Why Catholics can't be surprised to be hated – and how to profit by it
Christ promised we would be hated, and persecuted. Remembering that is crucial.
Christ promised we would be hated, and persecuted. Remembering that is crucial.
Editor’s Notes
In this part, Fr. Coleridge tells us:
How Christ foretold persecution so the Apostles would not be shaken when it came.
That his delay in revealing this was due to his comforting presence while still with them.
Why his grave and final warning unveiled the full scope of the world’s hatred.
The key way to get through the fury of the enemies of the Church is to remember Christ’s words, and to remember to rejoice amidst the storm. If we can do this, then even their hatred can strengthen our faith, as well as our charity and merit before God.
This can, in turn, put us in a better position to pray for our enemies and obtain for them the great good that they need: conversion.
As this is the final part of this long chapter which we began in Eastertide, let us also recall the words of St Ignatius in the Exercises about the third kind of humility:
Whenever the praise and glory of the Divine Majesty would be equally served, in order to imitate and be in reality more like Christ, Our Lord, I desire and choose poverty with Christ poor, rather than riches; insults with Christ loaded with them, rather than honours; I desire to be accounted worthless and a fool for Christ, rather than to be esteemed as wise and prudent in this world. So was Christ treated before me.
If one desires to attain this third kind of humility, [he] should beg Our Lord to deign to choose him for [it], which is higher and better, that he may the more imitate and serve Him, provided equal or greater praise and service be given to the Divine Majesty.
For more on this section, its place in the Gospel and the Liturgy, and the role of persecution as a “quasi-mark” of the Church, see Part I.
Hatred of the World
Passiontide, Part III
Chapter III
St. John xv. 11-27.
Story of the Gospels, § 156
Burns and Oates, London, 1892
Why did Christ say his people 'hated both me and my Father'?
Why does Christ say the Holy Ghost 'shall bear testimony of Me'?
What are the forces that drive the persecution of the Church?
Why zeal for false religions provokes persecution of the Church
Why Catholics must not be surprised to be hated – and how to profit by it
Our Lord forewarning the Apostles
‘But these things I have told you, that when the hour shall come, you may remember that I told you of them, but I told you not these things from the beginning, because I was with you.’1
It seems best to take these two sentences together. Our Lord says that He has told them of the persecutions which they have to endure, and of their cause, in order that they may be able, and glad to be able, to remember when the persecution comes, that He had told them. The meaning seems to be a continuation of what He had said a few moments before, that what He had told them was to prevent their being scandalized.
It was inevitable that the hostility of which He speaks should come upon them, and yet, when it did come, if they had not been forewarned, they might have been shocked, alarmed, surprised, and likely to lose heart or take offence. Thus we find, when the persecution was actually breaking out upon the Christians, St. Peter exhorting them almost as if he had these words of His Master in his mind:
‘Dearly beloved, think not strange the burning heat which is to try you, as if some new thing happened to you, but if you partake of the sufferings of Christ, rejoice, that when the glory shall be revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy. If you be reproached for the name of Christ, you shall be blessed, for that which is of the honour, glory, and power of God, and that which is His Spirit, resteth upon you.’2
Usefulness of the prediction
Our Lord here says that He tells the Apostles these things now that they may remember that He has done so. This should certainly preclude them from taking scandal.
They could say to themselves that their sufferings were just what He had told them beforehand. To remember this, would assure them of His prescience of the future, and turn their thoughts to His own sufferings, which had followed so closely on the prediction of their own resemblance to Him in having to suffer, and the thought that this was exactly the witness to Him that they were appointed to bear, that He was pledged to support them in their trial, which He could have prevented if it had so pleased Him, and that He would abundantly reward them and make their sufferings fruitful to themselves and to others for His glory.
At the same time He adds that He has not told them before, because He was with them, and was always able to strengthen them and console them by His presence, and moreover could always draw on Himself the greater part of the suffering.
Now, as the time was drawing near for His leaving them, He told them of their future treatment by the world, which could not be otherwise than it was to be, without some violent change in the nature of things, and the conditions under which the Gospel Kingdom was to be launched on society, that the remembrance of His prediction might give them strength and courage.
Solution of a difficulty
It has sometimes been a difficulty to expositors that our Lord should here have said that He had not told the Apostles of these things before, because He was Himself with them. For there are some passages in the Gospels which seem to be at variance with this statement.
Our Lord, in His great charge to them when they were sent out for the first time to preach, had told them of the persecutions which awaited them, and that they should be hated of all men for His Name’s sake. He had encouraged them to great fortitude, telling them not to fear those who could only kill the body, and the like. Again, He had used much stronger language in His prophecy on the Mount of Olives, and He had said something to the same effect before on this same evening.
