Feast of Saint Stephen, protomartyr

http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/122611.cfm

R. Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.
Be my rock of refuge,
a stronghold to give me safety.
You are my rock and my fortress;
for your name's sake you will lead and guide me.
R. Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.
Into your hands I commend my spirit;
you will redeem me, O LORD, O faithful God.
I will rejoice and be glad because of your mercy.
R. Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.

Saint Stephen's feastday always follows immediately after Christmas and reminds us of  the cost of discipleship. It might  be a sobering event, but Stephen is the most joyous of martyrs. He rushes in where more cautious souls hesitate. His confidence in Jesus is infectious and enviable.

But the murder of a defenseless, innocent man cannot easily be described in cheerful terms. Death by stoning, as we have recently come to know from stories in Afghanistan, is dreadful. It is a mob action, a tearing away of every pretense of civility as people -- presumably both men and  women -- scream curses and insults, push against one another in their rush to get at the victim, grab rocks of every size and hurl them at  the victim, whose death comes slowly and uncertainly. How will they know when he is dead? Surely no doctor will step forward to say, "That's enough now." How long will it continue? I suppose, until the savagery of the crowd has abated. And what on earth could spur them to such violence? That is hard  to imagine. 

Meanwhile, others watched. The young man Saul, a devout scholar of the Law from Tarsus, witnessed the crowd and approved of their action, though he may have been sickened by the experience. Friends and fellow Christians of Stephen watched helplessly. Perhaps some felt "survivor's guilt." Could I have done something to prevent this? Should I have risked my life to defend him? Should I have died with him? But I have family who depend upon me. Why did he do this? Couldn't he have stifled the Spirit for a few minutes, until the crowd calmed down? 

Saint Luke intentionally describes the death of Stephen as a reenactment of Jesus' death:

• he was filled with the Holy Spirit, like Jesus
• he saw the heavens opening and the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven, as Jesus had predicted before the Sanhedrin (Luke 22:69, and  Ps 110:1; Dn 7:13–14; Acts 7:56.); and
• the mob covered their ears "lest they hear him" as, when Jesus was arrested a disciple struck off a man's ear, rendering him deaf. 

Luke's narrative also follows the broad outline of the Mass, in that we hear Stephen announce the Word of God before he gives his own body for sacrifice. 

But Saint Stephen's eager joy triumphs over all the horror of the story. On this second day of Christmas we honor Stephen and thank God that he has called some of our best people to follow more closely in the footsteps of Jesus.