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| PERSECUTION OF COPTIC CHRISTIANS IN EGYPT. Image from nowtheendbegins.com via google.com |
"If the world hates you,
realize that it hated me first."
Today we observe and experience real and actual persecutions against Christians - and sadly, many of these persecutions come from persons who also claim to be Christians or groups which consider Christ as a Prophet. We don't have to wonder anymore because the Lord himself prophesied about it.
Even when Christianity had already been declared as State Religion by the Emperor Constantine and public persecutions of Christians have been stopped, he also persecuted in a way one of the greatest defenders of true Christian doctrine, St Athanasius, by exiling him because he won't give up the fight against the Emperor's favored version of Christianity: Arianism, a heretical belief that teaches Christ wasn't divine but was only granted the status of a God by the Father. This we discussed yesterday in this article.
It really was a wound against the Body of Christ that during the middle ages and the early years of the modern era, the Church has to fight against her children who separated from her, the Protestants, and both sides even had to recourse to actions that truly violated the command of the Lord to love one another.
Persecutions from non-Christians are somehow understandable because they know not the Lord as we do. But when persecutions are done by people who claim to be Christians, especially people who claim to be fellow Catholics, it doubles the pain: like Cain killing Abel - brother killing a brother. Here we can separate the true Christians and those who merely claim to be Christians. The true Christians are those who, like the Lord Jesus Christ, undergo passion and death and surely will rise again by the power of the Lord; while those who are fake Christians, those who merely claim being Christians, are those who, like the disciples left the Lord upon hearing hard doctrine, such as that of the Bread of Life or Holy Eucharist and, in our time, against abortion, contraception, homosexuality, same-sex marriage, divorce, euthanasia, stem cell research, etc.
As the Lord said, no servant is greater than his master. The Lord suffered persecution from the hands of His fellow Jews. Today, we also suffer in the hands of those who claim to be Christians and yet do not follow the Lord through His Body, the Church. But we must find assurance in the words of the Lord who said,
Even when Christianity had already been declared as State Religion by the Emperor Constantine and public persecutions of Christians have been stopped, he also persecuted in a way one of the greatest defenders of true Christian doctrine, St Athanasius, by exiling him because he won't give up the fight against the Emperor's favored version of Christianity: Arianism, a heretical belief that teaches Christ wasn't divine but was only granted the status of a God by the Father. This we discussed yesterday in this article.
It really was a wound against the Body of Christ that during the middle ages and the early years of the modern era, the Church has to fight against her children who separated from her, the Protestants, and both sides even had to recourse to actions that truly violated the command of the Lord to love one another.
Persecutions from non-Christians are somehow understandable because they know not the Lord as we do. But when persecutions are done by people who claim to be Christians, especially people who claim to be fellow Catholics, it doubles the pain: like Cain killing Abel - brother killing a brother. Here we can separate the true Christians and those who merely claim to be Christians. The true Christians are those who, like the Lord Jesus Christ, undergo passion and death and surely will rise again by the power of the Lord; while those who are fake Christians, those who merely claim being Christians, are those who, like the disciples left the Lord upon hearing hard doctrine, such as that of the Bread of Life or Holy Eucharist and, in our time, against abortion, contraception, homosexuality, same-sex marriage, divorce, euthanasia, stem cell research, etc.
As the Lord said, no servant is greater than his master. The Lord suffered persecution from the hands of His fellow Jews. Today, we also suffer in the hands of those who claim to be Christians and yet do not follow the Lord through His Body, the Church. But we must find assurance in the words of the Lord who said,
"Anyone who proves victorious
I will allow to share my throne,
just as I have myself overcome
and have taken my seat
with my Father on his throne."
- Revelation 3:21
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