Feast of St.
Stephen, proto-martyr
(Acts 6:8-10.7:54-59; Matthew 10:17-22)
“Is it an accident…,” St. Thomas Becket asks in his
Christmas sermon according to playwright T.S. Eliot, “that the day of the first
martyr follows immediately the day of the Birth of Christ?” Not at all, he goes on to say. Martyrdom is the design of God to draw humans
back to the love which the birth of Christ reveals. In other words, the Church proposes today’s
Feast of St. Stephen as a reminder that Christ was born to die out of love for
the world.
Although many households take down their Christmas lights
today and stores haul out Valentine decorations, the Church does not intend
that her members go back to life as usual.
Rather, she wants them to realize that they are being called deeper into
the mystery of holiness which does not shun the world but seeks to sanctify
it.
Celebrating what is good and expressing sorrow when the good
is thwarted by evil, we Christians show others of God’s care for all. Christmas festivities will continue until the
Feast of the Baptism of the Lord, but we should temper them by understanding how
material substances are readily corruptible while virtue lasts forever.
