The Devastation Notwithstanding

Saturday, 12th week in Ordinary Time

Memory of the First Martyrs of Rome
June 30, 2018: Lam 2: 2, 10-14, 18-19; Mt 8: 5-17

Destruction, devastation, desecration, disease and death bed...these are the situations elaborated in the Word today, but alongside there is an insistence on mercy, healing, forgiveness, faith and trust and above all the immeasurable love of God which takes our sickness to a glorious end! 

This is what we need to keep in our mind- all the possible devastation notwithstanding, the Lord is with us, for us and the Lord loves us. What can separate us from the love of God, St Paul would question in his letter to the Romans (8:38,39). Nothing can separate us from the Love of God that is poured on us through Jesus Christ, nothing except our own obstinacy! 

The day after the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul , we remember all the first martyrs of Rome, that is, the hundreds or even thousands who were killed because they professed their faith in Christ, as the Son of God. The Roman catacombs stand witness to this historical facts even today. Nothing could separate them from the love of Christ - neither suffering, nor starvation, nor threats, nor persecution, nor the fear of death - nothing could separate them. They gave their lives for their faith, because they truly understood how much Christ loved them.

We are called to believe beyond doubt today that nothing, absolutely nothing can separate us from the Love of God that is poured into our hearts through Jesus Christ, nothing except our own obstinacy! Let us beware!