St.'s Simon and Jude

Yesterday the Church celebrated the feast of St.’s Simon and Jude, Apostles and martyrs.  

I’ve always wondered why the Church put these two together, instead of giving each their own feast day.  I know part of it probably has to do with the fact that we don’t know much about them.

 

For Simon, all we know is that he was a “zealot,” a veritable terrorist of his day, and for Jude… poor Jude… I have to admit that I’ve always thought of him as a syrupy-sweet old man, trying to stay out of people’s way, because he didn't be to be accused of being the "other" Jude in the room, you know -- Judas Iscariat. 

The little we do know about these and the rest of the apostles makes you wonder if Jesus knew what he was doing when he chose them.  From a tax collector, to fishermen, it seems as if Jesus went out of his way to scrape the bottom of the barrel for disciples.

Regarding Simon and Jude, some try to spin this by pointing to them as a proof of the diversity of the Church – I mean how much more diverse can it get than a terrorist and a nobody? 

Others say that by placing these two saints together, we get a glimpse of the humanity that Christ calls to himself – how very lofty... and how very unapproachable.  But I wonder if there is more to this… something deeper.

When I envision Jesus choosing Simon and Jude, I see a mastermind at work.  He doesn’t pick these two to make a point about how “all are welcome” or to glorify the human tendencies to be either radical or malleable.  No, by choosing these men, Jesus is making a clear statement here, and that is to evangelize.

You see, the reason he chose Simon and Jude was because he wanted to save them!  He wanted to save them from themselves and their sins.  He wanted to free them from the tyranny of violence, the saccharin chains of ambiguity. He wanted to transform them into himself, so that His Good News could go throughout all the earth, and as the Psalmist says, "give glory to God like the angels of heaven!) (Ps. 19:2)

But most importantly, for us today at least, Jesus chose them to be a foundation of witness for us; a witness of conversion.  He shows us, through this chose of broken men, that he wants us too, even with our brokenness: our weaknesses, our ambiguities, and even our violence.  He wants it all!  He wants us completely, so that he can heal us, and so, as St. Paul alludes to in his letter to the Ephesians (Eph. 2:19-22), make us "members of His household;" so that he can make us "fellow citizens with the holy ones;" and so that he can show us, that even in this valley of tears called life, we are "strangers and sojourners no longer."

My friends, how much more radical, or loving, can you get?