28 November 2018 - Wednesday of the 34th week of Ordinary Time - Luke 21:12-19

     In today’s Gospel, Jesus warns his disciples that they will suffer for him through their trials and tribulations.  But, he also says that he will be there accompanying them, strengthening them and protecting them.  This is a continuation of yesterday’s Gospel from the 21st chapter of Luke. Jesus warns his disciples about upcoming persecutions and violence that they will have to endure. The members of the Early Church will soon face these things. Unfortunately, these things will also play out throughout the history of the Church, including in our modern era. Jesus tells them that they will be handed over to prisons and synagogues. Think of how John the Baptist was handed over to King Herod, being put in prison and eventually put to death.  Jesus, too, will be handed over the civil and religious authorities.  Why would Christ’s disciples be worried about being handed over to the synagogues, since they are practicing Jews themselves?  Many of Christ’s followers in the first century found themselves in conflict with the Jewish synagogues and institutions. In that era, the synagogues were not only places of religious worship, but they also were places of civil administration and places where individuals were held for trial. When I became a priest in 2008, I never dreamed of the open hostility that Christian would face in North America and Europe today, ten years later, of the secularism that is trying to wipe out any influence Christianity has on our society. Perhaps in reading the Sacred Scriptures and studying Church history, we can better understand what we are going through and realize that in many ways history repeats itself.  Maybe we can learn from the challenges and struggles of the past

        Today we celebrate St Catherine Laboure as the saint of the day.  She entered the covent of the Daughters of Charity in Paris.  As a novice in that order, the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to her three different times in 1830.  During one of those apparitions, the Blessed Mother showed Catherine the medal of the Immaculate Conception, which is now known throughout the world as the Miraculous Medal. The Blessed Mother commissioned her to have one of these medals made and to spread devotion to this medal.  At the time of those apparitions, she revealed them only to her spiritual director.  45 years later, she revealed those apparitions to her superiors.  

         The Blessed Mother and the community of saints are always with us, even in the midst of persecution and criticism of our faith.