{"id":17356,"date":"2018-10-15T09:28:10","date_gmt":"2018-10-15T13:28:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=17356"},"modified":"2018-10-15T09:42:30","modified_gmt":"2018-10-15T13:42:30","slug":"persecuted-for-my-sake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=17356","title":{"rendered":"Persecuted for My Sake"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/wEmYhD90Lp0\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; encrypted-media\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Persecuted for My Sake<br \/>\nSunday, October 14, 2018<\/p>\n<p>You\u2019re blessed when your commitment to God provokes persecution. The persecution drives you even deeper into God\u2019s kingdom. . . .  And know that you are in good company. My prophets and witnesses have always gotten into this kind of trouble. \u2014Matthew 5:10,12, The Message<\/p>\n<p>Today \u00d3scar Romero (1917\u20131980) will be named a saint by the Catholic Church. As Archbishop of San Salvador for the last four years of his life, Romero was a strong, public voice for the many voiceless and anonymous poor of El Salvador and Latin America. When he preached in the cathedral on Sunday mornings, I\u2019m told that the streets were empty and all the radios where on full volume, to hear truth and sanity in an insane and corrupt world.<\/p>\n<p>Here is a man who suffered with and for those who suffered. His loving heart shines through clearly in his homilies:<\/p>\n<p>The shepherd must be where the suffering is. [1]<\/p>\n<p>My soul is sore when I learn how our people are tortured, when I learn how the rights of those created in the image of God are violated.  [2]<\/p>\n<p>A Gospel that doesn\u2019t take into account the rights of human beings, a Christianity that doesn\u2019t make a positive contribution to the history of the world, is not the authentic doctrine of Christ, but rather simply an instrument of power. We . . . don\u2019t want to be a plaything of the worldly powers, rather we want to be the Church that carries the authentic, courageous Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, even when it might become necessary to die like he did, on a cross. [3]<\/p>\n<p>In his homily on March 23, 1980, the day before he was murdered, Romero addressed the Salvadoran military directly:<\/p>\n<p>Brothers, we are part of the same people. You are killing your own brother and sister peasants and when you are faced with an order to kill given by a man, the law of God must prevail; the law that says: Thou shalt not kill. No soldier is obliged to obey an order against the law of God. No one has to obey an immoral law. And it is time that you recover your consciences. . . . In the name of God, then, and in the name of this suffering people whose laments rise up to heaven each day more tumultuously, I plead with you, I pray you, I order you, in the name of God: Stop the repression! [4]<\/p>\n<p>The next day, following his sermon, a U.S.-supported government hit squad shot him through his heart as he stood at the altar.<\/p>\n<p>Only a few weeks earlier, Romero had said:<\/p>\n<p>I have often been threatened with death. I must tell you, as a Christian, I do not believe in death without resurrection. If I am killed, I shall arise in the Salvadoran people. I say so without boasting, with the greatest humility. . . . A bishop will die, but God\u2019s church, which is the people, will never perish. [5]<\/p>\n<p>Romero\u2019s epitaph reads \u201cSentir con la Iglesia\u201d (\u201cTo be of one mind and heart with the Church\u201d); these words were his episcopal motto, his promise to share the suffering and strength of the people he served.<\/p>\n<p>Searching for Meaning<br \/>\nMonday, October 15, 2018<\/p>\n<p>During the next two weeks I will reflect on suffering and how we might recognize God\u2019s image and likeness in people even\u2014and perhaps especially\u2014during hard times. Some of the greatest wisdom has come from those who experienced unspeakable trauma and harm. Holocaust survivor and respected psychiatrist Viktor Frankl (1905\u20131997) offered guidance for anyone who suffers. Rabbi Harold Kushner explained in his foreword to Man\u2019s Search for Meaning:<\/p>\n<p>The greatest task for any person is to find meaning in his or her life. Frankl saw three possible sources for meaning: in work (doing something significant), in love (caring for another person), and in courage during difficult times. Suffering in and of itself is meaningless; we give our suffering meaning by the way in which we respond to it. . . .<\/p>\n<p>Forces beyond your control can take away everything you possess except one thing, your freedom to choose how you will respond to the situation. You cannot control what happens to you in life, but you can always control what you will feel and do about what happens to you. [1]<\/p>\n<p>Etty Hillesum (1914\u20131943), a young Jewish woman who died at Auschwitz, shared an intimate glimpse into her own experience through her journals:<\/p>\n<p>June 14, 1941: More arrests, more terror, concentration camps, the arbitrary dragging off of fathers, sisters, brothers. We seek the meaning of life, wondering whether any meaning can be left. But that is something each one of us must settle with himself and with God. And perhaps life has its own meaning, even if it takes a lifetime to find it. . . .<\/p>\n<p>June 15, 1941: For a moment yesterday I thought I couldn\u2019t go on living, that I needed help. Life and suffering had lost their meaning for me; I felt I was about to collapse under a tremendous weight. . . . I said that I confronted the \u201csuffering of mankind\u201d . . . but that was not really what it was. Rather I feel like a small battlefield, in which the problems, or some of the problems, of our time are being fought out. All one can hope to do is to keep oneself humbly available, to allow oneself to be a battlefield. [2]<\/p>\n<p>This is what it means to hold the contradictions and the pain of the world, as we do in contemplation. Hillesum accepted her destiny. She believed, as I do, that we are called to be both the agony and the ecstasy of God\u2014for the life of the world. For me, to be a Christian means to accept that battlefield, to accept and to somehow participate in the mystery of death and resurrection in oneself and in the universe. It is a process of \u201coneing\u201d with Foundational Reality, which some call at-one-ment.<\/p>\n<p>Social psychologist Diarmuid O\u2019Murchu writes:<\/p>\n<p>Creation cannot survive, and less so thrive, without its dark side. There is a quality of destruction, decay, and death that is essential to creation\u2019s flourishing. . . . And the consequence of this destructive dimension is what we call evil, pain, and suffering. Obviously, I am not suggesting fatalistic acquiescence. Indeed, I am arguing for the very opposite: an enduring sense of hope, which it seems to me is not possible without first coming to terms with . . . the great paradox. It is . . . the unfolding cycle of birth-death-rebirth. And it transpires all over creation, on the macro and micro scales alike. [3]<\/p>\n<p>Yes, I know, sisters and brothers, suffering is and will always be a mystery, maybe the major mystery.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211;<\/p>\n<p>TRY TO STAY CONSCIOUS OF ME<br \/>\n as you go step by step through this day. My Presence with you is both a promise and a protection. My final statement just before I ascended into heaven was: Surely I am with you always. That promise was for all of My followers, without exception. The promise of My Presence is a powerful protection. As you journey through your life, there are numerous pitfalls along the way.<br \/>\nMany voices clamor for your attention, enticing you to go their way. A few steps away from your true path are pits of self-pity and despair, plateaus of pride and self-will. If you take your eyes off Me and follow another\u2019s way, you are in grave danger. Even well-meaning friends can lead you astray if you let them usurp My place in your life. The way to stay on the path of Life is to keep your focus on Me. Awareness of My Presence is your best protection.<\/p>\n<p>MATTHEW 28:20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>HEBREWS 12: 1\u2013 2  Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us,<br \/>\n    2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Persecuted for My Sake Sunday, October 14, 2018 You\u2019re blessed when your commitment to God provokes persecution. The persecution drives you even deeper into God\u2019s kingdom. . . . And know that you are in good company. My prophets and witnesses have always gotten into this kind of trouble. \u2014Matthew 5:10,12, The Message Today \u00d3scar [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17356"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17356"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17356\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17361,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17356\/revisions\/17361"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}