Sermon 382

SERMO 382

SERMON ON THE FEAST OF SAINT STEPHEN THE FIRST MARTYR

It is commanded that we love our enemies.

The Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ commands us something and promises something. What he commands is here. What he promises is elsewhere. What he commands is finite, because it is temporal. What he promises is not finite, because it is eternal. What he commands is work. What he promises is reward. Here your Holiness should observe how great is his mercy towards us, that he has placed toil here with an end, and a reward in heaven without end. And therefore we should first labor here and afterward receive the reward in heaven rather than wish to receive the reward here and afterward toil. For concerning some, the Lord says: Truly I say to you, they have received their reward. But perhaps you are slow to receive the reward from labor. With what face do you ask for what God promises and not do what God commands? First fulfill the precept and thus demand the promise. First, I say, listen to the one commanding and then demand from the one promising. For he commands us to love our enemies. Love, he says, your enemies, do good to those who hate you and pray for those who persecute and slander you. A grave precept, but a great reward. Love your enemies. It is work. Do good to those who hate you and pray for those who persecute and slander you. And lest you fear the toil, he immediately subjoined the reward: So that you may be, he says, the children of your Father who is in heaven, who makes his sun rise on the good and the evil and sends rain on the just and the unjust.

The example of Christ who prayed for his murderers.

Pay attention to the Lord Himself who commanded this, for He did it. After all the impious Jews had done to Him, those who repaid Him evil for good, did He not, while hanging on the cross, say: Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do? He prayed as a man, who was heard with the Father. For even now He prays in us, prays for us, is prayed to by us. He prays in us as our priest, prays for us as our head, is prayed to by us as our God. Therefore, when He was praying while hanging on the cross, He saw and foresaw: He saw all His enemies, but foresaw that many of them would become friends. Hence, He sought pardon for all of them. They were raging; He was praying. They said to Pilate: Crucify; He cried out: Father, forgive. And though He was hanging with harsh nails, He did not lose His gentleness. They were raging; they were barking all around; they were shaking their heads, which were not sound, and like madmen around a singular physician set in the midst, they were raging all around. He was hanging and healing. He was hanging and yet expending. He did not come down, for He was making medicines for the mad from His blood. Indeed, after the resurrection, He healed those whom He had endured as most insane while hanging. Behold why Christ came: so that He might not lose what He had found but might seek and save what had perished, so that by loving raging enemies He might make them believing friends.

Stephen's example for praying for the stoners.

But lest perhaps you say that it is too much for you to imitate your Lord, who suffered for you, leaving you an example so that you might follow in His footsteps, consider Stephen, your fellow servant. He was a man like you, born of the mass of sin like you, redeemed by the same price as you, he was a deacon as you know. When he was being struck by a shower of stones from the Jews, he not only did not threaten, but moreover prayed for pardon for his stoners. "Lord," he said, "do not hold this sin against them." As if he said: "I will die in the flesh, let them not perish in mind." They were throwing stones, he was sending prayers ahead.

How much the prayer of Stephen availed in the conversion of Paul.

As your Holiness knows how powerful the prayer of the holy martyr was, let us recall together that young man named Saul who, when Saint Stephen was being stoned, kept the garments of all those stoning him, so that he seemed to be stoning with everyone's hands. Afterwards, as you know - for I speak to those who know, to my brothers, to the sons of my Father, to fellow disciples - afterwards he received letters from the chief priests, so that he could bring back to Jerusalem in chains any followers of the Christian way, men and women, to be tortured and punished. As he was on his way, suddenly a light from heaven shone around him. He fell and heard a voice saying to him: Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is hard for you to kick against the goad, because you will wound not the goad but the feet with which you kick. And he said: Who are you, Lord? Although you fell once, you acknowledged the Lord: Who are you, Lord? And He answered: I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom you are persecuting. Why do you rise against me to your harm and not rather humble yourself for your good? Saul, Saul, what is between you and me? Despite all the wrongs you commit against me, I could indeed have destroyed you long ago, but my Stephen prayed for you. When he was cast down he was raging, when he was lifted up he believed. Cast down as a wolf, lifted up as a lamb. Cast down as a persecutor, lifted up as a preacher. I say plainly, I say more explicitly: cast down as the son of perdition, lifted up as the vessel of election. For if Saint Stephen had not prayed in this way, the Church would not have Paul. But Paul was lifted up from the ground because on the ground the prayer of Saint Stephen was heard.

God does not want the death of the sinner, and teaches us to pray for our enemies.

But against such things, so you, whoever you are, who does not love. Bend the knee, strike the forehead on the ground, cry out and say: God, kill the evil. Even you who pray thus, that a man may die, pray badly against evil and you have already become two evils. You cry out and say: God, kill the evil. He will answer you: Which one of you? Let your Holiness take heed, I speak a known truth. A human judge does not kill the criminal by himself, but orders it and the executioner kills. And you, when you say: Lord, kill the enemy; you make yourself a judge and you seek God to be the executioner. And God will answer you: I will not be the torturer of the sinner but the liberator, because I do not desire the death of the sinner but that he may be converted and live. Before you came invited, did you not blaspheme me? did you not provoke me with evil deeds? did you not wish to wipe my name from the earth? did you not despise me in my precepts or in my servants? If I had killed you then, the enemy, whom would I now make a friend? Rather God says to you: I will teach you to imitate me. Hanging on the cross, I said: Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing. I taught this to my soldiers, I taught this to the holy martyrs. Be you also my soldier against the devil. Otherwise, you will fight invincibly in no other way, unless you pray for your enemies.