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Renewing your Catholic center

By Father Dennis Meinen
View from the scooter

Do you ever wish you could take a break from life? Is your disability getting you down by the big black hole (depression)? A president of a European country once said that, as president, he wishes he could be ordered to prison two days a week. There he could "take a break from freedom" and do what he really wanted to do but never had enough time writing.

A recent Feast Day told about a saint, Ignatius of Antioch. We only know him as a prisoner and our portrait of him came from the letters he wrote at the beginning of the 2nd century as he was led through Asia Minor to his martyrdom in Rome As he was being escorted by this "band of leopards,” as he called the squad of Roman soldiers, he was writing letters of encouragement to Christian communities along the way, seven total.

They offer a penetrating view into the depth of his spirituality and a clear picture of Church life scarcely 70-80 years after Jesus died and rose again. He also helps anyone who is in danger of giving up on life or losing their focus to find again their Catholic center. He taught many things about Christ, the virgin birth, the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, the Trinity, priests and deacons and the unity of the community under the bishop’s authority.

Ignatius calls the faithful the Catholic Church for the first time and represents a direct link through Polycarp, another bishop, to the Apostle John. Ignatius insisted that these seven churches do not use political pressure to set him free because he greatly desired to repeat the sufferings of Jesus in his own life
The Catholic Church highly values this martyr because of his teaching and letters which had to have been heavily influenced by those who walked with Jesus.

In the year 107, he was torn apart by wild lions in the Roman Amphitheater and died a martyr's death. He too found that he was most free when most restricted because he now had the opportunity to prepare for life with Christ. This truly is a message for the chronically ill.