Today in history- The christian martyrs

PERPETUA AND FELICITY

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It was in 180 C.E. that the first known Christian martyrs of Africa were executed. One of the most famous and most outstanding acts of martyrdom, however, occurred in the year 203 C.E. and centers around two young incredibly brave African women–Perpetua and Felicity. The account of their deaths, known as “The Martyrdom of Perpetua and Felicity,” was so inspiring and popular in the early centuries that it was read during liturgies.

In the year 203 C.E., Perpetua made the decision to become a Christian, although she knew it could mean her death. Her father was frantic with worry and tried to talk her out of her decision. His motivation is understandable for at 22 years of age, this well-educated, high-spirited woman had every reason to want to live–including an infant son whom she was still nursing.

Perpetua was arrested with four others, including Felicity, another African woman. Perpetua was baptized before being taken to prison–a prison that was so crowded with people that the heat was suffocating. For Felicity it was even worse as she suffered from the stifling heat, overcrowding, and rough handling while she was eight months pregnant.

The officers of the prison began to recognize the power, faith, strength and leadership of Perpetua and the warden himself became a believer. There was a feast the day before the public spectacle so that the crowd could see the martyrs and make fun of them. But the martyrs turned this all around by laughing at the crowd for not being Christians and exhorting them to follow their example.

Bears, leopards, and wild boars attacked the men while the women were stripped to face a wild cow. When the assembled crowd, however, saw the two African young women, one of whom had obviously just given birth, milk running from her breasts, they were horrified and ashamed, and the two women were removed from the arena and clothed again. In spite of everything, however, Perpetua and Felicity were thrown roughly and brutally back into the arena. Regardless of her own pain and suffering though, Perpetua, filled with compassion and still thinking of others, went to help Felicity to her feet. The two then stood side-by-side, dignity intact, heads raised high as all of the martyrs assembled in the arena had their throats cut.

si kwa ubaya but leopard na wildboar zikiwekwa kwa cage zita attack hao majamaa ama leopard itameza boar Obelix syle

sasa ata kwani hao watu wanaogopa boars aje? its history, maybe ata ni hekaya.

hii prison ilikuwa wapi afirika?
bears zilikuweko afirika kweli…but, sorry…you never know ya mungu ni mengi…

Ati Mwaka ngani. Rudia tena hapo

[CENTER]The MARTYRDOM

of Saints

PERPETUA and FELICITY[/CENTER]
[B]

†[/B]

– From the Mystical Revelations of Maria Valtorta –

JESUS:

“It was not My intention to give you this vision this evening. I had intended to show you another episode of the ‘gospels of faith.’ 5 But someone who deserves to be satisfied expressed a desire, and [so] I satisfy him.6 Despite your pains: see, observe and describe. As for your pains, give them to Me; and the description, to your brothers.”

Valtorta:

"So I write despite my pains, so severe, in which I seem to have my head in a vise that starts from the nape [of the neck] and joins my forehead, and then goes down toward my spine in back: a terrible pain in which I thought I would explode with meningitis; and then I fainted. Even now it is so severe. But Jesus allows me to write successfully in order to obey. Later…, later…, what will be, will be.

Meanwhile, I assure you7 that I pass from one surprise to another. Because, first, I find myself before some Africans, or at least Arabs, while I have always believed that these Saints were Europeans. For I had not the least notion of their social and physical condition and their martyrdom. As for Agnes, I knew her life and death.8 But these! It is as if I were reading an unknown account.

For the first illustration, before I fainted, I saw an amphitheater somewhat like the Coliseum (but not in ruins), then empty of people. Only one young and very beautiful dark-skinned woman stands erect there in the middle of it. Raised above the ground, she radiates a beatific light that bursts out from her brown body and from the dark garment that covers her. She seems an angel of the place. She looks at me and smiles. It is then that I faint and see nothing more.

Now the Vision is completed. I am in a building that, from its gloomy appearance and lack of any conveniences whatever, reveals itself as a fortress used as a prison. It is not the underground place of the Tullianum 9 I saw yesterday. Here there are little rooms and elevated corridors. But they are of such scant space and light, and furnished with such bars, iron gates and locks, that their severity nullifies their ‘somewhat better’ [aspect] given by their placement [compared to the Tullianum]. This cancels that still smaller idea of their freedom.

In one of these ‘holes,’ the young dark-skinned woman I saw in the amphitheater sits on an ugly little table that also serves as bed, seat and table. Now, she does not radiate any light, but only such peace. She has in her lap a little boy a few months old to whom she gives her milk. She sings him a lullaby, cuddling him with a gesture of love. The baby plays with the young mother and she caresses his little face, which is more olive-complected against her brown maternal breast. He attaches and detaches himself from it greedily, and with sudden little laughs full of milk.

The young woman is very beautiful: with a regular, roundish face, and very beautiful large eyes of a velvety black, a thick but small mouth full of very white and regular teeth; black and somewhat kinky hair, but held in place by tight tresses wrapped round her head. She has a brown color, swarthy but not excessively so. Even among us Italians, and especially in the south of Italy, we see that color, but just a little lighter than this. When she rises to put the little boy to sleep by walking up and down the cell, I see that she is tall and gracefully shaped. Not excessively so, but her figure is already well formed. She seems a queen in her stately bearing. She wears a simple dark garment, almost like her skin. It falls down on her in soft folds along her beautiful body.

An old man enters. He, too, is dark. The jailer lets him enter by opening the heavy gate. He then withdraws. The young woman turns and smiles. The old man looks at her and weeps. For some minutes they remain thus.

