A martyr is someone who dies for the faith. They're killed because of their religion. I'm reading a little book, Blessed Charles de Foucauld: A Grain of Wheat. Blessed Charles de Foucauld died in the first World War, 1916. He was killed not for religious reasons, at all. During an attack by rebels, de Foucauld let himself be taken, was tied up, robbed, and killed. His body lies in El Golea.
In a meditation of John 19:30, Bl. Charles wrote:
My Lord Jesus you are dead. You died for us? If we really believe this, we ought to want to die, to die a martyr's death; to accept suffering in death instead of being afraid! It won't matter for what motive we are killed if we ourselves receive that unjust and cruel death as a blessed gift from you, if we thank you for it as a gentle grace, as a blessed imitation of your end... The motive for killing us won't matter, if we will die out of pure love and our death will be a sacrifice pleasing to you. If this is not martyrdom in the strict sense of the word, and in the eyes of the world, it will be in your eyes. It will be a very perfect image of your death and a loving end which will lead us straight to heaven.
What do you think? "If we receive the death as a gift from God."
Then many of us are martyrs, are we not?
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