Reflections for the Week of May 30, 2010 from the Reverend M. Dion Thompson
This week offers us ample opportunity to pause and consider a few of the great Christian martyrs of antiquity and of the 19th century. On Tuesday you can offer prayers of remembrance and thanksgiving for Justin, a philosopher and defender of the Christian faith in the second century. His writings give us a glimpse of the worship of early Christians and the debates that surrounded what was then seen as a peculiar sect. On Wednesday you can take a moment to consider the witness of Blandina and her companions, martyred in Lyon in 177. That’s about 10 to 20 years after Justin’s death. Blandina, who was a slave woman, suffered horrible torture, yet did not denounce her faith. “I am a Christian,” she said, “and nothing vile is done among us.” If you find yourself with a few prayer moments on Thursday, offer thanks in memory of the Martyrs of Uganda, who died in 1886. Their witness helped change the dynamic of Christianity’s growth in Uganda. They went to their death singing hymns and praying for their enemies. They showed their countrymen that Christianity was not simply a white man’s religion, imported from Europe, but was a religion that spoke to all. Only in recent years has the true history of the Early Church and its African roots become known beyond the circle of learned scholars. On Saturday you can take a faith trip back to the eighth century, where you’ll find Boniface. He spent his life organizing churches in what we know as Germany. On June 5, 754, a band of pagans killed Boniface and his companions as he waited for some converts to arrive for confirmation. Here is a prayer to remember those who gave their lives so that our faith would not die: “Almighty God, who gave your servants boldness to confess the Name of our Savior Jesus Christ before the rulers of this world, and courage to die for this faith: Grant that we may always be ready to give a reason for the hope that is in us, and to suffer gladly for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.”
In the Anglican Cycle of Prayer we are asked to pray for the Diocese of Cyprus and the Gulf and its bishop, the Rt. Rev. Michael Augustine Owen Lewis; for the Diocese of Dallas and its bishop, the Rt. Rev. James Monte Stanton; and for the Diocese of Delaware and its bishop, the Rt. Rev. Wayne Parker Wright.
“In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh.” Acts 2:17
PRAISE FATHER, SON, AND HOLY GHOST!
ALLELUIA!
ALLELUIA. CHRIST IS RISEN!
THE LORD IS RISEN INDEED. ALLELUIA!