Saint Stephen | Poem

 

She is
the Mother of the Night
St. Stephen, the Protomartyr, at Her side

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St. Stephen

first Christian martyr
feast on 26 December
appointed one of the first deacons
to take care of the temporal relief of the poorer members

His name is a Greek equivalent for the Aramaic Kelil (crown)
The Church had acknowledged him a man of
"good reputation, full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom"
"a man full of faith, and of the Holy Ghost"
"full of grace and fortitude"
uncommon oratorical powers and unimpeachable logic
"great wonders and signs"
"the wisdom and the spirit that spoke"
still could not bend the minds of the unwilling;
this the forceful preacher became an enemy.

The cavillers of the synagogues whose wounded pride
inflamed their hatred they suborned false witnesses
However this may be, the accusation left him unperturbed
"all that sat in the council...saw his face as if the face of an angel"

When Stephen "looking up steadfastly to heaven"
they cast him out of the city to stone him to death.

Little did all the people present, casting stones upon him,
realize that the blood they shed was the first seed
of a harvest that was to cover the world.

The only first hand source of information on the life and death of St. Stephen is the Acts of the Apostles.

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