Saint Methodios tells us, quoting St Paul, that his fellow
Sicilian, St Agatha, whose name means ‘the good one’, was 'a virgin espoused to
one man, Jesus Christ’. She was ‘good’ not necessarily by nature but because
she used her young freedom to choose the highest Good possible, namely, the Son
of God as Spouse of her soul. For the sake of her fidelity to this highest and
most enthralling Good, she was willing to sacrifice a lesser good: the life of
her body. This clinging exclusively to the person of Jesus her Bridegroom was
Agatha’s manner of ‘going apart to a deserted place to rest’ with her Beloved,
just as the apostles are invited to do by Jesus in today’s gospel.
We are all invited to do
the same. Let us repent of all our own infidelities to the highest Love, to all
our duplicity of mind, heart, and body, as we beg the Lord to be move with pity
for us when we choose to go astray as if we did not already have him as our
ever-solicitous, ever-loving Shepherd. And, through the intercession of St
Agatha let us ask Christ to restore full communion to the churches of
Constantinople and Rome, to both of which the Sicilian martyr and virgin St
Agatha belongs.
Reflection by Father Simeon.
