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Gospel Reading for September 28, 2026 – John 15: 18-21
EXTENT OF OUR LOVE
“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you. Remember what I told you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also. They will treat you this way because of my name, for they do not know the one who sent me.
————
Today, we celebrate the feast of the first Filipino saint, St. Lorenzo Ruiz, and his companions. He was canonized by Pope St. John Paul II in 1987 and is the patron saint of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) and the Filipino youth.
Lorenzo was born in 1594 in Binondo, Manila, to a Chinese father and a Filipino mother. He worked as a skilled calligrapher and as a church clerk. In 1636, he was falsely accused of murder and sought safety aboard a ship with Dominican missionaries, not knowing they were sailing to Okinawa, Japan, during a time of great Christian persecution under the Tokugawa Shogunate.
He was arrested and imprisoned for two years, and was brutally tortured in Nagasaki to force him to give up his faith in God. His famous final words were:
“I am a Catholic and wholeheartedly do accept death
for God; had I a thousand lives, all these to Him shall I
offer.”*
He died on September 29, 1637.
St. Lorenzo Ruiz did not go to Japan for the Faith like his Dominican companions. Yet when he was being gravely tortured to renounce his faith in exchange for his freedom, he chose God.
Can we imagine ourselves in the shoes of St. Lorenzo Ruiz? Under such grave torture, what would we have done? Our answer to this question may help us, more or less, estimate the EXTENT OF OUR LOVE for God.
Lord Jesus, send us your Spirit that we may remain steadfast in our faith in the midst of trials and challenges. Amen.
