Today we celebrate the feast of the martyred apostles STS SIMON AND JUDE
If I ask anyone "who both are?" Many would refuse to tell many things about them. It doesn't mean they do not know about them but because nothing great is said about them...
St. Peter has a great legendary oration and was acknowledged by Jesus as Rock so on and so forth...
St. James has a great history of being a bishop of Jerusalem and a first apostle martyr and written an epistle of much importance.
St. Paul... Ha.... Need not say about his monumental works...
St. Matthew... A wonderful evangelist...
St. John... Close to Jesus, evangelist, theologian etc...
What about STS SIMON AND JUDE... what are they famous for...?
Atleast about St. Jude we know something but about Simon we know practically nothing....
Let us try to explore something about them...
Historically all the apostles except a few were missionaries... Like our India's apostle St. Thomas...
Sts Simon and Jude were also missionaries by ministry. They are verbal evangelists who practically converted many people from the middle East region.
What colossal lesson we could learn from them...
If we could keenly observe the title given to SIMON... it is said that he was a zealot. St. Simon was against the inhuman rule of Romans. He thought to himself Jesus as the Revolutionary and hence he followed Jesus. No big details were given in the Gospels about St. Simon but still we could see the transformation of him from a zealot into a missionary.
Jesus chose him purposely to have a crystal clear understanding of the attitude for the kingdom of God. So then St. Simon was fighting for the worldly freedom and Jesus changed him for to fight for a heavenly regime.
His death is still confusing... Some say he was crucified by King Trajan some others say that he was cut by a saw. Whatever it may be. HE DIED FOR JESUS.
ST. JUDE in his own ways a Martyr too. We came to know about him through the said history and by the experience of St. Bridgette who has got visions of Jesus' suffering. In which Jesus himself acknowledged St. Jude as the patron for hope of the hopeless.
We now flock to St. Jude's shrine... But still what symbolises St. Jude...
Is it the staff he holds??? Or the Fiery Split tongue on his head ???? Or the scroll with Jesus' face???... What else...
He is symbolised by the very commitment to his promise to Jesus and the simplicity on his mission.
We could see many famous apostles... But amidst them these two were hidden and simple... No much talking but much mission... In fact they were the hidden protectors of faith which no one can easily take out from them.
Let us also pray to Jesus to be his hidden companions kept within his heart for a greater mission of spreading God's word through our lives.
Let us pray
O Jesus the saviour, may my heart bend towards your beautiful heart and melt in your precious blood for a mission for your love. Amen.