Then the pain of the old man erupts. With anxiety he pleads with his daughter to have pity on his suffering:

‘It’s not for this that I begot you!’ he says to her. 'Among all my children I have loved you: joy and light of my house. And now you want to ruin yourself and ruin your poor father, who feels his heart dying with the pain that you give him. Daughter! for months now I am pleading with you. You wished to resist [me] and [now] you have known prison: you who were born amid comforts. Bowing my back before the powerful, I have obtained [permission] for you, though a prisoner, to remain in your house. I assured the judge that I had made you yield to my paternal authority. Now he mocks me, because he sees that you care nothing about my authority. This is not what that doctrine you call “perfect,” should teach you. What kind of God is He Whom you follow, then, that He inspires you not to respect the one who begot you? not to love him? For if you loved me you would not give me so much sorrow. Your stubbornness – that not even pity for that innocent child has conquered – has succeeded in having you snatched from your house and shut up in this prison.

But now they no longer talk of prison, but of death! And an atrocious death! Why? For whom? For whom do you want to die? Does this God of yours need your, need our sacrifice – mine and that of your offspring who will have no more mother – does He!? Does His triumph need your blood and my weeping to be complete? But how so? The wild animal loves its offspring, and loves them all the more as it has held them at its bosom. Even in this I was hoping, and it was for this that I obtained for you to be able to feed your baby. But you do not change. And after you have fed him, warmed him, and made yourself a pillow for his sleep, now you reject him, abandon him without regret. I do not plead with you for myself. But in his name. You have no right to make him an orphan. Your God has no right to do this. How can I believe Him to be more good than our gods if He wants these cruel sacrifices? You cause me not to love Him, but to curse Him always more. But No! No! What am I saying? Oh! Perpetua, forgive me! Forgive your old father whom sorrow drives mad!

You want me to love Him, your God? I will love Him more than myself. But stay among us. Tell the judge that you relent. Then you may love whomever you wish of the gods of the earth. Then you may do with your father whatever you wish. I do not call you “daughter” anymore. I am not your father any longer, but your servant, your slave; and you are my mistress. Lady: order, and I will obey you. But have pity, have pity. Save yourself while you still can. There is no more time to wait. You know your companion has brought her offspring to light, and nothing stops the sentence now anymore. Your son will be torn from you; you will not see him anymore. Perhaps tomorrow, perhaps this very day. Have pity, daughter! Have pity on me and on him who does not even know how to speak. But you see how he looks at you and smiles! How he calls for your love! Oh! Mistress! My Mistress! Light and queen of my heart! Light and joy of your newborn son: have pity, have pity!’

The old man is on his knees and kisses the hem of his daughter’s garment. He embraces her knees and seeks to take her hand, which she places on her heart to suppress her human torment. But nothing makes her yield.

‘It is for the love that I have for you and for him,’ she answers, 'that I remain faithful to my Lord. No glory of earth will give to your white head and to this innocent child such adornment as my dying will give you. You will join the Faith. And then what would you say of me if, out of momentary cowardice, I had renounced the Faith? My God does not need my blood nor your weeping to triumph. But you need it, in order to be joined to Life. And this innocent child does, in order to remain there. Through the life that you gave me and the joy that he has given me, I obtain the Life that is true, eternal, blissful. No. My God does not teach us to have no love for our fathers, our children. But to have true love. Sorrow makes you delirious now, Father. But afterward, the light will be in you and you will bless me. I will bring it to you from Heaven. And this innocent child: it is not that I love him less, now that I have caused the pouring out of my blood to nourish him. If pagan ferocity were not against us Christians, I would have been a most loving mother to him, and he would have been the goal of my life. But God is greater than [this] flesh born from me, and infinitely greater the love that should be given to Him. I cannot – even in the name of my maternity – put His love after that of a creature.

No. You are not the slave of your daughter. I am always a daughter to you and in all things obedient – apart from this: in renouncing the true God for you. Let the will of men be accomplished. And if you love me, follow me in the Faith. There you will find your daughter, and for always, because the true Faith gives Paradise, and my holy Shepherd has already given me a welcome in His Kingdom.’

Here the vision changes, because I see other personages enter the cell: three men and a very young woman. They kiss and embrace each other in turn. The jailers also enter to take away Perpetua’s son. She staggers as if struck by a blow, but she recovers.

Her feminine companion comforts her:

‘I, too, have lost my offspring. But she is not lost. God was good to me. He granted me to beget her for Him and her baptism is bejewelled with my blood. She was a baby…, and beautiful as a flower. Your child also is beautiful, Perpetua. But to make them live in Christ, these flowers need our blood. Thus, we will give them a double life.’

Perpetua takes the little boy, whom she had placed on the cot where he sleeps, full and content. She gives him to her father, after having kissed him lightly so as not to wake him. She blesses him also and traces a cross on his forehead, on his small hands, his little feet, and his breast, dipping her finger in the tears flowing from her eyes. Perpetua does it all so gently that the baby smiles in his sleep as if it is a caress.

Then the condemned go out, and in the middle of some soldiers, they are brought to a dark dugout of the amphitheater to await their martyrdom. They pass the hours praying and singing sacred hymns, exhorting each other to heroism.

Now I, too, seem to be in the amphitheater that I have already seen. It is filled with a crowd of people with, for the most part, bronze skin. However, there are also many Romans. The crowd is noisy and agitated on the tiers of seats. The light is intense, despite the curtain stretched out on the side with the sun.

They make the six martyrs enter the arena in single file. It seems to me that they have already carried out some cruel games there, because it is already stained with blood. The crowd whistles and curses. The martyrs, with Perpetua in the lead, enter singing. They stop in the middle of the arena and one of the six turns to [address] the crowd:

‘You would do better to show your courage by following us in the Faith and not by insulting unarmed people, who repay you for your hate by praying for you and loving you. The rods with which you beat us, the prison, the tortures, snatching from two mothers their children – none of this changes your heart, neither out of love for God nor love of neighbor. You liars who call yourselves civil, but wait for a woman to give birth so that afterward you may kill her in both body and heart, separating her from her offspring. You cruel people, who lie in order to kill, because you know that none of us does you harm; and so much less do these mothers who have no other thought but their offspring. Three times, six times, a hundred times over we will give our life for our God and for you, that you may come to love Him. And we pray for you while already Heaven opens above us: “Our Father, Who art in Heaven…”’. The six martyrs pray on their knees.

