; Luke 19:45-48
There have been times when I have struggled with the tendency to hate others. Yes! However, whenever I read the story of the 117 martyrs we celebrate today, I change my mind completely. I find that I have no justification whatsoever to be angry with the people I want to hate. If anything, I have every reason to be grateful to God for them. They offer me an opportunity to experience persecution. Persecutions make us better. Andrew and his companions knew that ministry in Vietnam was suicidal. Yet they went. Before they got killed, they had succeeded in getting Vietnamese converts to love persecution as they did.
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Friends, of these 117 Martyrs, there were 96 Vietnamese, 11 Spanish, and 10 French; comprising 8 Bishops, 50 priests, and 59 lay people. Of these, 72 were beheaded, 22 strangled, 6 burned alive, 5 torn to pieces while still alive, and 9 died of torture in prison. Did you know that Vietnam was so hostile to Christians that over 130,000 of them were killed in several persecutions from 1625-1886? Like Judas and his brothers in the first reading, and like Jesus in the gospel, these Martyrs preferred to die witnessing, than allow anything or anyone desecrate God’s sanctuary. What is more? These martyrs also forgave their persecutors.
Good morning dear. God bless your day ahead. St. Andrew and his companions, pray for us!
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