(LifeSiteNews) — My friends, there is heroic breaking news out of the Holy Land this morning.
The Sisters of Mother Teresa (the Missionaries of Charity), along with priests of the Holy Family parish, the only Catholic church still standing in the region, have been told to evacuate. But they have refused. Why? Because they will not abandon the poor, the disabled, and the sick who cannot leave. They know full well that it is very likely they will all be killed by Israeli forces, who have vowed that “the gates of hell will open.”
Well, I have news for the Israeli government. In the New Testament we read that the gates of hell will not prevail against the Church. These holy women and priests will not abandon their spiritual children.
The Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, in a joint press release with the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate, has confirmed that these nuns and priests have made the conscious choice to stay, knowing full well it could mean their deaths. They are literally placing themselves in the line of fire rather than forsake the least of Christ’s little ones.
Picture it: The convent and parish compound — bombed, scarred by rocket fire. The site where snipers from the Israeli Defense Forces already brutally shot to death an aging mother and her daughter. Hundreds of terrified civilians, including the children, elderly and disabled, taking refuge there. Evacuation would mean certain death for those left behind. And so, the sisters and priests stay.
The press release can’t convey what an incredible witness this is to the world. This is the Gospel lived in flesh and blood: “Greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.”
The Missionaries of Charity have been in Gaza since 1973. They arrived the day after the parish priest was killed — and yet they never left. For 50 years they have ministered to the poor, tended the sick, comforted the forgotten. And now, in 2025, they are once again proving that their vocation is grounded in self-sacrifice.
This spirit of martyrdom is not just for them. They are giving us the example we need to live our lives for Christ today. There is no more comfortable Catholicism. There is only the spirit of the original Christians — a readiness for offering our lives, literally, for the Savior. Whether their blood is shed or not, their witness already convicts the world. They have chosen Christ over safety. May their example inspire us and especially leaders in the Church to conversion.
These true daughters of Mother Teresa and these holy and self-sacrificing priests, hidden and humble, show us what it means to be Catholic. They remind us that faith without love and sacrifice is dead.
Let us pray for them, even as they witness to us. Let us beg heaven for their protection. But let us also ask for their courage — courage to stand with Christ, even when it costs everything.
When so many leaders in the Church have demonstrated compromise and cowardice, the Missionaries of Charity in the Holy Land are proclaiming to the whole world: Jesus Christ is worth our lives.
That is the Church. That is the true hope for the future of the Church. And that is the very thing which will heal the Church — the Mystical Body of Christ — the only hope for the whole human race.
For LifeSiteNews and Sign of the Cross Media, I’m John-Henry Westen. May God bless you.
