While the apostles were making inroads in evangelization, there was a pharisee called Saul of Tarsus who was working against them.  Tarsus is in present day Turkey.  He was also a Roman citizen.  He was from a wealthy family.  His dad was a tent maker.  He studied under Gamalial a very famous teacher.  His Roman name was Paul whom we call St. Paul, the apostle of gentiles.  He was good Jew and believed that the new sect was misleading the Jews.  He was very actively persecuting the Jews who were following Jesus’ teachings.  That group was not being called “Christians” yet.  They called themselves “The Way”.  In Acts 6:8 to 7:60, we see a deacon named Stephen.  Paul was furious when he heard the preaching of Stephen.  He calls for an emergency meeting of the Sanhedrin.  Paul consents to the stoning of Stephen (Acts 8:1).  Stephen is the first martyr of Christianity. Paul wanted to continue his persecution in Damascus, Syria.  On the way to Damascus, he had a supernatural experience.  He saw a flashing light and a voice from Heaven spoke to him.  “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” (Acts 9:4). Our Lord Jesus didn’t ask Saul why he was persecuting His people.  He asked why Saul was persecuting Him.  I would like to fast forward for one second how our Lord would feel about the persecution that is happening to the Church today.  Saul had a conversion, and he became the model of all converts. Suddenly, he was a fervent and passionate exponent of the religion he had once hated. He considered himself the least of the Apostles because he had persecuted the Church. It was precisely his intense Jewish piety that led Paul to see Israel as unfaithful to God’s promises, so that he proclaimed that in the new dispensation there would be neither Jew nor Greek, an announcement for which some of the original Twelve were not prepared.^[1]  This situation led into the very first council our Mother Church had, the council of Jerusalem.  Next week we will take a quick look at how and why Greek became a prominent language in the Scriptures and then learn about the council.

^[1] Hitchcock, J. (2012). History of the Catholic Church: From the Apostolic Age to the Third M