Telemachus
Rome
391 A.D.
�Go to Rome.�
Telemachus was a peace-loving monk who caringly kept his garden and lived in a small farming province in Asia. However, though he normally feared the hustle and bustle of large cities, when he heard God�s voice tell him to go, he packed and left immediately. He prayed they entire journey for God�s direction.
When he arrived, the city was in the midst of celebrating its victory over the Goths in the north. Troops marched through the streets laden with spoils and dragged behind them those prisoners taken in battle, some of whom were generals and kings. Young Emperor Honorius had paraded through the streets earlier in the car of victory headed for the Coliseum, though it was his general, Stilicho, who had actually guided the troops to victory. The main activities of the celebration were to take place later that afternoon.
Swept along by the crowds, Telemachus soon found himself among the nearly eighty thousand spectators in the Coliseum. Though Constantine had put an end to the death of Christians in the Coliseum and barred gladiator games roughly seventy years earlier, Honorius had given in to the whims of the populace and retracted the prohibition against the gladiator contests.
As Telemachus made his way through the crowd, he looked onto the floor of the Coliseum to see two lines of young men armed with swords or three-pronged spears and nets. They stopped before the emperor�s box and raised their weapons.
�Ave, Caesar, morituri te salutant!� (�Hail, Caesar, those about to die salute thee!�)
Then, at some signal he had not seen, the two lines turned to face each other, pairing off, and they began to fight as bloody and fierce a contest as any on a battlefield. Telemachus was dumbstruck: Four centuries after Christ and they are still killing each other for entertainment?
Suddenly one young man with a sword was caught in a net and thrown to the ground. He was already badly hurt and unable to get back up. His opponent quickly pressed his advantage, taking his spear and resting it on the other�s chest, preventing him from moving. He called out, �Hoc habet!� (�He has it!�) and at some other unknown sign, the other gladiators stopped and stood aside.
Many in the audience began to stand, holding their thumbs down. A chant began, �Recipe ferrum!� (�Receive the steel!�) A small group of officials from below made their way into the arena and stood by the men for a closer look. Echoing the crowd, they held their hands out with their thumbs down. To Telemachus�s horror, the man simply nodded, then decisively drove the spear through the chest of his victim, whose death cry was lost in the cheers around him.
Then, as the officials made their way back to their seats, slaves came out with huge hooks and dragged the body of the fallen warrior across the sand, leaving a wake of blood. Other followed with more sand and rakes to refresh the floor of the Coliseum so the contests could continue.
Soon the other gladiators returned to their positions. However, before they could resume, a robed figure leaped the wall separating the crowds from the arena and ran to a position between the two fighters nearest the emperor�s box. When he got there, Telemachus placed his hands on the chests of the two men to divide them, calling out, �In the name of Christ, stop! Don�t despise God�s mercy in turning away the sword of your enemies by murdering one another!�
The crowd was only stunned for a moment. �This is no place for preaching!� someone shouted. �The old customs of Rome must be observed�on gladiators!� came another. Then the roar rose again so that no voice was distinguishable from the others.
One of the gladiators hit the old man in the stomach with the handle of his sword, doubling Telemachus over and dropping him to his knees. Then they turned to recommence their fighting, but unexpectedly, Telemachus rose back to his feet quickly and stepped between them again, pushing them apart. �In the name of Christ, stop!�
�Get him out of there!� �Go away, old man!� �Let them continue!� �Sedition! Sedition! Down with him!� Then a chant arose: �Run him through! Run him through!� and the people began throwing things into the arena � rocks, or whatever they could get their hands on, came soaring towards Telemachus.
One of the gladiators turned on him suddenly in the frenzy driving his sword up to its hilt into the old man�s stomach.
Suddenly the angry crowd hushed to an eerie silence.
Telemachus again sank to his knees, his blood flowing from his wounds into a growing pool of crimson in the sand. With his last breath, he again shouted out, �In the names of Jesus, stop!�
Then he fell to his face and did not move again.
No one else said a word. For a moment no one even stirred. Then one man got up and made his way out of the arena. Another man and his wife followed. Then more. Slowly the trickle grew until everyone had risen to their feet and all the spectators had made their way out of the Coliseum in a painful, guilty silence.
Never again were gladiator contests held in the Coliseum.
What does it take to stand against the crowd and cry out, �No, stop! This is wrong!� If we flow down the rivers of culture, even a �Christian� culture, that are based on people�s desires and their traditions and not on truth, and never make a wave, are we truly living as a witness for Jesus?
-Taken from Jesus Freaks Vol. II by dc Talk and The Voice of the Martyrs