Live for, die for.
St. Stephen, martyrdom, and Christian witness
What are we to live for? What are we to die for? How are we to handle any difficulties we face? How are we to persevere in love?
For the first few centuries of the Church, during various persecutions, many Christians had no choice but to find answers to these questions. Some renounced their faith entirely (leading to the controversy over Donatism, pushed back largely by Saint Augustine), while others, against the urges of their bishops, sought out the glory of martyrdom and tried to get themselves killed. Neither path stands as compelling witness to faith.
In contrast, the story of Stephen and many of the other early Christian martyrdom accounts give us much to chew on. Today’s First Reading gives us a short excerpt from Acts about the martyrdom of Saint Stephen, according to Tradition the first martyr of the Church. After being accused of “blasphemous words against Moses and God,” Stephen is brought by the crowd before the Sanhedrin and gives an impassioned defense of his words and Jesus’s, going so far as to close by calling those gathered “stiff-necked people,” “betrayers and murderers.” Of course, no one likes being called “stiff-necked,” so, unable to control their anger, the crowd stoned him to death while he prayed, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”
While persecution of Christians continues today in certain places, often to an even greater degree than under Roman rule, those of us in the United States live in a world far removed from any real persecution. Sixty-five percent of Americans identify as Christian, and though this number has been in decline for some time, Christians are not repressed or pushed to the corners. However, it’s clear that certain parts of Catholic teaching have lost their place in the cultural mainstream. That being said, we can’t fool ourselves into thinking that social conflict over Church teaching is something new, or that somehow we have it worse than generations before. For example, Christians fought with other Christians for hundreds of years over the divinity of Christ, a conflict spurred by the teaching of Arius (again, pushed back by Saint Augustine, though the problem long outlived him).
Unfortunately, with regard to today’s legitimate and pressing issues of disaffiliation and the broader societal rejection of particular Church teachings, we Christians bear much of the blame. Few arguments against Christianity are more persuasive than the actions of Christians, not least of which is the horror of sexual abuse and coverup in the Catholic Church. Additionally, in recent decades, rather than presenting a compelling case for belief, we Christians have developed a habit of painting ourselves as victims, ravaged by “cancel culture,” rather than demonstrating the compelling love of Christ. This is no way to evangelize.
In contrast, we have much to learn from the actions of St. Stephen and the other early martyrs, as well as from modern-day martyrs like St. Óscar Romero. When asked by the Sanhedrin to give an account of his faith, Stephen does so bravely and boldly, echoing the tone of the prophets before him. But what is perhaps most striking is Stephen’s reaction to the anger of the mob. Rather than condemning them or asserting his superiority, as we so often try to do, he echoes Christ’s words on the cross, saying, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” Even in the face of shocking and undeserved violence, Stephen chooses to forgive, even asking God for forgiveness on their behalf. It is only the love of Christ, to the end, that saves us. This is our call as Christians — paraphrasing a prayer often (mistakenly) attributed to St. Francis of Assisi, to love in the face of hatred, to bring light in the gloom of darkness, to cling to faith when surrounded by doubt. When we allow ourselves to become enraptured by God’s love, we become tangible signs of God’s presence for others. Nothing can spread God’s love more than love itself.
Sometimes, people around us don’t like what we have to say, and sometimes our actions have consequences, but our focus cannot be on complaining about “victimhood.” The Good News of Christ is something worth living for and dying for, and to complain feebly about the challenges faced by American Christians is to admit that we don’t believe this. To take up our cross as Jesus demands we do means to resign ourselves to the will of God and the consequences of love — to gain our lives by losing them. To love means to crush our thirst for power, for control, for fame and glory, for safety and security, all things the world esteems. In the eyes of the world, love never wins. Without faith, the love of Jesus ends in the Crucifixion. But it’s only this kind of witness, the love that seeks the good of the other even when utterly rejected — not coincidentally the same kind of love that God offers us — that has any hope to bring others to the light of the Gospel, and in which we have any hope of attaining the rewards of God’s promises.
Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by your life. Thanks be to God.
