If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you

4 MAY (Jn 15,18-21)

The persecution of the righteous is a constant of evil. It is as if evil existed to fight the good and consequently to eliminate the righteous that interweaves his life of good alone. That is how this truth is taught us by the Ancient Scripture.

Let us oppress the needy just man; let us neither spare the widow nor revere the old man for his hair grown white with time. But let our strength be our norm of justice; for weakness proves itself useless. Let us beset the just one, because he is obnoxious to us; he sets himself against our doings, Reproaches us for transgressions of the law and charges us with violations of our training. He professes to have knowledge of God and styles himself a child of the Lord. To us he is the censure of our thoughts; merely to see him is a hardship for us, Because his life is not like other men’s, and different are his ways. He judges us debased; he holds aloof from our paths as from things impure. He calls blest the destiny of the just and boasts that God is his Father. Let us see whether his words be true; let us find out what will happen to him. For if the just one be the son of God, he will defend him and deliver him from the hand of his foes. With revilement and torture let us put him to the test that we may have proof of his gentleness and try his patience. Let us condemn him to a shameful death; for according to his own words, God will take care of him.” These were their thoughts, but they erred; for their wickedness blinded them, And they knew not the hidden counsels of God; neither did they count on a recompense of holiness nor discern the innocent souls’ reward. (Wisdom 2,10-22).

If this rule applies to the righteous, much more it applies to the prophet, who has the mandate from the Lord to call every man to return to the Law of the Covenant, getting converted with all his heart, after having abandoned the path of evil. This was the true plight lived by Jeremiah, a prophet fragile in his humanity.

You duped me, O Lord, and I let myself be duped; you were too strong for me, and you triumphed. All the day I am an object of laughter; everyone mocks me. Whenever I speak, I must cry out, violence and outrage is my message; The word of the Lord has brought me derision and reproach all the day. I say to myself, I will not mention him, I will speak in his name no more. But then it becomes like fire burning in my heart, imprisoned in my bones; I grow weary holding it in, I cannot endure it. Yes, I hear the whisperings of many: “Terror on every side! Denounce! let us denounce him!” All those who were my friends are on the watch for any misstep of mine. “Perhaps he will be trapped; then we can prevail, and take our vengeance on him.” But the Lord is with me, like a mighty champion: my persecutors will stumble, they will not triumph. In their failure they will be put to utter shame, to lasting, unforgettable confusion. O Lord of hosts, you who test the just, who probe mind and heart, Let me witness the vengeance you take on them, for to you I have entrusted my cause. Sing to the Lord, praise the Lord, For he has rescued the life of the poor from the power of the wicked! Cursed be the day on which I was born! May the day my mother gave me birth never be blessed! Cursed be the man who brought the news to my father, saying, “A child, a son, has been born to you!” filling him with great joy. Let that man be like the cities which the Lord relentlessly overthrew; Let him hear war cries in the morning, battle alarms at noonday, because he did not dispatch me in the womb! Then my mother would have been my grave, her womb confining me forever. Why did I come forth from the womb, to see sorrow and pain, to end my days in shame? (Jer 20,7-18).

For Jesus and his disciples persecution will be like the air we breathe, like the water they drink, like the bread of which they satiate themselves. Mission and persecution are one. They exist to crucify the world. The world will crucify, eliminate, condemn and destroy them. They annul sin. Sin will annul them.

“If the world hates you, realize that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, the world would love its own; but because you do not belong to the world, and I have chosen you out of the world, the world hates you. Remember the word I spoke to you, ‘No slave is greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. And they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know the one who sent me.

Virgin Mary, Mother of the Redemption, Angels and Saints teach us how to love the cross.