We Desire to Gain the Lord’s Promises
From a letter by Saint Cyprian, bishop and martyr (c. 210-258)
We desire to gain the Lord’s promises; we must then imitate him in all things
Narrated by Frank Dugan, Huntington Beach, California
I greet you, dearest brothers, and would like also to enjoy your company face to face, if only the conditions in which I find myself did not prevent my coming to see you. What could be more desirable or more joyful for me than to embrace you now, to be encircled by those pure and sinless hands that have kept the faith of the Lord and refused to offer sacrilegious worship?
What could be more pleasant, more sublime, than to kiss at this moment those lips of yours, which have given such glorious utterance in praise of the Lord; to be seen also by those eyes of yours, which have despised the world and proved themselves worthy of seeing God?
But, because there is no opportunity for my sharing this joy, I send this letter as my representative for your ears and eyes to hear and see. Through it I congratulate you, and at the same time urge you to persevere courageously and steadfastly in your witness to heavenly glory, and to continue with spiritual courage, now that you have entered on the way that the Lord has graciously opened up for you, until you receive the crown of victory. You have the Lord as your protector and guide, for he has said: Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the world.
How blessed is the prison honored by your presence, how blessed the prison honored by your presence, how blessed the prison that sends men of god to heaven! Darkness brighter than the sun itself, more resplendent than this light of the world, for it is here that God’s temples are now established, and your limbs made holy by your praise of God.
Let nothing else be now in your hearts and minds except God’s commandments and the precepts of heaven: by their means the Holy Spirit has always inspired you to bear your sufferings. Let no one think of death, but only of immortality; let no one think of suffering that is for a time, but only of glory that is for eternity. It is written: Precious in the sight of God is the death of his holy ones. And again: A sacrifice to God is an afflicted spirit; a broken and humbled heart God does not despise.
Holy Scripture speaks also of the sufferings which consecrate God’s martyrs and sanctify them by the very testing of pain: Though in the eyes of men they suffered torments, their hope is full of immortality. They will judge nations, and rule over the peoples, and the Lord will reign over them forever.
When , therefore, you recall that you will be judges and rulers with Christ the Lord, you must rejoice, despising present suffering for you at what is to come. You know that from the beginning of the world it was so; justice is here oppressed in its conflict with the world, for at the very outset Abel the just is killed, and after him the just, and those sent as prophets and apostles.
The Lord himself is an example of all this in his own person. He teaches us that only those who have followed him along his way arrive at his kingdom: He who loves his life in this world, will lose it. And he who hates his life in this world, will save it for eternal life. And again he says: Do not fear those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul; fear rather him who can kill both body and soul and send them to hell.
Paul too admonishes us, that as we desire to gain the Lord’s promises we must imitate the Lord in all things. We are God’s children, he tells us. If children, we area also heirs of God, and coheirs with Christ, if only we suffer with him, that we may also be glorified with him.
Source: The Liturgy of the Hours – Office of Readings
Saint Cyprian (c. 210-258) was born of pagan parents in Carthage around the year 210. He was converted to Christianity in 246 and became a profound scholar of the Bible and the great religious authors, especially Tertullian. He was ordained and in 248 and made bishop of Carthage.
Cyprian convened a council at Carthage in 251, which would settle serious pending matters including (the lapsi) the terms under which the faithful who had apostatized during the persecution of Decius could be received back into the Church; dealing with the excommunication of schismatic leaders, and asserting the supremacy of the Pope.
In 252-54 Carthage was stricken with a terrible plague. Christians were blamed for the plague, and hatred for Cyprian and the Christians intensified, paving the way for the terrible persecutions to follow under Valerian. During these difficult times, Cyprian wrote numerous theological treatises on the Church, ministry, the Bible, virginity, the lapsi, and other spiritual works making him a pioneer of Latin Christian literature.
In 258, an imperial decree from Valerian was issued forbidding any assemblage of Christians and requiring all bishops, priests, and deacons to participate in the official state religion ushered in the persecution of Christians. Cyprian was arrested, and when he refused to participate, he was exiled to a small town fifty miles from Carthage. But the following year another imperial decree ordered that all bishops, priests, and deacons were to be put to death. Cyprian was arraigned before a new proconsul, and when he refused to sacrifice to pagan gods, he was beheaded on September 14, 258.