A large low gate opens, and out charge some wild beasts running so swiftly they seem to be racing. They seem to be wild bulls or buffalos. 10 Driven out together and equipped with pointed horns, they attack the unarmed group. They lift then into the air on their horns like so many rags. They throw them back down on the ground, they trample them. They turn back, fleeing as though maddened by light and by noise; and then return to the attack.

Perpetua, caught like a twig on the horns of a bull, is hurled many yards away. Yet for all her wounds she raises herself again, and her first concern is to rearrange her garments torn off her bosom. Holding them on her with her right hand, she drags herself toward Felicity who landed on her back, disemboweled in her midriff. Perpetua covers her and raises her, making herself a support for the wounded woman. The beasts return to wound them while the five others, only half-alive, are stretched out on the ground. Then the keepers drive the beasts back in [their dens] and the gladiators finish the job.

But Perpetua’s gladiator, whether from pity or inexperience, does not know how to kill her. He wounds her, but doesn’t get the right spot. ‘Brother, here, let me help you,’ she says in a thin voice and with a very sweet smile. Then, leaning the point of the sword against her right carotid [artery], she says: ‘Jesus, I commend myself to You!’ ‘Push, brother. I bless you,’ and she moves her head toward the sword to help the inexperienced and troubled gladiator.

COMMENTARY OF CHRIST

Valtorta: [“Jesus says to me”]:

JESUS:

"This is the martyrdom of My martyr, Perpetua, of her companion, Felicity, and that of their companions. She was guilty of being a Christian: a catechumen, yet. But how fearless in her love for Me! To the martyrdom of her flesh, Perpetua had joined that of her heart, and Felicity with her. If they knew [thus] how to love their executioners, how [well] would they have known how to love their children?

They were young and happy in their love of their husbands and their parents, in their love for their offspring. But God should be loved above all things. And thus do they love Him. They tear out their very bowels in separating themselves from their little babies, but their Faith does not die. They believe in the other Life. Firmly. They know that It belongs to whomever was faithful and lived according to the Law of God.

The law within the Law is love: for the Lord God, for one’s neighbor. What greater love [than] to give one’s life for those whom one loves, just as the Savior gave it for humanity that He loved? They gave their life to love Me and to bring others to love Me, and therefore to possess eternal Life. They want their children and parents, their husbands, their brothers and all those whom they love: with love of the blood and with love of the spirit – their executioners among these, since I said: 'Love those who persecute you11 – they want them all to have the Life of My Kingdom. And, to guide them to this My Kingdom, with their own blood they trace a sign that goes from Earth to Heaven, and it shines, it calls.

To suffer? To die? What is that? It is a fleeting moment, while Life eternal endures. It is nothing – that moment of sorrow, of pain – compared to the future of joy that awaits them. The wild beasts? The swords? What are they? Let them be blessed, for they give Life.

The martyrs’ sole preoccupation: to preserve their modesty – because whoever is holy, is holy in all. At that moment they were concerned, not with their wounds, but with their disordered garments: because [even] if not virgins, they are always modest. True Christianity always bestows virginity of spirit. It preserves it, this beautiful purity, even where matrimony and offspring have taken away that seal that makes virgins angels.

The human body, washed by Baptism, is the temple of God’s Spirit. It should therefore not be violated with immodest behavior or immodest dress. From a woman especially who does not respect herself, there can come only depraved offspring and a corrupt society – from which God withdraws Himself, and in which Satan plows and sows his briars, his troubles, that make you despair."

~ ~ ~

[March 3, 1944]

Valtorta: [“Jesus says to me”]:

JESUS:

"My martyrs had possessed Wisdom. And with them, My confessors. And all possess It who truly love Me and make of this love the aim of their life.

To the eyes of the world, that is not apparent. Rather, to be just seems [to the world] a weakness. It seems like something to take advantage of. As though with the passing of the ages, changes had taken place in the relationship between God and His faithful.

No. If I reduced the severity of the Mosaic Law, and gave all of you re-sources of incalculable power to help you practice the Law and reach Perfection: there has been no change, however, in the duty of respect and obedience that you should have for the Lord your God. If He has made Himself good to the point of giving Himself to make you good, you should be still more good, and not say: ‘Let Him think about saving us. Let’s enjoy ourselves.’ That is not wisdom: it is lunacy and blasphemy. That is the wisdom of the world, and blameworthy, not Divine Wisdom.

My martyrs were Divinely wise. They did not, like the ungodly, say to themselves: ‘Let’s enjoy today, for it never returns, and with death every joy ends. And, in order to enjoy [ourselves], let’s make arrogance our right. And by extorting from the weak and the good what it’s not permitted to extort, let’s draw from these our extortions wherewith to fill our wallets and purses, so as later to fill our belly and glut the lusts of our flesh and mind.’ The martyrs did not, like the ungodly, say to themselves: ‘To be just is a sacrifice, and it’s tiresome to be so. What a rebuke it is to see the just man. So let’s take him out of our midst, for his justice reminds us of God and rebukes us for living like beasts.’ 12

Instead, My martyrs overturned the theory of the world and wanted to follow only that of God. So the world put them to the test, it outraged them, tormented, killed them, hoping to disturb their virtue. But in its stupidity, the world did not know that every blow given to shatter their soul, was like a hammer that made them penetrate more into Me, and I into them, with a love of perfect fusion. So much so, that in the prisons and circuses they were already in Heaven, and they saw Me just as, after that moment of pain and death, they had seen Me for their blessed eternity.

They were neither dead, nor destroyed, nor tortured, nor in despair: as the travail of giving birth is neither death, nor destruction, nor torture, nor despair. Rather, it is life that begets life. It is a redoubling of a flesh that was only one and [now] becomes two. It is the satisfaction, the hope of being a mother and in having from that maternity unutterable joy for the whole of life. So also for them: that pain was hope, security, the Life that made them blissful.

