This past Tuesday we
celebrated the feast of St. Agnes, Virgin and Martyr. I took such joy in praying the Office of
Readings for her feast day. “Surrender
to God, and he will do everything for you.” What comfort flooded my soul as I
prayed these words of the antiphon! And
further on in Psalm 37,
“Commit
your life to the Lord,
trust
in him and he will act,
so
that your justice breaks forth like the light,
your
cause like the noon-day sun.”
As a community and individually, we are in the midst of a
few transitions, exciting ones at that, but change can often spur anxiety. And here is this twelve year old girl, this
young, beautiful daughter of the Father, who stands peaceful in the sight of a
brutal death. St. Ambrose, in the Second
Reading for the Office of Readings for that day, “From a treatise On Virgins,”
says of her, “There was little or no room in that small body for a wound.
Though she could scarcely receive the blow, she could rise superior to it.
Girls of her age cannot bear even their parents’ frowns and, pricked by a
needle, weep as for a serious wound. Yet she shows no fear of the blood-stained
hands of her executioners…As a bride she would not be hastening to join her
husband with the same joy she shows as a virgin on her way to punishment,
crowned not with flowers but with holiness of life, adorned not with braided
hair but with Christ himself.”
St. Agnes is a saint that has always followed me. I’ve heard it said that our patron saints
choose us, and for some reason, I know St. Agnes has chosen to be with me and
intercede for me in a special way. And
so, I am asking her, dear saint, to pray for me at this time and always, that I
may learn to God’s will, and to do it well, and to make His desires my own –
not to be swayed by the pressures of the world, but to surrender myself and my
life to Him, docile and obedient. Many
desired St. Agnes in marriage, but she had already given herself to her Spouse,
Jesus, and she was not to be moved. “She
answered: ‘To hope that any other will please me does wrong to my Spouse. I
will be his who first chose me for himself. Executioner, why do you delay? If
eyes that I do not want can desire this body, then let it perish’” (St. Ambrose
“From a treatise On Virgins”).
I will be His who first
chose me for Himself. What simplicity of
grace! How complicated we make our lives
and our decisions, even our discernment.
Surrender, commit, trust…..these are the lessons I have learned from St.
Agnes. “Wait for the Lord to lead, then
follow in his way” (Antiphon from the Office of Readings for St. Agnes’
feast).
Written by Kristen
