“Oblation” for Eugene meant the giving of one’s life totally to God for the spread of God’s Kingdom – whatever the personal cost. It is no wonder that on his first visit to the catacombs in Rome he was profoundly touched by this place commemorating countless acts of heroic oblation.
After hearing Mass we went down into the catacombs, seized with reverent fear at the sight of those underground caves where so many martyrs lived and were buried after their death. They estimate that there were a hundred and seventy thousand, among whom were eighteen sovereign Pontiffs. The bodies of Saints Peter and Paul were laid here for some time. You can see the altar on which the sovereign Pontiffs used to celebrate Mass and another one somewhat further on in the catacombs where Saint Philip Neri used to spend nights in prayer. We recognized the spot where Saint Cecilia’s body had been and the one which Pope Saint Maxim had occupied. When we had made several tours in these underground passages, following a guide, and all of us carrying a small candle which we were very careful not to let go out, we went out through the church, as we had entered, and regained the Via Appia to the Circus of Caracalla and the tomb of Cecilia Metella. A person can see only the remains of the Circus but can still capture somewhat its grandeur.
Roman Diary, 29 November 1825, EO XVII
“The prophet and the martyr do not see the derisive mob. Their eyes are fixed on the eternities.” Benjamin Cardozo
How many of us in moments of great fervor have not asked God to take us so that we too might give our lives for him. I certainly have, and when that thought of martyrdom came up – well I asked God to take me – it would be an act of God. God who is such total love, who in the person of Jesus gave his life for us, for me. There would be in those small secret corners of my thoughts the image of me dying for God, with of course the requisite people around to witness such holiness and goodness (of course these witnesses were the very people that I struggle with) and it would be quick and painless because I don’t do pain very well. I smile at my own self, just as I am sure that God has smiled upon hearing my little cries as he gathers me in an embrace of love. As I reflect on this I realise that it was all about me, and although I loved/love God it is still God initiating it all, doing the loving and I am but trying to copy what I have in fact experienced of him.
Martyrs – those who have loved, it has been a “giving” of their lives in the fullest sense for God. No secret thoughts and plans, it goes well past the “me”, past the “I”. It is simply the pure love of God, within, taken and given back (such an inadequate term). For there is no thought of the personal, but only of God and so might well be the purest of loves, the closest we can get to loving as God loves. And even that is but another gift from God for on our own I seriously doubt that we are capable of such a love.
I am not sure that I am martyr material, but I won’t rule it out. I still in moments of fervor, in moments of intense gratitude offer myself to God, all that I am. But what do I give to God? How do I love God? What are my eyes fixed on?