The world could not understand them – these holy lunatics whose lunacy was loving God with all the perfection possible to a creature; making themselves voluntarily barren, since their only nuptials were those with Me, the Divine. They made themselves eunuchs: for a spiritual love, they amputated human sensuality in themselves and lived as chastely as angels. The world could not understand these sublimely mad [souls]. Though aware of the sweetness of the bridal bed and of offspring, they knew how to renounce both and to fly to their torments, after they willingly tore their heart out in leaving their children and husbands for love of Me, their Love.

But they saved the world. If you, after such an example and washed so much with purifying blood, have become the wild beasts that you are: what would you have become, and how much so, without the holy and blessed generation of My martyrs? It is they who have kept you from plunging down to Satan far sooner than the moment that your lusts provoked. They still invite you to stop and put yourselves back on the way that ascends, forsaking the path that plunges down. They speak words of salvation to you. They say them to you with their wounds, with their words to the tyrants, with their charity, with their concern for their modesty, with their patience, their purity, faith, constancy. They say to you that there is only one science necessary: That which streams from Eternal Wisdom.

Wiser still than Solomon, they prefer this Wisdom to all the thrones and the riches of the earth. And to obtain It and preserve It they brave persecutions and torments, they embrace even death so as not to lose It. They love this Wisdom more than health and beauty, and want to have It for their light. Because Its splendor comes directly from God, and to possess It means for the soul to anticipate the beatific Light of the Eternal Day. With uprightness of heart they learn It and with charity they share It even with their enemies. They have no fear of remaining deprived of It themselves because they share It with the crowds deprived of It. For This Wisdom, living in them, instructs them that 'to give is to receive.'13 And that the more they spread the celestial waters that the Divine Font poured back into them, so much the more did those waters increase, even to brimming them over like chalices of a holy Mass, consumed for the good of the world by the Eternal Priest.

The wise king [Solomon] enumerated the gifts of Wisdom whose spirit is intelligent, holy, one, manifold, subtle…, but all these qualities they, My martyrs, possessed. There was in them what Solomon calls ‘a vapor of God’s power, and an emanation of the glory of the Almighty.’ 14 They therefore mirrored God in themselves again as no one [else] in the world. They mirrored God again in His qualities, and they mirrored Me, the Christ-Savior, in My holocaust.

Oh! How on the lips of every martyr could be put those words of Solomon proclaiming that he loved and sought Wisdom from his youth, and that he wanted Her for his Spouse! That he wanted Her for his Teacher and his riches! 15 And how [well] you can think without fear of error, that the prayer to obtain Wisdom that blossomed on the lips of Solomon, blossomed also on the lips of the martyrs. 16

And how above all you should strive – O you whom the greed of the flesh has dragged back again into a pagan darkness much deeper than the darkness of those to whom My martyrs brought the Light – how you should strive to make yourselves love and desire Wisdom. To pray that It come to you as a Guide in your individual and collective undertakings, that thus you may no longer be what you are: cruel maniacs who torture each other, ruining your life and substance – the two things to which you cling; and ruining the salvation of your spirit – to which I cling Who died to give your spirits salvation.

‘It is through Wisdom,’ says Solomon, ‘that the ways of men are corrected and that they know what is pleasing to God.’ 17 Remember it. And be aware that nothing else is pleasing to God but your good. Therefore, if you know and follow this way pleasing to Him, you will do good to yourselves both on Earth and in Heaven."

[CENTER][SIZE=6]Martyrdom of St. Agnes[/SIZE][/CENTER]

It seemed I was seeing a kind of portico (either a peristyle or a forum), a portico in ancient Rome. I say “portico” because there was a beautiful marble mosaic floor and white marble columns supporting a vaulted ceiling, decorated with mosaics. It might have been the portico of a pagan temple, or of a Roman palace, either the Curia or the Forum. I don’t know.

Against a wall there was a sort of throne, composed of a marble platform supporting a seat. On this seat was an ancient Roman wearing a toga. I then understood he was the Imperial Prefect. Against the other walls were statues and statuettes of gods and tripods for incense. In the middle of the room or portico was an empty space with a large slab of white marble. In the wall facing the seat of that magistrate there opened the real portico, by way of which the square and street were visible.

While I observed these details and the Prefect’s surly expression, three young women entered the vestibule, portico, or room (whichever you prefer).

One was very young–practically a child. Dressed completely in white–a tunic which covered her, leaving only her thin neck and small hands with a girl’s wrists visible. Her head was uncovered, and she was blond. Simply combed hair, with a part in the middle of her head and two long, heavy braids over her shoulders. Her hair weighed so much that it made her bend her head slightly backwards, giving her a stately queenly bearing, without her so desiring. A little lamb a few days old was folicking at her feet, bleating–entirely white, with a pink little nose like a child’s mouth.

A few steps behind the girl were the other two young women. One was almost the same age as the first one mentioned, but more sturdily built and with a more lower-class appearance. The other was more adult–about sixteen or eighteen years old at most. They, too, were dressed in white, with their heads covered. But more modestly dressed. They seemed to be servants, for they behaved respectfully towards the first one. I understood that the latter was Agnes, and the one her age, Emerentiana–I don’t know who the other one was.

Agnes, smiling and secure, went right up to the Magistrate’s dais. And here I heard the following dialogue.

“Did you wish for me? Here I am.”

“When you find out why I wanted you, I don’t think you will still call this gesture of mine a ‘wish’. Are you a Christian?”

“Yes, by the grace of God.”

“Do you realize what this assertion can bring to you?”

“Heaven.”

“Be careful! Death is ugly, and you are a child. Don’t smile, because I am not joking.”

“And I am not either. I am smiling at you because you are the pronobus of my eternal wedding, and I am grateful to you.”

“Think of an earthly wedding, instead. You are beautiful and wealthy. Many are already thinking of you. You have only to choose to become a happy patrician.”

