Word to the Wise
Saturday, August 3, 2019 - Saturday in the 17th Week in Ordinary Time
[Lev 25:1, 8-17 and Matt 14:1-12]Herod the tetrarch heard of the reputation of Jesus and said to his servants, "This man is John the Baptist. He has been raised from the dead; that is why mighty powers are at work in him." [Matthew]
The gory story of John the Baptist's martyrdom can distract from the very interesting irony in Herod's statement about Jesus. John was arrested because he dared to criticize Herod for marrying the wife of his half-brother! The wife was furious and took advantage of a public promise by Herod to her daughter to ask for the head of John the Baptist. Herod obliged.
Scripture scholars point out that the purpose of the story is to foretell the fate of Jesus who will also die at the hands of a ruler (Pilate) and rise from the dead. John the Baptist did not rise from the dead, but his story serves as a reminder to the disciples in Matthew's community that unbelief can give rise to violent opposition, which happened both to John the Baptist and to Jesus. Indeed, earlier in Matthew we were given the story of the father of this Herod, "Herod the Great," who ordered children killed because of the report by the Magi!
The English statesman, Edmund Burke, wrote, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to remain silent." If Christians remain silent in the face of great evil, the results are terrifying, as the Holocaust and other infamous acts in history have shown. Jesus and John fearlessly spoke out against evil powers in their day. They paid for it with their lives then, but they still live now to inspire us to preach. In the case of Jesus, it is a matter of ultimate importance - eternal salvation. AMEN