The difficulty is more apparent than real. In the sentences on which we have now been dwelling, our Lord has been speaking of the persecution which they were to have to bear, more explicitly and at the same time more gravely than ever before. He goes to the root of the matter, as it were, and they must have felt that the treatment which they were to receive at the hands of the world was nothing extraordinary or not to be expected considering the circumstances of the case.
They would see that it was no longer merely a party among the Jews, the Sadducees who were in power, or the Chief Priests who denied the Resurrection, that were jealous of His influence with the people, and were to be stirred up to hostility against Him. The persecution was not to be partial, or transitory and fitful in its manifestations, an enmity which could be appeased as well as aroused, and which might be conceivably changed into friendship more or less cordial. The followers of our Lord were to be treated as renegades and apostates, aliens from the holy nation, and indeed, as the Roman historian says of the Jews, the enemies of the human race.
And they would soon enough have a commentary on this prediction in what they were to witness before the setting of the morrow’s sun, in the treatment, of which they had at that moment no anticipation whatever, of our Blessed Lord in His own sacred Person at the hands of Jew and Gentile, priests and people and governor and king, high and low, rich and poor, nobles and populace.
Subscribe now to never miss an article:
Hatred of the World
Why did Christ say his people 'hated both me and my Father'?
Why does Christ say the Holy Ghost 'shall bear testimony of Me'?
What are the forces that drive the persecution of the Church?
Why zeal for false religions provokes persecution of the Church
Why Catholics must not be surprised to be hated – and how to profit by it
Here’s why you should subscribe to The Father Coleridge Reader and share with others:
Fr Coleridge provides solid explanations of the entirety of the Gospel
His work is full of doctrine and piety, and is highly credible
He gives a clear trajectory of the life of Christ, its drama and all its stages—increasing our appreciation and admiration for the God-Man.
If more Catholics knew about works like Coleridge’s, then other works based on sentimentality and dubious private revelations would be much less attractive.
But sourcing and curating the texts, cleaning up scans, and editing them for online reading is a labour of love, and takes a lot of time.
Will you lend us a hand and hit subscribe?
Follow our projects on Twitter, YouTube and Telegram:
See Toletus in Joannem, cap. xvi. annot. 5.
1 St. Peter iv. 12-14.
The image attached to this article is of St Paul Miki and Companion Martyrs. It sits in the church of St Francis Xavier in New York.
"The crosses were set in place. Father Pasio and Father Rodriguez took turns encouraging the victims. Their steadfast behaviour was wonderful to see. The Father Bursar stood motionless, his eyes turned heavenward. Brother Martin gave thanks to God’s goodness by singing psalms. Again and again he repeated: “Into your hands, Lord, I entrust my life.” Brother Francis Branco also thanked God in a loud voice. Brother Gonsalvo in a very loud voice kept saying the Our Father and Hail Mary.
Our brother, Paul Miki, saw himself standing now in the noblest pulpit he had ever filled. To his “congregation” he began by proclaiming himself a Japanese and a Jesuit. He was dying for the Gospel he preached. He gave thanks to God for this wonderful blessing and he ended his “sermon” with these words: “As I come to this supreme moment of my life, I am sure none of you would suppose I want to deceive you. And so I tell you plainly: there is no way to be saved except the Christian way. My religion teaches me to pardon my enemies and all who have offended me. I do gladly pardon the Emperor and all who have sought my death. I beg them to seek baptism and be Christians themselves.”
Then he looked at his comrades and began to encourage them in their final struggle. Joy glowed in all their faces, and in Louis’ most of all. When a Christian in the crowd cried out to him that he would soon be in heaven, his hands, his whole body strained upward with such joy that every eye was fixed on him.
Anthony, hanging at Louis’ side, looked towards heaven and called upon the holy names – “Jesus, Mary!” He began to sing a psalm: “Praise the Lord, you children!” (He learned it in catechism class in Nagasaki. They take care there to teach the children some psalms to help them learn their catechism).
Others kept repeating “Jesus, Mary!” Their faces were serene. Some of them even took to urging the people standing by to live worthy Christian lives. In these and other ways they showed their readiness to die.
Then, according to Japanese custom, the four executioners began to unsheathe their spears. At this dreadful sight, all the Christians cried out, “Jesus, Mary!” And the storm of anguished weeping then rose to batter the very skies. The executioners killed them one by one. One thrust of the spear, then a second blow. It was over in a very short time."