How many of us have worn or seen a St. Christopher medal? Let me tell you a little about St. Christopher. Little is actually known about St. Christopher; the only verifiable fact we know is that he was a martyr for the Faith in the early Church. In the Middle Ages, though, a legend developed about St. Christopher; they wanted to know how he got his name, since his original name was Offerus. This legend was one of the most inspiring of legends in the Middle Ages and is one that has a lot to say to the people of our time. The legend goes this way:
The man who would one day be named St. Christopher was someone who was engaged in a lifelong search for someone or something that he could devote his life to. He began his search by making himself as fit as he could be and then by looking for the most powerful person whose cause he could devote himself to. He teamed up with some local feudal lord who was charismatic and seemed to win every battle he fought. One day, though, he discovered that the feudal lord was afraid of Satan, so he went to look for this powerful Satan and served him for a while. As he got to know the ways of Satan, he discovered that Satan’s enemies would use the name of Jesus, or the sign of the cross, to chase Satan away. Satan was a weakling before Christ.
Now totally disillusioned with Satan, Christopher went to find Jesus Christ who was more powerful than everyone else. But he could not find Him. Jesus seemed to be elusive indeed. Is that not like our own time? Many people today find the real Jesus hard to find.
Since he could not find Jesus, Christopher had to find work in order to survive. Christopher was a tall man and such a strong man that he today would be accused of using steroids. Again the image here is one of power. So, since the region he lived in was in short supply of bridges over the various rivers, people relied on big strong men like Christopher to carry them across the raging rivers. And so he labored at a river that was not so deep that he could not cross it, but was a raging, strong river that very few had the strength to cross.
Day after day he carried people through the river to the other side: big people, little people, fat people, old people. My, my, was he strong.
Then one day a little boy came and asked Christopher to carry Him across the river. Christopher thought, “Oh, this will be a piece of cake!”
So he picked up the little boy and began to carry Him across the river. As they moved through the river the boy got heavier and heavier - to the point that Christopher realized that this little boy was the heaviest person he had ever carried, heavy as lead, the legend says. How could this be?
When they got to the other side of the river, Christopher let the boy down and said to Him, “Child, you have put me in great peril. I thought I was going to drown, for you weigh so much that it felt like I had the whole world upon me and that I could bear no greater burden.”
The Child said to him, “Indeed did you feel the weight of the whole world, for that is the burden I carry, and you carried Me. Since you have borne Me on your shoulders, your name shall now be Christopher, which means ‘Bearer of the Christ’.” And with that the Child was gone. Christopher realized that he had served the mightiest of kings and devoted the rest of his life to Christ, even eventually dying as a martyr for Christ.
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