First reading: 2 Kgs. 4:8–11,14–16a
One day Elisha came to Shunem, where there was a woman of influence, who urged him to dine with her. Afterward, whenever he passed by, he used to stop there to dine. So she said to her husband, “I know that Elisha is a holy man of God. Since he visits us often, let us arrange a little room on the roof and furnish it for him with a bed, table, chair, and lamp, so that when he comes to us he can stay there.”
Sometime later Elisha arrived and stayed in the room overnight. Later Elisha asked, “Can something be done for her?” His servant Gehazi answered, “Yes! She has no son, and her husband is getting on in years.” Elisha said, “Call her.” When the woman had been called and stood at the door, Elisha promised, “This time next year you will be fondling a baby son.”
Second reading: Rom. 6:3–4,8–11
Brothers and sisters: Are you unaware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were indeed buried with him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might live in newness of life.
If, then, we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. We know that Christ, raised from the dead, dies no more; death no longer has power over him. As to his death, he died to sin once and for all; as to his life, he lives for God. Consequently, you too must think of yourselves as dead to sin and living for God in Christ Jesus.
Gospel: Mt. 10:37–42
Jesus said to his apostles: “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”
“Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me. Whoever receives a prophet because he is a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and whoever receives a righteous man because he is a righteous man will receive a righteous man’s reward. And whoever gives only a cup of cold water to one of these little ones to drink because the little one is a disciple—amen, I say to you, he will surely not lose his reward.”
In other words
Fr. Dionisio Miranda, SVD (Divine Word Seminary, Tagaytay City)
When someone wants to assure you of his support, he says “I have your back.” Jesus assures us that he will have our back; he promises to consider everything done to us as done to him. The only condition? That we be his disciples in the truest sense of the title.
A basic condition to discipleship is not even religious; it begins with moral integrity. That we know we have when, in the face of difficult alternatives, we choose the good, right, and true over our natural inclinations and preferences. Morality is not about our feelings (damdamin in the psycho-affective sense); it is about our moral compass (bait as moral sense), what you “feel” when uplifted by the good deed, the spontaneous urge to nurture the hapless, the uncalculating generosity towards the needy and so on. Morality is allowing your bait to prevail, kahit hindi mo feel, because deep inside you owe it to the best of yourself (utang mo sa iyong sarili) to do so. The moral becomes religious when done in Jesus’ name: when Christ becomes the motive for receiving prophets, moral idealists, and God’s little ones.
Integrity is tested severely when it involves, as it often does, moral decisions involving our loved ones. When it is our siblings, parents, relatives, and friends who raise moral issues for us, will we uphold our moral integrity? Should disputes arise over religious beliefs as well, dare we choose God over father or mother, son or daughter if it comes to that? When faced with life-or-death choices, will we still follow Jesus? At stake, he reminds us, is eternal life which he alone can guarantee. Those are the radical choices Jesus presents us in today’s Gospel, a possibility we must reflect upon, if only in moments of prayer. A contrary choice, Jesus leaves no doubt, disqualifies one from becoming a true disciple worthy of his friendship.
Historically that is why the Church has recognized martyrdom as needing no further corroboration such as miracles to qualify for canonization. On one such event Pope Francis reminded us of three fundamental and enduring elements of martyrdom. One, the martyr is a Christian who, in order not to deny the faith, voluntarily suffers a violent and premature death. Two, the killing is perpetrated by a persecutor, moved by hatred against the faith or another virtue connected to it. Three, the victim assumes an unexpected attitude of charity, patience, meekness, in imitation of the crucified Jesus.
Aside from martyrs in the strict sense, the Church recognized extraordinary witnesses to faith and virtue under the title of “confessor.” Many consecrated persons were recognized as witnesses to a non-bloody (white versus red) martyrdom in living vows of evangelical poverty, consecrated chastity, and apostolic obedience. Against this backdrop of actual martyrs and confessors of virtue, Pope Francis has proposed a commission for the new martyrs—witnesses of the faith.
In the tradition of the confessors, these new martyrs witnessed to the heroic offering of one’s life. Even if not persecuted, what matters is they did live as extraordinary witnesses of holiness. In them existed “an external, objectively assessable condition in which the disciple of Christ freely placed himself and which leads to death.” As Pope Francis explains it, “What differs, in the various ages, is not the concept of martyrdom, but the concrete ways in which, in a specific historic context, it occurs. Even today, in many parts of the world, there are many martyrs who give their life for Christ, persecuted because, driven by faith in God, they defend justice, truth, peace, and human dignity.”
What is novel is that these new martyrs need not even be Catholic—“even an unbaptized Christian, who is Christian at heart, confesses Jesus Christ at the baptism of blood.” In the concrete Pope Francis was referring directly to some Orthodox Libyan martyrs and the Ugandan Anglican martyrs. They qualify, given “the necessary connection between the offering of life and premature death, exercise of Christian virtues at least to an ordinary degree, and reputation and signs of holiness after death.” He invites us to own them too as Christian martyrs within the Catholic Church—after all they also gave up their lives in order not to betray the Lord. In which category of disciples do we fit?