"If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him."
From the earliest moments of the Church, woman’s incomparable service to the extension of the Kingdom of God stands out. "In the first place, we see those women who had personally met Christ and followed Him, and who, after His departure, were devoted to prayer together with the Apostles in the Upper Room in Jerusalem until the day of Pentecost. On that day, the Holy Spirit spoke through the sons and daughters of the people of God, fulfilling the prophecy of Joel (Acts 2:17). Those women, and later others, played an active and important role in the life of the early Church, building up the first community from the very beginning—as well as subsequent communities—through their own charisms and multifaceted service."
It can be said that Christianity began in Europe with a woman, Lydia, who immediately began her mission to transform the new continent from within, starting with her own home. Something similar happened among the Samaritans, to whom a woman first spoke of the Redeemer. The Apostles, who had gone into that same town for food, perhaps did not dare to proclaim everywhere, as the woman later would, that the Messiah was right there on the outskirts of the city. The Church has always held a deep understanding of the role that the Christian woman—as mother, wife, and sister—was meant to play in the spread of Christianity. The Apostolic writings have preserved for us the memory of many of these women: Lydia in Philippi, Priscilla and Chloe in Corinth, Phoebe in Cenchreae, Rufus's mother—who was also like a mother to Paul—the daughters of Philip of Caesarea, and others.
We must all put what we have received at the service of the Lord and of others. "Woman is called to bring to the family, to civil society, and to the Church something characteristic, which is uniquely hers and which only she can give: her delicate tenderness, her tireless generosity, her love for the concrete, her sharpness of wit, her capacity for intuition, her deep and simple piety, her tenacity..." The Church expects from woman her commitment to upholding the true dignity of the human person. The Mystical Body of Christ "never ceases to be enriched by the testimony of so many women who fulfill their vocation to holiness. Holy women are an embodiment of the feminine ideal, but they are also a model for all Christians, a model of the *sequela Christi*—the following of Christ—an example of how the bride must respond with love to the love of the bridegroom."
The Lord asks all of us to serve Him, the Holy Church, society, and our fellow human beings with our goods, our intelligence, and all the talents He has given us. Then we will understand the depth of that truth: to serve is to reign.
HCD