The Most Fraught Holiday

While driving the other day, I heard WIP’s Hugh Douglas issue a warning to any women listening to his show: if your man wants to take you out for Valentine’s Day on Friday or Sunday, you aren’t his main event this weekend! Douglas then chuckled to himself as if he’d exposed the true colors of half the men in Philly.

Valentine’s Day is a fraught holiday. If you are single or widowed but don’t want to be, the cards, chocolates, and roses for sale can make you feel judged or envious. Inflation and price gouging can make even happy couples feel bad about themselves on February 14. Eating out in general is much more expensive than it was before the pandemic, and restaurants markup prices for entrées by 20% to 50% on Valentine’s Day.

So, let’s change the subject! Before Valentine’s Day was dedicated to romantic love, it was a day to remember a Christian martyr. But who? More than one Valentinus was persecuted for their faith. 

The biography of one such St. Valentine describes him as a Christian priest who was placed under house arrest but won over his judge by restoring the eyesight of the judge’s daughter. The judge and his whole household were baptized. Later, he was arrested for evangelizing and appeared before Emperor Claudius Gothicus. When Valentine pressed Claudius to convert, the emperor sentenced Valentine to death. He was beaten and beheaded on February 14, 269. The date and the saint gradually got associated with romantic love in the late Middle Ages and early modern period, thanks in part to the poetry of Geoffrey Chaucer and John Donne.

There are many such stories of martyrs who healed in the name of Christ and boldly witnessed to him, even when threatened with death. Today, persecution is not a problem that American Christians face. It’s indifference. But our engagement with the world should still mirror the general pattern of the saints who’ve gone before us. Our words and our deeds should point away from ourselves and toward the one who suffered and rose from the dead to heal a broken world. Some, like Valentine’s judge, may come to faith; others, like Emperor Claudius, may not.

This Valentine’s Day, whether you are single, married, divorced, or widowed, ask yourself three questions:

1. With whom does Jesus Christ want me to talk about my experience of him?
2. What good deed can I do that will glorify God?
3. Can I leave the results of my witness up to God?

Grace and peace to you, 
Marvin

Image credit: Public domain reproduction of illuminated manuscript page, Germany, 14th-15th century.