ON THIS “red day” of my life and ministry as a bishop, allow me to repost a homily I delivered on 25 Nov. 2020, Red Wednesday, entitled “WASHED BY THE BLOOD OF THE LAMB” based on Lk 21:12-19, Memorial of St. Catherine of Alexandria.
Red is a dangerous color. The Spaniards say if you don’t want to be attacked by a raging bull, you should not wear red.
But we will always deal with all kinds of raging bulls in this world; they are not only the ones that you find in bull fight arenas. Now you have them also in some uniformed authorities who see red everywhere, especially in the context of the new Anti-Terror Law. If you haven’t noticed yet, RED TAGGING has become fashionable again. Haven’t we heard lately about some very well-known women and religious and Church leaders who have been red-tagged, all because they had the courage to support some social advocacies especially in serving as voice for the voiceless?
As far as some people are concerned, it seems that the tendency to see the political red everywhere has become practically an obsessive-compulsive disorder. It is the color that is often associated with those who are involved in any kind of protest and clamor for social change. These are the ones who are bound to be more quickly labeled as “communists” or “subversives,” or even as alleged “terrorists” who can now be lawfully arrested without warrant. Apparently, the new law would rather play safe with anyone suspected of being a terrorist by presuming them guilty unless proven innocent.
Red is more obviously the color of blood. It is the color that is spilled and painted on our streets when people are brutally murdered, when their human dignity is violated. Perhaps the tormentors themselves hate the color because it exposes their violent ways. That is why they have it washed away very quickly.
Thank God we have instituted in the Church a Red Wednesday that calls attention to the plight of persecuted Christians around the world. It is a celebration that uses the color more appropriately—the color of martyrdom, the color of fearless prophetic witnessing, even at the price of so much persecution, or even at the price of death. It is the liturgical color we use to celebrate the passion and death of John the Baptist. It is the color we wear when we celebrate the passion and death of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. It is the color that we wear to honor our courageous martyrs.
The continuing passion and death of Christ in the Church all over the world is what we proclaim at each time we celebrate the Eucharist. At the moment of consecration, the priest, on behalf of the whole Church, repeats the words Jesus said at the Last Supper in the present tense, and in the first person: “Take and eat, THIS IS MY BODY which is given up for you; take and drink, THIS IS MY BLOOD…which is poured out for you and for many, for the forgiveness of sins.”
In the Book of Revelation 7:14, we hear about the vision of martyrs wearing white robes. They are identified as the elders who have “washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” Isn’t that a paradox? The robes that are washed in the blood of the lamb are purified; they become white!
At the risk of being called idolaters or even idol-worshippers by some fellow Christians, we in the Catholic Church insist on venerating our martyrs with the same love and veneration that we dedicate to Christ. But why not—if they lived their lives no longer as their own? Why not, if their lives had become a luminous reflection of the Christ who lived in them? Remember what St. Paul says about what it means to be a Christian? He says, it is to declare “My life no longer belongs to me; it belongs to Christ who lives in me.” (Gal 2)
You have often heard me say, we have been called not just to be Christians but TO BE CHRIST. When we are baptized, we become part of Christ, part of his body the Church, participants in his life and mission. And so, I wish to propose RED to be also an abbreviation for REDEMPTION, which is what the life and mission of Christ is all about.
The most radical thing about the Christian faith is that we no longer believe in automatic retribution—namely, that salvation is exclusively only for the righteous; and that nothing but damnation awaits the sinners. We believe rather in REDEMPTION, because we believe in a God who loves unconditionally, a merciful God who stubbornly chooses to save, nor just the righteous but also the sinners. To do this, he gives up his life as a ransom for the many.
Actually, it is not right to equate red with just suffering and death; that tends to be too morbid and pessimistic. Red is also the color of Valentine’s Day, is it not? And so, it is also the color of LOVE, of God’s everlasting love, the love that binds all disciples together in communion, in the one body of Christ. Red is about being ready for the consequences of loving as Jesus has loved us, including suffering and death, if necessary.
In this time of pandemic, when those who have recovered from Covid-19 can help in the healing process of other infected patients by literally donating their blood plasma, perhaps we can also let red symbolize our resolve to heal together as one, if only we can allow the love of Christ to transform our fears into courage, our sense of hopelessness into patient endurance, and our egotism into compassion.
Red was the color of the blood of the lamb that was painted on the doors of the Hebrew slaves, to ward off the passing angel of death and to protect their families from a devastating plague—such as the Covid-19 pandemic.
May Red be a symbol of our having been vaccinated by the redeeming love of Christ. Let it also anticipate Christmas for all of us, the color of the eternal King who allowed himself to be born in a humble stable, in the company of shepherds and of those in the peripheries of society, the blessed ones who bring about God’s kingdom in the here and now.
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