COURAGE GOES VIRAL
He woke up on the wrong side of the bed, which is to say in between the two men, not in between the two women where he had fallen asleep. He shoved the man on his right roughly to the ground and yelled expletives at him when the man remonstrated about his rude awakening. This verbal exchange did not last long, for the man was used to such treatment and he knew his place. He was privileged to be a bed-mate of a general in the Roman army and he was not going to take it for granted. He gathered his garments and left the room but not before the traditional placatory statements had been made. Cato, the first man and the general, turned his dignified attention to the other man. He was gentler this time as one might expect him to be with his own brother. Cyprian turned and concluding that Cato was in no merry mood, judging from Cato’s ruddy face and the noise of the brief scuffle that had invaded his dreams, he quickly roused his wife, Augusta. They donned their clothes in haste and after uttering the salutations befitting Cato’s rank and station, they quit the room. Only Felicia remained asleep now.
Cato, his ire dissipating in the isolation, found himself recollecting the events of the previous night. Cyprian, himself a Roman soldier of a lower rank, had just returned with the company of Suetonius Paulinus from the successful crushing of the British uprising. After the brothers had enjoyed a feast with their wives, Cyprian proposed their age-old family tradition; communal sex, with each brother selflessly making available his own wife for the pleasure of the other, at the small cost of a double thrill. Cyprian, kept from this particular wantonness by Paulinus strict battlefront soldier code of conduct, requested the addition of a male prostitute. Cato, whose lechery did not extend to members of his own sex, acquiesced and called for whats-his-name, who was in his employ solely for use by those among his guests who had that peculiar taste. All was set for a night of unrefined passions. But there was a problem.
Cato’s wife, Felicia, had unfortunately (by Cato’s estimation) been converted to Christianity, the blight that was threatening the very foundations of the great Roman empire, and subsequently refused any act that went athwart the principles of her new found faith. How it angered him! His own wife a member of the detested cult he had sworn to his lord and emperor Nero to help stump out. He barred her from leaving the house in an attempt to keep the disgrace from becoming public. A shame that walls have ears and soon, he found himself having to remind the emperor that his loyalty to the course of Roman supremacy was unsullied and so he couldn’t possibly be living with a Christian in his own home. His usually relentless conscience never pricked him once after he had said this. Perhaps it was less wrong to be dishonest with dishonest men.
Felicia refused to take part in the act, to Cyprians surprise and Cato’s vexation. Fine. She did not have to be involved in it, but he’d be damned if he didn’t make her watch every bit of it. So Cato made her watch as he and his brother shared Augusta and as Cyprian made what’s-his-name earn his keep. Once, she attempted to stealthily leave the room but Cato, whose attention had never left her, spotted her and slapped her across the face so hard that even when they’d fallen asleep, exhausted from copulatory exertion, she didn’t dare try to leave again.
Cato gently brushed aside the hair on her face and saw that it was swollen and purple around the eye and soiled with a mixture of sweat, tears and mucus. Remorse swelled up in his chest and threatened to burst out through his eyes. He loved her and had not meant to hurt her. She was warm and judging from how fast asleep she was, Cato surmised that she might have taken ill and would remain in bed for a greater part of the day. Its all good, he thought, quickly realizing that he didn’t have to cook up a story to explain her absence from the public execution of that nuisance, Paul.
Why didn’t that man just shut up about this Christ and save himself from an unpleasant death? Surely, he must have had some value for his own life. Instead, he put his neck on the line and now he was going to get it, quite literally, in the neck. Insufferable. The whole bunch of those Christians, his wife included. Why couldn’t they just renounce their faith, only publicly at least, so they would save their lives? Foolishly obstinate persons! How it annoyed him to have to sit through all the forms of their execution the desperately wicked Nero could think up. Cato had no choice in the matter, though. Nero insisted that his generals be present. Whether it was to entertain them or to remind them of how brutal he can be, none of them really knew. Yet they all came. Nero’s bad books were not a place to be in; it had earned Agrippina, his own mother, a journey-of-no-return across the River Styx.
He brooded on these as he cleaned himself, dressed up and left for the amphitheatre. He sent for a physician for Felicia before leaving his house, flung by his personal guard. Cato had an inveterate aversion to conventions so naturally, he hated the attire he had to wear as a Roman soldier. However, unlike some other conventions, he couldn’t do away with this one completely, so he managed with minor alterations that satisfied his ego more than effect any real change; he seldom put on his galea, his lorica was obviously several times less flamboyant than it ought to have been and his caligae, when he was not at war, did not have the customary metallic spikes on the soles.
Many wars have been fought, and are being fought, on Earth. Yet the number would be exponentially higher if we could see and include the internal conflicts that go on within all men at some point in the lives. Perhaps its true that peace is not just the absence of war.
Though Cato was not at war with anyone, there was a major battle raging inside of him. A battle for his soul. Outwardly, it was easy to assume an air that suggested that all that Felicia’s private sermons preached to his ears alone did were to anger him. Oh but our own hearts are quite immune to our own made-up acts and his heart pricked him whenever he was alone. The message of Christ was compelling, to say the least. In other circumstances, he thought, circumstances, he thought, if the consequences were not so fatal, he might have believed.
