“A Love Story” by the Rev. Robert Coats
The Gospel of St. John 15:12-13 (Inclusive Bible)
Jesus said to them, “This is my commandment: Love one another as I have loved you. There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”
February 14th is the Feast Day of St. Valentine. We all know what that means: We buy cards, flowers and candy for those we love. We go out to eat at our loved one’s favorite restaurant. We might go away to an extremely expensive hotel or resort. If we REALLY love the other person, we buy them jewelry! The more expensive the jewelry, the greater the degree of our love for the other person. Chubby winged angels carrying bows and arrows, heart shaped boxes of candy, a dozen roses and a big diamond: this is Valentine’s Day.
Yeah. Not so much.
At least this was not the intent of honoring the day a priest of the early church was tortured and executed in Rome on February 14, 270.
St. Valentine exemplified for the church the definition of love: He stood up to the face of oppression, power, and injustice. He refused to back down even to the point of sacrificing his own life for others.
St. Valentine is the Patron Saint of engaged couples, bee keepers, those who suffer epilepsy and those who are prone to fainting, happy greetings, happy marriages, love, lovers, travelers, and young people. He is always pictured with birds and roses.
In all likelihood, Valentine lived sometime between approximately 220 or 230 C.E. and the time of his death on February 14 in the year 270 C.E. Because of his very early martyrdom in the church’s history, exact details of his life do not exist. Archaeologists, however, are convinced of his existence because they found the buried remains of a church built around 300 C.E. which was constructed and dedicated to honor his deeds.
Valentine lived during a time of persecution of Christians by the Roman government. He became well known for his compassion and willingness to help anyone who came to him. He was known for not turning away anyone who sought his help. It didn’t matter whether the individuals who sought his help were either Christians or non-Christians. All who came to him, he aided. His good deeds became too well known and the Roman authorities arrested Valentine for violating the laws which forbade aiding Christians. He was so well known that he came to the attention of the Emperor Claudius. Claudius, fascinated as to why someone would risk their life to aid those of the outlawed Christian sect, had him brought from his prison cell to meet him. Claudius, in talking with Valentine, began to like him and would frequently have lengthy discussion with Valentine. Valentine would most likely have saved his life based on this budding friendship with the Emperor, however, Valentine made a mistake which sealed his fate: He tried to convert the Emperor. The Emperor became so enraged that Valentine would try and convert him to Christianity, that he ordered Valentine’s torture and execution. While imprisoned awaiting his death, the warden of his prison sought Valentine’s aid in helping his daughter who had recently lost her eyesight. The story goes that Valentine prayed for the warden’s daughter and her eyesight was restored to her. Apparently a relationship of some nature (no one knows if it was romantic in nature or not) developed between Valentine and the warden’s now sighted daughter. On the night before his execution, Valentine asked to see the warden’s daughter one last time before his death. but his request was denied. So, instead, he wrote her a lengthy letter and signed it “Your Valentine.” It is upon this action that the tradition of sending a note (or card) to someone we care about is supposed to have been born.
What I find most fascinating about Valentine’s story are the actual criminal charges against him and which for their violation he was arrested, imprisoned, tortured and executed by the state: He was found guilty of performing illegal marriage ceremonies.
Valentine’s crime was performing the marriage ceremonies for those whom Rome decided to be unworthy of the right of being married: Christians. The Roman Empire, in its effort to try to eradicate Christians, declared that marriages occurring between either two Christians or between a Christian and a non-Christian to be illegal unions and anyone who officiated over the weddings of Christians was guilty of violating this imperial law; the penalty for which was torture and execution. As far as the Roman Imperial Government was concerned, Christians were not deserving of the right of having their unions recognized as valid. Christians, in the eyes of the Roman Empire, were sub-human and their joining in legal unions was not something for which they were worthy. Christians, to Rome, were vile and abhorrent. They were considered so because they were practitioners of incest and cannibalism. They were considered to be practitioners of incest because they called each other brother and sister and they greeted their brothers and sisters with a kiss telling their brothers and sisters that they loved them. They were considered to be cannibals because they ate the flesh and blood of their god/man during their religious meals. It was clear to the civilized Romans that Christians were an abomination and they did not want the Christians recruiting good, civilized Romans into their abominable lifestyles.
The Prefect of Rome promised the Emperor Claudius that he would be able to make Valentine renounce his faith, yet after extended degrees of torture, Valentine remained adamant in his refusal to do so. Seeing his various methods of torture ineffectual, the Prefect then resorted to having Valentine beaten with clubs. It was only after this too proved ineffectual did the Prefect give up his efforts to force Valentine to renounce his faith and ordered Valentine decapitation which occurred immediately. Valentine’s beheaded body was buried outside of Rome and his grave site became the location of the church which was built in his honor and dedicated to his memory.
Sadly, the life, works, great deeds and ultimate sacrifice of Valentine, and many others whose lives were martyred for their obedience to the command of Jesus Christ to “love one another as I have loved you,” is lost to most of North American Christianity. So many North American Christians carelessly throw around the word “persecution,” and in doing so insult the thousands of women and men who lost their lives because they felt it more important to obey the teachings of Jesus Christ then to preserve their own lives. Valentine was tortured, clubbed, and beheaded. The Emperor Nero would impale Christians alive onto wooden spikes and then set them on fire to use them as human torches to light the garden at his Imperial palace. My own Quaker ancestors were persecuted by other Christians both in Europe and in North America. One ventured into Puritan New England were to be a Quaker was a crime. He was tied, spread eagle, to the spokes of a wagon wheel and the wagon was driven many miles to the border of the then colonies of Massachusetts and Rhode Island where he was unceremoniously tossed bloodied, bruised and broken into Rhode Island. Yet, North American Christians, ignorant of their own history, cry that they are persecuted because at a public football game, at a public high school, paid for by the tax dollars of every citizen, they are not given the privilege of elevating their religious expression above that of the other people of the community by saying a publicly broadcast prayer ending “in the name of Jesus.”
Perhaps if the predominant expression of North American Christianity were aware of its own history, it’s adherents would follow the example of Saint Valentine who was known for never turning anyone away who sought his help, non-Christians and Christians alike, and paid with his life for obedience to the teachings of Jesus Christ. Perhaps if the predominant expression of North American Christianity were aware of of it’s own history, that they were persecuted with real, torturous persecution as a subjugated minority deprived of their life, liberty, property and even the right to marry all because of adhering to the teachings of Jesus Christ; the adherents would be not be so ready to do unto others as was done unto them. Sadly, even if they were aware of their own history, this would probably not be the case because they have the words and teachings of their founder, Jesus Christ, written out for them in their Christian Scriptures, yet they do not obey his words and teachings: “This is my commandment: Love one another as I have loved you.”
My prayer is that this St. Valentine’s Day as we rush about trying to find the perfect card, trying to buy the perfect gift, trying to buy the perfect dozen roses; that we – just for a moment – remember the life and sacrifice of the man for whom the day is named: Saint Valentine. May his life and good deeds be an inspiration to us and may we find the ability to try to follow his example and obey the teachings and commands of the one whose name we name: Jesus Christ.
Blessed Be!
The Rev. Robert Coats is a PCA minister with an educational background in Queer Theology and Pastoral Counseling. His weekly reflections based on the Revised Common Lectionary Readings are posted at his blog A Prophet In Pink Sneakers
