Memorial of Saint Paul
Miki and companions, martyrs
(I Kings 2:1-4.10-12; Mark 6:7-13)
A famous theologian of the second century (Tertullian)
wrote, “The blood of martyrs is the seed of Christians.” But perhaps it would be more poetically
justified to say that the blood of martyrs waters the seed sown by missionaries
who are sent forth as Jesus commissions his apostles in today’s gospel. The preachers assure their hearers of what
their hearts are afraid to believe: that the creator loves them so much that he
has worked out a way for them to share his eternal life. This message is then verified by martyrs like
St. Paul Miki and his twenty-five companions in Japan at the end of the
sixteenth century. These saints testified
to God’s love by choosing death at the hands of the shogun rather than recant their
belief in so gracious a creator.
Japanese Christians could not publicly practice their faith in Japan for
the next two hundred and fifty years as the country closed itself to the rest
of the world. But when Japan finally
welcomed foreigners in the nineteenth century, Christians there numbered more
than two hundred thousand!
We would be incorrect to think that the age of martyrdom is
ended. Hundreds if not thousands of Christian
martyrdoms are documented every year. These
occur largely in Africa and the Middle East.
As always, the victims do not die in vain. First, they experience eternal life. Second, their stories germinate the faith in
others to accept that same message of God’s efficacious love.
