Saturday 17th week in ordinary time
"Mt 14:1-12"
Herod had seized John and bound him and put him in prison, for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip's wife; because John said to him, "It is not lawful for you to have her." And though he wanted to put him to death, he feared the people, because they held him to be a prophet.
John spoke up. He could have kept silent and saved his life. 'Anyway', he could have thought, 'is Herod going to change by any chance, just because I tell him off?' There are martyrs who have given their lives for the sacrament of the Eucharist; others, for being priests. St John the Baptist is the martyr of marriage. He didn't say, 'In my opinion, it's probably not such a good idea for you to have your brother's wife'. Rather, he said things straight. And it didn't matter that it was the king he was speaking to. St John Fisher and St Thomas More acted in the same way with another king. Martyrs never compromised the truth, not even to save their lives.
We have to call a spade a spade; and a sin a sin. We have to be witnesses to the truth even when we face difficulties. In defending the truth, like St John the Baptist, Christians have to follow the words of Jesus: "have no fear of them; for nothing is covered that will not be revealed or hidden that will not be known...everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in Heaven" (Mt 10:26).
Roma Ligocka tells a story of an incident that happened in communist Poland when she was a young girl during a summer camp. One day they were all singing songs together and at one point the leader started a revolutionary song that was offensive to God. Suddenly one of the girls, in tears, stood up petrified. "Why don't you sing with us?" asked the leader. "I do not sing against God," she answered in a small but firm voice. Silence. The camp leader intoned a new song. No one spoke anymore about it. But Ligocka explains how something had changed; something that shook her convictions and expanded her horizons. That night she discovered that "there are people who have the courage to stand up and say 'No'."
My Mother, Queen of Martyrs, give me the courage to stand up for the truth.
