His Name

Today’s Gospel Text:  But before all this they will lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors for my name's sake. 13 This will be a time for you to bear testimony. 14 Settle it therefore in your minds, not to meditate beforehand how to answer; 15 for I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which none of your adversaries will be able to withstand or contradict. 16 You will be delivered up even by parents and brothers and kinsmen and friends, and some of you they will put to death; 17 you will be hated by all for my name's sake. 18 But not a hair of your head will perish. 19 By your endurance you will gain your lives. Luke 21:12-19

Reflection: The mention of persecution and the type and reason for persecution is something that is unique of Christ as a religious founder, who doesn’t leave his disciples in the dark about it.

He brings out the sure truth of persecution in the language of that time and the reason for such persecution, viz., the name of Jesus Christ or the name Christian.

History has proved it and never in the history of humanity has any followers of any religion faced persecution and even annihilation in the measure in which Christians have faced for their faith all because they carry the name of Jesus and yet it has grown.

Many a times it is not for the wrong they have done, but for the faith which they hold in Jesus Christ.

When one thinks in terms of numbers then it dwarfs the whole Jewish holocaust at the hands of the fascists. 

Even today it is one of the most persecuted group, even in those parts of the world which has been predominantly Christian, on account of the rapid securitization and relativistic morality, each defining a morality that suits them.

Yet in the midst of these persecutions the faith has grown better in many places in the world: “the more you kill the more we are. The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.” – Tertullian, a second century Church father

Is it really the name of Christ that brings about persecution, yes primarily, it has been the cause for persecution, but there are other factors which make people with loose morality claustrophobic by the very presence of a practicing Christian: his practicing presence speaks to the conscience of the unrighteous.

We need to ask ourselves; Do I proclaim Christ and is my presence a source of discomfort to the indulgently immoral ones in society? Does it make the heretic and the apostates uncomfortable? Does it make the unbelievers refer to their conscience? 

Prayer:  Help me know the cost of following you and do so wholeheartedly, never forgetting to witness to your glorious name O Lord!

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