St. Ignatius of Antioch: feared no evil

After the section where Jesus criticized the Pharisees for their legalism, Jesus continued His teaching with words of encouragement: “Do no be afraid of those who kill the body.” (Lk 12:4).

While civilizations sing their heroes who are examples of courage, the church has continually sung her particular example of courage–those who did not fear even death, the martyrs. The church’s message is not a more or less strict legal code or a list of forbidden behavior but it is above all else, a witness that life in Christ reaches heights unknown to human power.

A saint is someone who has virtues, namely, who is predisposed to do good. A canonized saint is someone who practised those predispositions to a heroic extent. Thus, all martyrs are automatically saints because they lived to a heroic extent the virtue of courage.

When St. Ignatius of Antioch wrote his letters to the church in Rome, he knew that, being a bishop, his persecuted church would try to avoid that he be caught and tortured by the Romans. However he pleaded with them earnestly,

“Show me no untimely kindness. Let me be food for the wild beasts, for they are my way to God. I am God’s wheat and shall be ground by their teeth so that I may become Christ’s pure bread.”

What must be proclaimed is not, that apostasy is a sin, but that the church makes people who are capable of overcoming the most paralyzing fear–the fear of death.