Today the Church celebrates the feast of St. Ignatius of Antioch, Bishop and Martyr for the faith. Following St. Peter and Evodius he became the third Bishop of Antioch and was martyred for his faith during a persecution under Trajan. On his way from Antioch to Rome to face his martyrdom he wrote seven letters to churches in different cities: Ephesus, Magnesia, Tralles, Rome, Philadelphia, Smyrna and to Polycarp directly. I have to admit, he’s one of my favorite saints and most likely because of this particular part of his letter to the Christians in Rome:
I am writing to all the churches to let it be known that I will gladly die for God if only you do not stand in my way. I plead with you: show me no untimely kindness. Let me be food for the wild beasts, for they are my way to God. I am God’s wheat and shall be ground by their teeth so that I may become Christ’s pure bread. Pray to Christ for me that the animals will be the means of making me a sacrificial victim for God.
It takes one who has fully identified with Christ to call efforts to avert his martyrdom “untimely kindness”. And again, how poetic he is, “I am God’s wheat and shall be ground by their teeth so that I may become Christ’s pure bread.” It is examples like this which inspire the saying attributed to Tertullian, “the blood of martyrs is the seed of Christians.” May we all seek to be God’s wheat, ground by the teeth of our lives that we may become Christ’s pure bread and seed for Christians to come. St. Ignatius of Antioch, ora pro nobis!
