"A Christian answer to the unchristian deed..."

Over a year ago I read a book about faith by Charles Colson that I found at my local library. I found it highly interesting and thought I'd enjoy reading another book by him. Years ago I was involved in politics and have kept a bit of an interest in it though I've mostly become jaded by both political parties. However, this book God & Government seemed a good source for getting one man's thoughts on the roles of both church and state. So when I placed an Amazon.com order, I bought it. And it sat on my bookshelf ever since. I had many other books to read and seeing that 400+ page book just made me procrastinate for a while. Recently I decided I'd like to finish all the books I'd bought and never read. So I picked it up and started reading. The past two or three weeks I've been reading three texts and that is one of them. I've been posting a few thoughts to a Gmail draft of phrases and statements that I like, but when I read about the Communist regime's oppression of the Poles and one man's stance against it...well, this story just took my attention in such a huge way that I had to share it. Father Jerzy Popieluszko was only 37 when he died, but his life can still be an inspiration to those who are living oppressed and he remains a wonderful example of how we must overcome evil with good and act like Jesus. I hope you enjoy this part of his story. The first two paragraphs are some of his teachings included in the book.

"'A man who bears witness to the truth can be free even though he might be in prison ... The essential thing in the process of liberating man and the nation is to overcome fear... We fear suffering, we fear losing material good, we fear losing freedom or our work. And then we act contrary to our consciences, thus muzzling the truth. We can overcome fear only if we accept suffering in the name of a greater value. If the truth becomes for us a value worthy of suffering and risk, then we shall overcome fear -- the direct reason for our enslavement.

"'A Christian must be a sign of contradiction in the world...A Christian is one who all his life chooses between good and evil, lies and truth, love and hatred, God and Satan ... Today more than ever there is a need for our light to shine, so that through us, through our deeds, through our choices, people can see the Father who is in Heaven.'

Father Jerzy's influence did not escape the notice of the authorities. The secret police followed him everywhere. On the first anniversary of martial law, a pipe bomb sailed through the front window of his small flat, exploding in his sitting room.

Then, on October 19, 1984, while driving back to Warsaw from Bydgoszcz where he had celebrated a special mass and delivered a homily called "Overcome Evil with Good," Father Jerzy disappeared.

Thousands prayed for him in churches all over Poland. The steelworkers stopped their work in order to pray and threatened a national strike if their priest was not returned to them. The universities smoldered with unrest.

On the last Sunday of October, as fifty thousand people filled St. Stanislaw Kostka in an emotional Mass for the Homeland and listened in tears to a tape of Father Jerzy's final Sermon, Father Antoni Lewek, one of the thirty priests at the altar, received word: 'Just a moment ago it was announced on television that Father Jerzy's body has been found in the Vistula River.'

'I shall never forget what happened,' Father Lewek said later. 'In a second people went down on their knees, crying and shouting; what we had feared most, the worst, had happened . . .

'And then something very moving happened. This crying crowd managed to show that they could forgive. Three times they repeated after the priest: "And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespass against us." It was a Christian answer to the unchristian deed of the murderers.'

On November 2, the day of Father Jerzy's funeral, people marched the streets past the secret-police headquarters bearing banners reading, 'We forgive.'

Regardless of their expertise in murdering the body, the executioners could not kill the soul. Father Jerzy had taught his people well."

Oddly enough, when I read the Wikipedia article, it stated he was being beatified by the Roman Catholic Church on June 6, 2010 which is...today.

pg. 216-217 of God & Government by Charles Colson


For more on loving your enemy, please read Achelois' wonderful post "On Hating."