“My choice has already been made. I love the Only One worthy of being loved, and this is the hour of my wedding; this is the temple for it. I am hearing the voice of the Spouse Who is coming and am already seeing His look of love. I am sacrificing my virginity to Him so that He will make it into an eternal flower.”

“If you are concerned about your virginity and about your life as well, sacrifice at once to the gods. This is what the law requires.”

“I have one true God and will sacrifice to Him willingly.”

And here it seemed that some of the Prefect’s assistants gave Agnes a vase with incense in it so that she could scatter it before a god over the tripod chosen by her.

“These are not the gods I love. My God is our Lord Jesus Christ. To Him, whom I love, I will sacrifice myself.”

It seemed to me at this point that the angered Prefect ordered his assistants to place chains around Agnes’ wrists to keep from fleeing or committing some offensive act against the images, since from that moment on she was regarded as guilty and a prisoner.

But the smiling virgin turned to her executioner, saying, "Don’t touch me. I came here spontaneously because I am called here by the voice of the Spouse, Who from Heaven is inviting me to the eternal wedding. I have no need for your bracelets or your chains. Only if I wanted to be moved towards evil would you have to place them on me. And–perhaps–they would be of no use, for my Lord God would make them more useless than a linen thread on a giant’s wrist. But to go out to meet death, joy, and marriage with Christ–no, your chains are of no use, O brother. I bless you if you give me martyrdom. I do not fleee. I love you and pray for your spirit.

As beautiful, white, and upright as a lily, Agnes was a heavenly vision in the vision…

The Prefect gave the sentence, which I did not hear clearly. There seems to have been a kind of gap during which I lost sight of Agnes, intent as I was on the multitude that had crowded into that place.

I then came across the martyr again, even more beautiful and cheerful. In front of her was a little golden statue of Jove and a tripod. At here side was the executioner, with his sword already unsheathed. They seemed to be making a last attempt to bend her will. But Agnes, with flashing eyes, was shaking her head and, with her small hand, refusing the statue. The little lamb was no longer at her feet, but, rather, in the arms of the weeping Emerentiana.

I saw they were having Agnes kneel down on the floor in the middle of the room, where the large slab of white marble was located. The martyr recollected herself, with her arms over her chest and her gaze uplifted to the sky. Her eyes, in the rapture of a delicate contemplation, became flooded with tears of superhuman joy. There was a smile on her face, which was not paler than before.

One of the assistants took hold of her braids, as if they were a rope, to keep her head still. But there was no need to.

“I love Christ!” she cried when she saw the executioner lift the sword, and I saw it penetrate between the shoulder blade and collarbone and open her right carotid, and the martyr fell, still maintaining her kneeling position, to her left, like someone cuddling up to sleep, in a blessed sleep, for the smile did not leave her face and was hidden only by the blood gushing from her slashed throat as if from a beaker.

This was my vision tonight. I could not wait to be alone to write it down and take joy in it once more in peace.

It was so lovely that while I was experiencing it–and tears were falling which I think the faint light in the room hid from those present, and I remained with my eyes closed, partly beause I was so absorbed in contemplation that I needed to concentrate and partly to make them think I was sleeping, although I don’t like people to know…where I am–I could not bear to hear bits of ordinary, very human phrases drifting like flotsam amidst the beauty of the vision, and I said, “Hush, hush,” as if the noise bothered me. But it was not that. The fact was that I wanted to remain alone to contemplate in peace. As I indeed managed to.

Then, afterwards, Jesus spoke to me.

Jesus said:

"It is said, ‘God, having infinitely loved man, loved him until death.’ (John 13:1).

My truest followers are not and were not unlike their God, and, in keeping with His example and for His glory, they have given Him and men measureless love extending to the point of death.

I have already told you that the death of Agnes, like that of Therese, has a single name: love. Regardless of whether the sword or illness appears to be the cause of the death of these creatures, who were able to love with that relative ‘infinity’ of the creature (I speak this way for quibblers over words), which is a lesser copy of God’s perfect infinity, the true and exclusive agent is love.

A single word should be affixed as an epigraph upon these ‘saints’ of Mine. The one which is used for Me: Dilexit. ‘He loved’. Agnes the girl and the young Cecilia loved; the group of Symphorus’ children loved; the tribune Sebastian loved; the slave Julia loved; Cassian the teacher loved; Rufus the caprenter loved; Linus the pontiff loved; the white flowerbed of virgins, the tender meadow of the children, the delicate company of the mothers, the virile one of the fathers, the iron-hard cohort of the soldiers, and the sacerdotal procession of bishops, pontiffs, priests, and deacons loved; the humble and twice redeemed mass of slaves loved.

This purple court of Mine, which confessed Me in the midst of torments, loved. And, in gentler times, the host of those consecrated in cloisters and convents loved, and the virgins in all convents, and the earthly heroes who, while living in the world, have been able to make love a cloister for the spirit so that it will live loving only the Lord, for the Lord’s sake, and men through the Lord.

‘He loved.’ This little word, which is greater than the universe–for in its brevity it contains God’s most forceful force, God’s most characteristic characteristic, and God’s most powerful power–this word, whose sound, when spoken supernaturally to describe a life led, fills creation with itself and makes mankind start with admiration and the Heavens with rejoicing, is the key, the secret which opens up and explains the resistance, generosity, fortitude, and heroism of so many creatures who on account of age or family conditions seemed to be the least suited for such heroic perfection. For, if it still does cause amazement that Sebastian, Alexander, Mario, and Speditus should have been able to defy death for the sake of Christ–just as they had defied death for Caesar–it is astonishing that some who were little more than girls, like Agnes, and loving mothers should have been able to cast their lives into the midst of tortures, agreeing, as their first torment, to wrest themselves away from the embrace of relatives and children out of love for Me.

