Monday Musings - Have We Become Too Complacent About Death and Judgment?
[Last week I shared a silly whimsical glance into the particular judgment of one attorney - the judgment that occurs immediately after death. Today, we cast aside that foolishness, and get real. The salvation of souls is at stake. Ponder what Ven. Louis of Granada, O.P. had to say on the subject.]
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“Consider, also, how uncertain is the hour of death. It generally comes when man is most forgetful of eternal things, overturning his plans for an earthly future, and opening before him the appalling vision of eternity. Therefore, the Holy Scriptures tell us that it comes as a thief in the night; that is, when men are plunged in sleep and least apprehensive of danger. The forerunner of death is usually a grave illness with its attendant weariness, sufferings, and pains, which weaken the powers of the body and give entrance to the king of terrors. Just as an enemy who wishes to take a citadel destroys the outer fortifications, so death with its vanguard of sickness breaks down the strength of the body, and, as it is about to fall before the repeated assaults of its enemy, the soul, no longer able to resist, takes its flight from the ruins…
'Men aspiring to perfection," says the holy Doctor [St. Gregory]... "constantly reflect upon the justice of the Sovereign Judge who is to pronounce sentence upon them in the dread hour which terminates their earthly career. They unceasingly examine themselves upon the account they are to render before this supreme tribunal. And if happily they find themselves innocent of sinful actions, they still ask with fear whether they are equally free from the guilt of sinful thoughts. For if it be comparatively easy to resist sinful actions, it is more difficult to conquer in the war which we must wage against evil thoughts. And though the fear of God's judgment is always before them, yet it is redoubled at the hour of death, when they are about to appear before His inflexible tribunal. At this moment the mind is freed from the disturbances of the flesh; earthly desires and delusive dreams fade from the imagination; the things of this world vanish at the portals of another life; and the dying man sees but God and himself. If he recalls no good which he has omitted, yet he feels that he cannot trust himself to give a correct and impartial judgment. Hence his fear and terror of the rigorous account to be exacted of him.' (Moral., 24:16, 17).
Do not these words of the great Doctor prove that this last hour and this supreme tribunal are more to be dreaded than worldly men imagine? If just men tremble at this hour, what must be the terror of those who make no preparation for it, whose lives are spent in the pursuit of vanities and in contempt of God's commandments? If the cedar of Lebanon be thus shaken, how can the reed of the wilderness stand? "And," as St. Peter tells us, "if the just man shall scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?" (1Pet. 4:18).
Reflect, then, on the sentiments that will be yours when you will stand before
the tribunal of God, with no defenders but your good works, with no companion
but your own conscience. And if then you will not be able to satisfy your
Judge, who will give expression to the bitterness of your anguish? For the
question at issue is not a fleeting temporal life, but an eternity of happiness
or an eternity of misery. Whither will you turn? What protection will you seek?
Your tears will be powerless to soften your Judge; the time for repentance will
be past. Little will honors, dignities, and wealth avail you, for
"Riches," says the Wise Man, "shall not profit in the day of
vengeance, but justice shall deliver a man from death." (Prov. 11:4).
The unhappy soul can only exclaim with the prophet, "The sorrows of death have encompassed me, and the perils of hell have found me." (Ps. 114:3). Unhappy wretch! How swiftly this hour has come upon me! What does it now avail me that I had friends, or honors, or dignities or wealth? All that I can now claim is a few feet of earth and a windings-sheet. My wealth which I hoarded I must leave to be squandered by others, while the sins of injustice which I here committed will pursue me into the next world and there condemn me to eternal torments. Of all my guilty pleasures the sting of remorse alone remains. Why have I made no preparation for this hour? Why was I deaf to the salutary warnings I received? "Why have I hated instruction, and my heart consented not to reproofs, and have not heard the voice of them that taught me, and have not inclined my ear to my masters?" (Prov. 5:12-13).
To preserve you, my dear Christian, from these vain regrets, I beg you to gather from what has been said three considerations, and to keep them continually before your mind. The first is the terrible remorse which your sins will awaken in you at the hour of death; the second is how ardently, though how vainly, you will wish that you had faithfully served God during life; and the third is how willingly you would accept the most rigorous penance, were you given time for repentance.
Acting on this advice, you will now begin to regulate your life according as you will then wish to have done."
(From The Sinner’s Guide by Ven. Louis of Granada, O.P.)