THE SON BUILDS EVERLASTING HOUSE


SAINT CECILIA, MARTYR  

1 Maccabees 6:1-13; Ps 9:2-4,6,16,19; Lk 20:27-40

The Indestructible House of God

The work of God is indestructible in its origin, for they are from God who knows all things and can do all things. Every one of God’s works was conceived in wisdom and truth and willed into existence by Him. In considering the works of God, we must make a distinction between the existence of things as willed by God and their existence in matter and time. As the scriptures testify, God has prepared a kingdom for us before the foundation of the world, implying that He called and chose us even before we gained our material existence. Therefore, God’s infinite power endows spiritual existence to everything He wills. But their material existence, for those things which are to be material, must also follow the time and season set by His divine Majesty. Among these are those things that need the cooperation of man to come into existence. Most promises or blessings contained in the word of God fall under this category. They require our faith to gain material or visible existence, in addition to the spiritual existence the word of God has already conferred on them. The word of God revealed to us contains every profitable good for us here on earth and our everlasting well-being in heaven. But only faith can midwife their realisation in our lives. Faith is the assurance of what we do not see and the conviction of blessings we hope for. Heb. 11:1

The laxity of the people of Israel in keeping the Commandments and the covenant established with God unleashed the forces of evil and unbelief, which God permitted for the refinement of their faith and rededication of their hearts to Him. Very often, our treatment of holy things unholily opens the gates of evil and sets free the forces of unbelief for our punishment, one would say, but actually for our purification and reawakening to the holy presence of God. We read about this in the stories of the trials and persecutions of the people of God recorded in the first and second Maccabees. These happened before the coming of the Son of Man, or the Righteous One, as prophesied by Daniel. King Antiochus Epiphanes was foretold as one to champion the persecution of the people of God and the erection of the abomination of desolation over the altar of sacrifice in Jerusalem. That the uprising of evil and forces of unbelief was related to the laxity of God’s people, we have also read in these books. The tenacity of the faith of Mattathias, his brothers, and a few Jews in the city of Modein countered the uprising and spread of evil and sin. Through their faith and courageous battle against evil and sin, the reality of God’s presence and kingdom was restored to the glory of God, the salvation of his people, and consternation of evil people and sinners. Antiochus confesses his abandonment of righteousness as the cause of his sorrow and damnation. “I have been asking myself how I would have come to such a pitch of distress, so great a flood as that which now engulfs me—I who was so generous and well-loved in my heyday.” He was destroyed by his attempt to destroy the House of God.

The House of God lasts forever; only its physical manifestation can cease due to the unbelief of the people. Thus, what causes the destruction of the physical manifestation of the House of God is the cessation of faith in the people. The House of God remains among us as long as we still make the act of faith in God’s word and presence. Through our act of faith in God’s word, we not only sustain the physical manifestation of the House of God, but we are also sustained spiritually by God who dwells in His word and subsequently in us. Based on this spiritual truth, Jesus unravelled what seemed to the Sadducees to be a mystery or paradox. Faith preserved Abraham and all the faithful in spiritual life. “And Moses himself implies that the dead rise again, in the passage about the bush where he calls the Lord the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. Now he is God, not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all men are in fact alive.” The House of God lasts forever, and also those who praise and worship Him there last forever. Saint Cecilia rejoiced in the saving help of God during her mortal life and offered it in faith and worship of God. Nothing much is known about her, except her glorious name and popularity in music. She must have lived around the 3rd or 4th century. A basilica was built in her honour in Rome in the 5th century. The Passion of Saint Cecilia describes her as a perfect example of a Christian woman who embraced virginity and suffered martyrdom for the love of Christ.

Let us pray: O God, who gladden us each year with the feast day of your handmaid Saint Cecilia, grant, we pray, that what has been devoutly handed down concerning her may offer us examples to imitate and proclaim the wonders worked in his servants by Christ your Son. Who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. 

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