But to the human and superhuman generosity of the martyr to love there corresponds the divine generosity of the God of love. It is I who give My strength to these heroes of Mine and to all the victims of the unbloody, but long and no less heroic martyrdom. I make Myself strength in them. It is I who infuse fortitude into the lamb Agnes and the feeble old man, the young mother and the soldier, the master and the slave, and, in addition, over the centuries, into the cloistered nun and the statesman who dies for the faith, the unknown victim and the spiritual leader.

In the depths of their hearts and on their lips, do not seek any other pearl or savor except this: ‘Jesus.’ I, Jesus, am wherever holiness shines and charity pours itself out."

[CENTER]A Vision of Paul and the Early Martyrs Tullianum Jail, Rome[/CENTER]

I see a large dark room. I call it a large room just to signify that it is very spacious and constructed with stone. But it is a cellar which the light barely enters through two floor-level slits which also serve for ventilation. It is quite insufficient, however, for the number of people gathered there and because of the moisture oozing from the walls, made of almost square-shaped blocks of stone joined with lime mortar, but with no plaster and beaten earth flooring.

I know it is the Tullianum jail. My counselor tells me. From the same source I also know that the throng packed into such a small space is made up of Christians imprisoned for their faith and waiting to be martyred. It is a time of persecution, and precisely one of the first persecutions, for I hear mention of Peter and Paul and know they have been killed under Nero.

You can’t imagine the sharpness of detail with which I “see” this jail and those enclosed herein. I could describe the age, physiognomy, and clothing of each individual. But in that case I would never finish. I shall thus limit myself to stating the things, points, and personages that make the greatest impression on me.

There are people of every age and social conditon. From the elderly–who, in all mercy, should be left to a natural death–to children only a few years old who should rightfully be left to their innocent games, free and joyous, but who are languishing as poor flowers who will never again see the flowers of the earth, in the unhealthy shadows of this jail.

There are rich people with well cared-for clothing and poor people in poor clothes. And the language also contains variations in pronunciation and style, depending on whether it emerges from the educated lips of gentlemen or the mouths of common people. Mixed together with the Latin of Rome, the foreign words and pronunciations of Greeks, Iberians, Thracians, and many others are also heard. But if the forms of clothing and speech are different, the spirit is the same, guided by charity. They love one another with no distinction based on race or wealth. They love one another and seek to provide mutual assistance.

The strongest give up the driest and most comfortable places–if you can call a few slabs of stone scattered here and there serving as seats and cushions “comfortable”–to the weakest. And they cover them with their clothing, remaining with nothing but their tunics for the sake of modesty, using togas and cloaks to act as mattresses and cushions and blankets for the sick trembling with fever or those wounded by tortures previously undergone. The healthiest help the sickest by lovingly giving them something to drink–a little water poured from a pitcher into a rustic recipient–and soaking some strips of cloth torn from their clothes in it to provide bandages for dislocated or lacerated members and for the brows burning with fever.

And they sing from time to time. A soft song which is certainly a psalm or several psalms, for they alternate…

One of them begins as follows: “I love, for the Lord listens to the voice of my prayer.”

Another says:, “O God, my God, I keep watch for You from the first light of day. My soul is thirsty for You, and my flesh, much more. In a desert land, impassable and without water…”

A child moans in the half-darkness. The song halts.

Someone asks, “Who is crying?”

Someone answers, “Its Castulus. The fever and the burn give him no relief. He is thirsty and cannot drink because the water burns his lips, scorched by the fire.”

“There is a mother here who can no longer give her milk to her baby,” says an imposing matron with a refined appearance. Have Castulus brought to me. Milk burns less than water."

Someone orders, “Castulus to Plautina.”

A person comes forward that, from his clothing, I would deem to be either the servant of a Christian family who is sharing the lot of his masters or a common laborer. He is thickset, dark, and robust, with almost shaven hair and a short dark-colored robe clasped at the waist by a belt. He is certainly carrying a poor child about eight years old in his arms, as if on a stretcher. His clothing, though now covered with earth and stains, is elegant, of pure white wool and with the neck, sleeves, and bottom edge adorned with sumptuous Grecian embroidery. His sandals are also elegant and beautiful.

Plautina sits down on a stone which an old man gives up for her. Plautina is also dressed entirely in white wool. I do not remember the exact names for the Roman clothes, but I think this long robe is called a chiamys, and the cloak, a palla. I cannot guarantee my memory, though. I know Plautina’s clothing is very beautiful and ample and envelops her graciously, turning her into a lovely living statue.

She sits down on the block of stone leaning against the wall. I distinctly see the large stones overhanging her, against which she stands out with her slightly olive-colored face, large black eyes, raven-black braids, and snow-white dress.

“Give him to me, Restitutus, and may God reward you,” she says to the merciful bearer of the little martyr. And she separates her knees a bit to receive the child, as if upon a bed.

When Restitutus sets him down, I see a ruin which makes me shudder. The poor child’s face is one big burn. Perhaps he was handsome. He is now monstrous. No more than a little hair on the back of his head; in front the skin is bare and consumed by fire. There are no longer a brow and cheeks and a nose as we conceive of them, but a bright red swelling, pink from the fierce heat, as if caused by an acid. Instead of lips, another wound which is horrible to look at. It seems they held just his face over the flame, for there is no more burn under his chin.

Plautina opens her tunic and, speaking with the love of a true mother, squeezes her round breast full of milk and has the drops trickle between the lips of the child, who cannot smile, but who caresses her hand to show his relief. And then, after quenching his thirst, she lets some more milk fall upon the poor face to medicate it with this balm, which is a mother’s blood turned into nourishment and the love of a woman left without children for someone left without a mother.

The child no longer moans. With his thirst quenched and his agony soothed, and rocked to sleep by the matron, he falls asleep, breathing with difficulty.

Plautina looks like a mother of sorrows, in view of her pose and expression. She looks at the poor little child and certainly sees her child or children in him, and tears roll down her cheeks, and she thrusts her head backwards to keep them from falling onto the child’s wounds.

The song resumes, “I anxiously awaited the Lord, and He turned to me and heeded my cry.”

