Live Free
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Father Alfred Delp sat in a Gestapo prison cell awaiting trial and execution. His hands were bound but he was able to write on pieces of paper which he smuggled out of the prison with his laundry.
Jenny Howell writes of him:
"Delp’s prison meditations are a penetrating account of the gutted society he lived in, where because of disordered lives... humankind was losing its very humanity. He believed Advent was the event through which order could be properly restored."
Advent. It seems incongruous to stand politically in this time of holy waiting. And yet fitting. Fr. Delp was arrested because he took part in underground anti-Nazi gatherings. He wrote to his congregation:
“These are not matters that can be postponed to suit our convenience... They call for immediate action because untruth is both dangerous and destructive."
And he continued to write of Advent...
“We run the risk of concealing Christmas behind bourgeois customs and sentimentality, behind all those traditions that make this holiday dear and precious to us... We are not celebrating some children’s holiday, but rather the fact that God has spoken His ultimate Word to the world. Christ is the ultimate Word of God to the world.”
He didn't want to die. He felt that there was so much more to do. And yet...
“This is seed-time, not harvest. God sows the seed and some time or other he will do the reaping. The only thing I must do is to make sure the seed falls on fertile ground... May others at some future time find it possible to have a better and happier life because we died in this hour of trial.”
Keep speaking the truth, friends in Christ. Do not succumb to the glittery myth of the unredeemed life. True freedom is Christ alone... and so we are bound to speak truth unceasingly.
Live free. ❤️