“They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” Rev 7:14
Easter was recently celebrated with great joy and beauty. As we celebrate the Good News of the Resurrection, new Catholics are baptized and welcomed into the Church family, children receive their First Holy Communion, and teens are confirmed. Churches are filled to capacity for all these celebrations.
But this year, Easter was marred by the shocking news that Catholic churches in Sri Lanka had been bombed. The body count was still rising when I left for Mass. I looked around at the joyful faces and happy families, and could not imagine anyone bombing a parish just like this at Easter Mass. I thought about what it would mean if going to Mass that morning led to the end of our earthly lives, as it had for hundreds of Sri Lankan Christians. Relatives bereaved. Families wiped out. Children, including many who had just received their First Communion, were suddenly gone.
It was reported that a Sunday school teacher asked some of the Sri Lankan children if they would give their lives for Jesus. They all raised their hands. Within minutes, many children joined the ranks of the martyrs. We, like these martyred children, must also be ready to give our lives for Christ. Be prepared to follow Him, even to the cross. Believe in His promise, “My sheep hear my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish” (Jn 10:27-28).
John’s Revelation, which the Church reads today on the Fourth Sunday of Easter, testifies to the reality of Christ’s promise of eternal life. Written in a time of persecution, his vision shows that the martyred saints live eternally, standing before the throne of God holding palms of victory. There, it is promised, “God will wipe away every tear from their eyes” (Rev. 7:17).
The persecution of Christians continues and intensifies. At the end of the second millennium, John Paul II said, "The Church has become once again a Church of martyrs." Let us pray for all who died in the Easter Sunday massacre. And let us confidently ask these new saints, not yet canonized but surely standing before the throne of God, to lift up their prayers for us who remain.
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