“The Lord is my Shepherd. I shall lack nothing. He has set me in a grassy meadow. He has led me to refreshing water.”

“Fabius is dead,” a voice says at the back of the vault. “Let us pray,” and they all say the Our Father and another prayer which begins like this: "May the Most High be praised, for He has mercy on His servants and opens His Kingdom to our unworthiness without asking our weakness for anything but patience and good will. May Christ be praised, for He suffered torture for those whom His mercy know to be too weak to undergo it and has asked them only for love and faith. May the Spirit be praised, for He has given His fires for martyrdom to those not called to the consummation of martyrdom and makes them holy with His Holiness. So be it. (Maran atha) (I don’t know if I am writing this correctly).

“How fortunate Fabius is!” and old man exclaims. “He is already seeing Christ!”

"We, too, shall see Him, Felix, and go to Him with the twofold crown of faith and martyrdom. We shall be as if reborn, without a trace of stain, for the sins of our past life will be washed in our blood before being washed in the Blood of the Lamb. We sinned greatly–we who were pagans for long years–and it is a great grace for the jubilee of martyrdom to come to us to make us new, worthy of the Kingdom.

“Peace be with you, my brothers and sisters,” thunders a voice which I immediately sense I have previously heard.

“Paul! Paul! Bless us!”

There is a rush of movement in the throng. Only Plautina remains motionless, with the pitiful burden on her lap.

“Peace be with you,” the apostle repeats. And he advances up to the center of the entrance hall. “Here I am with Diomedes and Valente to bring you Life.”

“What about the Pontiff?” many ask.

“He sends you his greeting and his blessing. He is alive, for the time being, and safe in the catacombs. The fossores (Christians disguised as grave-diggers to bury the martyrs) are guarding him well. He would come, but Alexander and Caius Julius informed us that he is too well known among the jailers. Rufus and the other Christians are not always on guard duty. I–less well known and a Roman citizen–have come. Brothers and sisters, what news do you have for me?”

“Fabius is dead.”

“Castulus suffered the first martyrdom.”

“Sixta has now been led to torture.”

“Linus has been taken with Urbanus and his sons to Mamertinus or to the Circus–we don’t know.”

“Let us pray for them–whether alive or dead. That Christ may give all of them His Peace…”

And Paul, with his arms opened in the form of a cross, prays (short, rather unattractive, but an impressive man) in the middle of the dungeon. As if he, too, were a servant, he is wearing a short dark robe with a little cloak and a hood which he has thrust back in order to pray. Behind him are the two men he has named, dressed as he is, but much younger.

When the prayer is over, Paul asks, “Where is Castulus?”

“On Plautina’s lap, there, in the back.”

Paul cuts through the crowd and approahces the group. He bends over and observes. He blesses. He blesses the child and the matron. The child appears to have awakened at the cries greeting the apostle, for he raises a little hand, trying to touch Paul, who then takes the hand between his own and speaks. “Castulus, do you hear me?”

“Yes,” says the child, moving his lips with difficulty.

“Be strong, Castulus. Jesus is with you.”

“Oh, why didn’t you give Him to me? Now I can’t any longer!” And a tear falls to aggravate his wounds.

“Don’t cry, Castulus. Can you swallow a single crumb? You can? Well then, I’ll give you the Body of the Lord. Then I’ll go to your mother and tell her that Castulus is a flower in Heaven. What should I say to your mother?”

“That I am happy. That I have found a mother. That she gives me her milk. That my eyes don’t hurt any more. (It’s not a lie to say so, is it–to console my mother?) And that I ‘see’ Paradise and my place and hers better than if these eyes of mine were still alive. Tell her fire doesn’t hurt when the angels are with us and that she shouldn’t fear either for my sake or for hers. The Savior will give us strength.”

"Wonderful, Castulus! I shall tell your mother what you have said. God alway helps, brothers and sisters. And you see this. He is a child. He is at the age when people can’t bear the pain of a slight malaise. And you see and hear him. He is in peace. His is ready to suffer everything, after having already suffered so much, provided he can go to the One whom he loves, and he loves Him because he is one of those whom He loved–a child–and he is a hero of the Faith. Take heart from these children, O brothers and sisters. I am returning from having taken Lucina to the cemetery, the daughter of Faustus and Cecilia. She was only fourteen years old, and you know much she was loved by her family and how weak she was in health. And yet she was a giant before the tyrants. You know that with these (clothing disguise) I pass myself off as a fossor (grave digger) so that I can gather as many bodies as possible and lay them in holy ground. I thus live in contact with tribunals and see, as I live in contact with the circuses and observe. And it is a comfort for me to think that I, too, in my hour–if God so pleases–shall be sustainted by Him like the saints who have preceded us. Lucina was tortured with a thousand torments. Beaten, hung, stretched out, and twisted with tongs. And she was always healed by the work of God. And she always withstood all the threats. The final torture, before martyrdom, was aimed at her spirit. The tyrant, on seeing her caught up with the love for Christ, a virgin who had bound herself to the Lord our God, wanted to wound her in this love of hers. And he condemned her to be with a man. But one, two, and ten who approached all perished, struck down by a heavenly thunderbolt. Then, unable to break and destroy the lily of her purity in any way, the tyrant ordered that she be bound and hung in such a fashion that she would remain as if seated and then lowered swiftly onto a pointed wedge, which tore apart her viscera. The barbarian thought he had thus taken away her virginity. But her purity had never flourished so beautifully as in that bloodbath, and from her torn viscera her lily spread forth to be picked up by God’s angel. She is now in peace.

Courage, brothers and sisters. I had fed her yesterday with the Bread of Heaven, and with the taste of that Bread she went to her final martyrdom. I shall now give that Bread to you as well, for tomorrow is a day of superhuman feasting for you. The Circus awaits you. And you do not fear. In the beasts and snakes you will see celestial appearances, for God will work this miracle for you, and the jaws and coils will seem to you to be loving embraces; the roars and hisses, heavenly voices; and, like Castulus, you will see Paradise, which is already descending to welcome you into its blessedness."

