In the Epistle reading today, the Holy Apostle Paul holds up the apostles as examples for all. We know from the context of the epistle, the First Epistle to the Corinthians, that Paul is referring most especially to himself and Apollos when he refers generally to "the apostles." He makes a contrast that is meant to touch the hearts of the Corinthian Christians. The contrast is between the Corinthian community's relative prosperity and privilege and the apostles' hardships. Paul seeks to move the Corinthians' hearts from consideration of fleshly/material prosperity as a sign of God's blessing to the understanding of the apostles as those who are conformed to Christ through suffering.
The Apostle's task, convincing the Corinthian Church to regard things with spiritual eyes rather than the eyes of the flesh, is not easy. The Corinthian community is very proud of the esteem and honor that its members are held in. Further, the Corinthians seem to be convinced that they have achieved this high standing in the sight of the city's greater polity without the assistance of the apostles in any way. Apostolic leadership was doubtless useful in the original founding of the Church in Corinth, but now, as the members of the community see it, the achievements of the community have grown to maturity. The community is no longer in need of such leadership. Through the prudent actions of the Church, the Church of Corinth is now held in esteem and respect by all.
To this line of reasoning, Paul counters that the respect and esteem of all is not the goal. The apostles are the example of the true goal, but the true goal is not anything that the Corinthian community want to look in the face. The true goal is conformity to Christ, who, as Isaiah the prophet tells us, "was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, accustomed to infirmity, the kind of man from whom other men look away, and we held Him in no esteem." Paul is explicit concerning the ways that the apostles are conformed to this image. He says, "to the present hour, we hunger and thirst, we are ill-clad and buffeted and homeless, and we labor, working with our own hands. When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we try to conciliate; we have become, and are now, as the refuse of the world, the offscouring of all things."
The message that the Holy Apostle Paul is giving to the Corinthian Church, and, through them, to us, is fundamental. The Gospel of Christ is always counter-cultural. Although, at various different times, the Church might happen to be held in the esteem and respect of the culture around it, the Church must be very careful to not become attached to that esteem and respect. It is very temporary indeed. Eventually, the world, incited by the Prince of this World, will turn against the Church an try to destroy it, because the Church's virtues cannot long coincide with worldly values.
We live in an age of renewed persecution of the Church. The active persecution of the Church is in fact spreading throughout the globe. There is at once "hot persecution," as Christians are tortured and murdered across the Islamic world and in countries where atheistic communism holds sway, and "cold persecution" as the expression of Christianity is confined and regulated by liberal, socialist states, particularly in western Europe and North America. The expression of Christianity is redefined and restricted by means of "hate speech statutes" and outward evidence of Christianity is removed from public view.
Saint Paul's message to the Corinthian Church is clear also to us: the persecuted Church, wherever it may be, whether it is enduring a cold persecution or a hot persecution, is better than us, who continue to profess our Christianity in relative comfort and convenience. They are better than us because of conformity to Christ. They are more like Christ, and that, in Christianity, is the only criterion of perfection. Let us recall Christ's commandment: "Be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect." Further, by means of another commandment, He tells us how to achieve that perfection: "Learn from Me, for I am meek and humble of heart." Saint Paul reiterates the importance of these commandments in the Christian life when He commands, "be imitators of me, as I am of Christ."
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