THOMASIANS SHOULD learn from the way the martyrs confronted not just suffering, but also the “culture of death” that prevents people from living with dignity, the dean of the UST Faculty of Theology said.
In his homily for the Triduum Mass of the feast of the Thomasian Martyrs, Fr. Jannel Abogado, O.P. described the concept of martyrdom as someone’s personal initiative to emulate Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross. However, martyrs cannot rely on pure imitation to endure death and suffering, he added.
According to him, another feature of martyrdom apart from imitation is the participation that “tells us that our Lord Jesus Christ is continuously present in our lives.”
“They know that it is in death that they will be reborn. That in accepting death, they will live. That is the [mystery] of the life of a martyr— that they accept death because they want to live,” Abogado said on Friday, Nov. 7 at the Santisimo Rosario Parish.
“And so the same thing that we can learn from them: to confront not necessarily death, but what our Pope Francis coined as the ‘culture of death,’ the culture and conditions that prevent true living, that prevent our brothers and sisters to live with the dignity of the children of God,” he added.
Abogado said Christians who were persecuted for their beliefs were able to accept their fate willingly because Christ sustained them in their life of suffering. He recalled the life of one of the Church’s earliest martyrs, St. Ignatius of Antioch, who wrote a letter asking the Christians of Rome to allow his impending death and not “stand in his way of coming into life.”
“On the contrary, if they would prevent him from facing death or facing his martyrdom… then he would be returned to the valley of death which is the earthly life,” he said.
Citing Pope Leo XIV’s new apostolic letter “Dilexi te,” Abogado said caring for the poor could be a way for Christians to avoid those conditions, as it is united with the concept of martyrdom. He invited Catholics to live through “the vision of God” and emulate the Thomasian martyrs who were persecuted for their service to the poor.
“It is not an option, to work or to show preferential love for the poor. Because that is what our Lord Jesus Christ expects us to do,” the Dominican to theologian said.
“If we do that, if we are able to or if you did our part in caring for the poor, then that is the way of martyrdom as well.”
The Eucharistic celebration was part of the three-day commemoration of the Thomasian Martyrs, a group of 17 saints and blesseds who were former administrators, professors and students of UST that suffered persecution in Japan, Vietnam and Spain.
The Mass was followed by a candlelight vigil and the launching of the University pilgrimage led by Fr. Jayson Gonzales, O.P. at the Thomasian Martyrs Monument. F