The Christians, except for Plautina, are all kneeling and singing: “As the hind longs for the brook, so my soul longs for You. My soul is thirsty for God. For the mighty, living God. When may I come to You, Lord? Why are you sad, my soul? Hope in God, and it will be granted to you to praise Him. By day God sends His grace, and by night He recieves the song of thanksgiving. Prayer to God is my life. I shall say to Him, ‘You are my defense’. Come. Let us joyously sing to the Lord. Let us uplift shouts of joy to God our Savior. Let us present ourselves to Him with cries of rejoicing. For the Lord is the great God. Come. Let us prostrate ourselves and worship Him who created us. For He is the Lord our God, and we are the people nourished by Him, the flock guided by Him.”

While they were singing, some Roman soldiers and jailers entered; they also mount guard so that unfriendly people will not enter.

Paul prepares for the rite. “You shall be our altar,” he says to Castulus. Can you hold the chalice on your chest?"

“Yes.”

A linen cloth is spread over the child’s little body, and the chalice and bread are set upon it

And I attend the Mass of the martyrs, which is celebrated by Paul, and served by the two priests accompanying him. It is not like today’s Mass, though. It seems to me to contain parts now lacking and to lack parts now in use. It lacks the Epistle, for instance, and after the blessing–“May the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit bless you”–there is nothing else. But the parts are the same as now from the Gospel to the Consecration. The Gospel read was that of the Beatitudes.

I see the linen cloth trembling on the chest of Castulus, who as Paul requested, is holding the base of the chalice in his fingers so that it will not fall. I also see that when Paul says, “This consecration of the Body…” the flush of a smile passes over the wounded face of the child, and then the little head suddenly sinks down with a deathly heaviness which constantly grows.

Plautina seems to be jolted, but controls herself. Paul proceeds as if not noticing anything. But when, after breaking the Host, he is about to bend over the little martyr to give him Communion as the first of all with a minuscule fragment, Plautina says, “He’s dead.” And Paul pauses for an instant and then gives the matron the fragment intended for the child, who has remained with his fingers clasped over the base of the chalice in his final contraction, and they have to disengage them from it in order to take the chalice and give it to the others.

Then, after Communion has been distributed, the Mass ends. Paul takes off his vestments and places them and the linen cloth and the chalice and the receptable for the hosts in a bag he is carrying under his cloak. He then says, “Peace be with Christ’s martyr. Peace be with holy Castulus.”

And everyone responds, “Peace!”

“I shall now take him to another place. Give me a cloak to wrap him in. I shall take him without waiting for nightfall. Tonight we shall come for Fabius. But I shall take him…as a child who has fallen asleep. Fallen asleep in the Lord.”

One of the soldiers offers his red cloak, and they lay the little martyr upon it and wrap him in it, and Paul takes him on his arm (the left arm), as if he is a father who is carrying his sleeping son somewhere else, with his head resting on his father’s shoulder

“Brothers and sisters, may peace be with you, and remember me when you are in the Kingdom.” And he goes out, blessing them.

[CENTER] [SIZE=6] Jesus says:[/SIZE][/CENTER]

"It is not the Gospel, but I want it to be considered one of the ‘gospels of faith’ for you that fear.

You also fear persecutions. You no longer have the fiber of old. But I am always Myself, children. You must not think that I can’t give you an intrepid heart in the hour of trial. Without My help, no one, even then, could have remained steadfast in the face of so much torture. And yet old men and children, young girls and mothers, and spouses and parents were able to die, encouraging others to die, as if they were going to a celebration. And it was a celebration. An eternal celebration!

They died, and their dying was a breach in the dike of paganism. Like water which goes on eroding and eroding and slowly but inexorably breaks man’s sturdiest works, their blood, issuing from thousands and thousands of wounds, gnawed at the pagan wall and, like many brooks, scattered into Caesar’s militias, into Caesar’s royal palace, into the circuses and spas, and among gladiators and animal keepers, those employed at the public baths, and the cultured and the common folk–everywhere, unstoppable and invincible.

The soil of Rome soaked up this blood, and the city rises–I might say it is cemented–with the blood and dust of my martyrs. The few hundred martyrs you are familia with are nothing compared to the thousands and thousands still buried in the entrails of Rome and the thousands and thousands of others who, having been burned on the stakes in the circuses, became ash scattered by the wind, or, after being torn to pieces and devoured by beasts and reptiles, became excrement which was swept up and flung out as manure.

But if you do not know these unknown heroes of Mine, I know them all, and their complete annihilation, even of their skeletons, has been what has fertilized the savage soil of the pagan world more than any manure and made it become capable of bearing the Heavenly Wheat.

Now this soil of the Christian world is becoming pagan again, and poison germinates, not bread. And that is why you are afraid. You have become too estranged from God to have the fortitude of old in you.

The theological virtues are dying in the places where they are not already dead. And you don’t even remember the cardinal virtues. In not having charity, it is only natural for you to be unable to love God to the point of heroism. In not loving Him, you do not hope in Him and do not have faith in Him. In not having faith, hope and charity, you are not strong, prudent, and just. In not being strong, you are not temperate. And in not being temperate, you love the flesh more than the soul and tremble over your flesh.

But I can still work the miracle. Believe, too, that in every persecution the martyrs are able to be such through My aid. The martyrs–that is, those who still love Me. I then take their love to perfection and make them athletes in faith. I come to the aid of those hoping and believing in Me. Always. In any circumstance.

The little martyr remaining with his hand clasping the chalice, even beyond death, teaches you where strength is. In the Eucharist. When someone feeds on Me, as Paul states, he no longer lives through himself, but Jesus lives in him (Galations 2:20). And Jesus was able to endure all torments, without bending. Whoever lives by Me will thus be like Me. Strong.

Have faith."

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