Lenten Meditations: Saturday 17 February 2024

Feb 17, 2024 by Jill

SATURDAY AFTER ASH WEDNESDAY – St Janani Luwum of Uganda, Archbishop and Martyr 1977

LITURGICAL THEME FOR THE DAY: Janani Luwum was born in 1922 at Mucwini in East Acholi in Uganda. His father was a convert to Christianity. As a boy, Janani spent his time herding the family’s cattle, goats, and sheep. His father could not afford for him to go to school until he was 10 but then Janani worked hard and went on to Gulu High School and then on to Boroboro Teacher Training. Janani taught in a primary school before he was converted in 1948. He became very active in the East African revival movement. First, he studied to be a lay reader, and then a deacon. He was priested in 1956. In 1974, Janani Luwum he became Archbishop of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, and Boga-Zaire.

Three years previously Colonel Idi Amin had overthrown the Government of Uganda and established a military dictatorship. Amin’s regime became infamous around the world. Thousands of people were arrested, beaten, imprisoned without trial and killed. Archbishop Luwum often went personally to the office of the dreaded State Research Bureau to help secure the release of prisoners.

On 5 February 1977, the Archbishop’s house was raided by soldiers who said they had been ordered to look for arms. On 8 February the Archbishop and nearly all the Ugandan bishops met and drafted a letter of protest to the President and asked to see him. A week later, on 16 February, the Archbishop and six bishops were publicly arraigned in a show trial and were accused of smuggling arms. Archbishop Luwum was not allowed to reply but shook his head in denial. The President concluded by asking the crowd: “What shall we do with these traitors?” The soldiers replied, “Kill him now”. The Archbishop was separated from his bishops. As he was taken away Archbishop Luwum turned to his brother bishops and said: “Do not be afraid. I see God’s hand in this.” The next morning it was announced that Archbishop Luwum had been killed in a car crash. The truth was that he had been shot because he had stood up to President Amin and his Government.

MEDITATION OF THE DAY: The story of Nathaniel captures our attention in this jaded world, often because of a simple phrase in the King James Version, which reads in whom there is no guile“, (the NIV translates it as “in whom nothing is false.” What a charism to have, what discipline and spiritual purity must have been deeply part of the person of Nathaniel! In Nathaniel, what you see and hear is what is there. You know where you stand. Not that he cannot be persuaded otherwise, for he quickly endorses Jesus once he feels known by him. Perhaps that is why he expresses what so many thought, but did not say, when he says, “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” He wasn’t being mean-spirited but simply going on what he understood and was willing to be corrected if wrong. The fact is that we are very much like Nathanael — many of us start out skeptical; we need to meet Jesus personally for him to change our lives. He was open. He was willing to “Come and See”. Once he did he fell on his knees and declared: “Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel.”

PRAYER OF THE DAY O God, by whose providence the blood of the martyrs is the seed Of the Church: Grant that we who remember before you blessed servant Janani, Archbishop, and Martyr, in Uganda, may, like him, be steadfast in our faith in Jesus Christ, to whom he gave obedience, even to death, and by his sacrifice brought forth a plentiful harvest; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever.

LENTEN LYRICS: God of the Movements and Martyrs – A Hymn by David LaMotte arranged and performed by The Many

LENTEN DISCIPLINE – Get 2 sheets of paper and a pen, on one, write your behaviors, habits, and choices that have been authentic and life-giving, and, on another, those that have been duplicitous and deprived you or others of life. Make a plan with a spiritual partner and the Lord to root out just one of those who are from the spirit of death.

ANCIENT WISDOM/PRESENT GRACE: “In ordinary life, we hardly realize that we receive a great deal more than we give and that it is only with gratitude that life becomes rich.” –  Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Life Together).

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