If he could truly believe and keep it hidden forever, he might have accepted the love that had so tangibly changed his wife; heaven knew he needed some of that transformation. Yet he knew from the passionate manner in which his wife pleaded with him to accept Jesus as his Lord that he couldn’t truly believe and keep silent about his faith. He couldn’t risk it. The cost was too steep or more appropriately in this case, too deep. Six feet deep to be exact.
With his mind so occupied, the execution began all too soon for him. Paul was led into the amphitheatre like a sheep to the slaughter. He was known throughout the Roman Empire and so essentially throughout the world. The attendance at his send off from this world did not belie this fact; the amphitheatre was brimming with people. When Cato set his eyes on Paul for the first time, he almost chuckled at how such a small man had caused such a great fuss in the whole world. Between the massive guards that led him to his death, Paul’s diminutive stature was exaggerated. The bald patch on his head ensured, however, that no one would mistake him for a child.
The noise in the amphitheatre soared to new heights when Paul was brought in. It mainly comprised cheers of approval at the execution of the notorious man but a section of the crowd was mourning the imminent passing of a great apostle. It was traditional to allow the person about to be executed a last opportunity to make a statement to the living. Nero hoped that one of the Christians would eloquently renounce his or her faith and declare the emperor of Rome Lord of all while giving this exit speech so that he might pardon him or her and set a shining example for the rest, but to date, he had been disappointed. Perhaps he was about to suffer his greatest disappointment yet. When the soldiers had silenced the crowd sufficiently, Paul, with poise not expected from a dying man, began to speak. Some say it was his finest sermon and others maintain it was merely a summary of every epistle he had ever written. Yet its effect on the crowd was undeniable. His speech ended with this statement: Do not be ashamed of the gospel of Christ that alone can save you. Do not despise the faith! Always remember in whom you have believed. As soon as he concluded his speech, something absolutely remarkable occurred. As though rehearsed, the words of the Apostles creed began to ring out from the crowd in different languages. The number of Christians was obviously greater than thought to be, and they had found their voice.
“I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ His only Son our Lord. . .”
The livid Nero might have been bellowing for the crowd to be silent if his attention was not drawn to Cato, who had surprised him by no mean amount. Cato was on his feet and reciting the creed, which he knew because Felicia said it so often, with tears flowing freely down his cheeks.
“. . .was crucified, dead and buried. He descended into hell. The third day He rose again from the dead. . .”
When we stand on the precipice of a great decision, all we need is a push in the right direction. Paul had provided that push for Cato. The dying man had passed on his bravery to the living one.
“. . .from whence He shall judge the quick and the dead. . .”
His rage seething, Nero seized a sword from the baldric of a nearby soldier. He might not be able to control the entire crowd, but his own soldier he could discipline. Approaching him from behind, Nero repaid Cato’s stab in the back with a bloodier one.
“. . .I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints. . .”
His life was fleeting towards the blinding glow that Paul’s had preceded him to, yet Cato never felt more alive. Somewhere in the periphery of his blurry view, he thought he saw Felicia and somehow, he knew she was glad he was leaving her to join Him. His body crumbled to a heap on the ground, his spirit took a celestial leap into the Saviour’s waiting arms we. . .the resurrection of the body and in the life everlasting. Amen”
You may be wondering what the heading of this piece had to do with its body, the cocktail of fact and fiction that you have just finished reading. Or perhaps you cracked it all by yourself what I intend to get across. When one man finds courage, others find theirs too.
It has always baffled me that the early church grew in number in spite of the fact that it was under intense persecution. Then it hit me that the steadfastness of the saints to what they claimed they believed was perhaps the most credible proof of their faith. This steadfastness was, and still is, a potent polarizing magnet of men, that draws men and puts them on the same wavelength as those who possess it.
History is full of stories of men whose individual bravery and unyielding stance in what they believed sparked a raging fire of courage among their comrades. Leonidas and the 300 Spartans gave the whole of Greece confidence that Persia was not indomitable. Many Christians in the 18th century changed their stance on the slave trade because John Wesley dared to speak against it when many clergymen were for it. Martin Luther King, possibly the most famous dreamer in the world apart from Joseph, played a great part in the reformation of America in terms of racism, as his namesake did in the reformation of the church several centuries before him. I daresay there are countless more unnamed men and women whose courage gave, and is giving, other people courage. History may not remember you for standing for what you believe, but your influence will nevertheless be felt. On June 5, 1989, a man dared to stand in front of Chinese military tanks that were deployed to stop an ongoing protest at Tiananmen Square. Eventually he was removed and no one knows for certain what became of him. Some may say he failed but today, he is something of a cult hero for all who believe in fighting the good fight no matter the obstacles or the consequences. The courage of the Unnamed Protester, as he has been called, has begotten courage.
Christians, I write to you most directly. The world is no longer comfortable with what our faith truly demands. Integrity and morality have now become merely relative ideas. Stand! It doesn’t matter if other Christians stand with you or against you. Stand! Stand for Jesus!
Never forget others will find their feet when you stand. Perhaps, it is opportune that fear so paralyses us that we lose all immunity against every onslaught aimed at us. It ensures that when one man finds courage, it quickly goes viral.
Joseph Nyamison
