On The Last General Judgment: On The Reasons For The Last Judgment
TWENTY-SECOND SERMON
ON THE FIRST REASON FOR THE LAST JUDGMENT,
Subject.
There must necessarily be a day of general judgment; first, that God may make good in the sight of the whole world His lessened honor; secondly, that God may publicly justify His now incomprehensible Providence. Preached on the eighth Sunday after Pentecost.
Text.
"Give an account of your stewardship." (Luke xvi. 2.)
Introduction.
These very words shall be said to all of us when the last trumpet shall resound in the graves of all, with the words, " Arise, you dead, and come to judgment." Then shall the Judge say to each one of us in particular: man, give an account of your stewardship: tell Me how thou have lived, what you have thought, said, and done all the time you have spent in the world. But, we might ask with reason, is it not an article of faith that every man shall be judged immediately after death, and sent into eternal glory or eternal torments? Why then should men appear again to hear another sentence? Is not the first one good and just enough, as it is pronounced by an infallible Judge? Not a doubt of it! What is, then, the object of a new examination and judgment? Will the last judgment perhaps make some change in the first? Not at all; the sentence once uttered shall not be recalled. On the last day each one shall hear the same sentence that was pronounced on him at the particular judgment on the last day of his life at the moment of death, and no other, says St. Augustine. If I am then condemned to hell, then shall I certainly hear in the last judgment the words: - Depart, accursed ! " If I am then admitted to the kingdom of heaven, I shall certainly hear on the last day the words: "Come, you blessed!" What is then the use of a general judgment? My dear brethren, St. Thomas and other holy Fathers assign several reasons for it, from which shall select two principal ones, the first of which concerns God, and the second us mortals. The first shall furnish me with matter for this and the two following sermons.
Plan of Discourse,
There must necessarily be a general judgment. Why? That God may publicly in the sight of the whole world make good His lessened honor. Such shall be the first part. There must necessarily be a general judgment. Why? That God may publicly, in the sight of the whole world, justify His now incomprehensible providence. Such shall be the second part. Let us now faithfully honor God, and bow down in humble reverence before all the decrees of His providence, such shall be the conclusion.
We beg of You, Jesus Christ, the future Judge of the living and the dead, to give us Your grace to this end, through the merits of Mary and of the holy angels.
The reason why most men on earth give God so little of the honor due to Him, and are so backward in fearing and loving Him, is that they have but a dark knowledge of His majesty. We do not know what a great Lord He is, and how worthy of honor, fear, and love. It is true that an infallible faith represents all this to us; but how weak, languid, and neglected is not this knowledge of the faith in most men? Must we not acknowledge, my dear brethren, that such is the case? God, says our faith, is the absolute Lord and Master of all time, of every moment of our lives. We often refuse to act on this truth; we show by our conduct that we believe quite the contrary, for we misspend our precious time given us by God in a most foolish manner, wasting it in idleness, vanity, gluttony, avarice, the lusts of the flesh, gaming, and useless amusements. God, says our faith, is almighty, and present in all places; at any moment He has the power of reducing us to nothing if such is His will. We often refuse to act on that knowledge; otherwise should we, poor, despicable creatures as we are, so often rebel against Him, offend Him so audaciously, and before His very eyes trample His law under foot? God, says our faith, is the sworn Enemy and Chastiser of sin, and His infinite justice will not allow the least transgression to go unpunished, unless it has been fully atoned for. We often refuse to act on that knowledge; otherwise should we dare to offend Him so presumptuously? Do we not falsely imagine that we are free from all punishment when we spend whole weeks, months, and years in sin, calmly and quietly, as if there were no one in heaven or on earth from whom we have anything to fear? We separate the divine mercy and justice from each other, and imagine that justice must always give way before and yield to mercy; as Tertullian says, we look on justice as an idle attribute of God, that never upholds its rights and leaves every thing to mercy. God is good, we say; God is patient; God is tolerant of the sinner; He is ready to forgive, and therefore it makes little matter how one lives. Thus, through want of a proper knowledge of God, His honor is often lessened and despised.
Hence there must come a time in which God will avenge His
honor and publicly show before the world what He is. And that
will be the last day of general judgment, which is therefore
called in Holy Writ " the day of the Lord." " The loftiness of
men shall be bowed down," says the Prophet Isaias, "and the
haughtiness of men shall be humbled, and the Lord alone shall
be exalted in that day." The Prophet Osee calls this day a pub
be festival of the Lord, on which God, not rightly known before,
shall declare Himself publicly. Then the reprobate as well as
the just and elect shall acknowledge His supreme right and ab
solute power to rule over all the elements, and the living and
the dead, who will come forth from their graves at His command. For if, according to the opinion of St. Paul, it is an evident
sign of the almighty power of God that He can destroy great
things, and again restore what He has destroyed, showing by the
first that all creatures have their being from Him, and by the
second that He alone can replace them in their former state; on
the last day He will give supreme proof of this twofold power in
the sight of the whole world. The sun shall be darkened; the
moon shall refuse to give her light; the powers of the heavens
shall be moved; the stars shall fall from the sky; fire shall precede the coming of the Judge and destroy everything on earth.
How great must be the might of God in thus reducing the
world to ashes! And the same might shall appear just as great
in the restoration of so many creatures in the general resurrection. Imagine, my dear brethren, if you can, each and every
human being who has ever lived from the time of our forefather
Adam to the present day; imagine the countless millions who
have lived till now in the four quarters of the globe, those who
are still actually living, and those who are still to live on earth
till the last day, in all countries and nations; imagine that vast
number of human beings without a single exception rising from
their graves in a moment, as the Apostle St. Paul says: "In a
moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet, the
dead shall rise again incorruptible," and they shall all assemble
in the valley of Josaphat when the angel shall sound his trumpet
and call out: Arise, you dead, and come to judgment. How many
men shall be amongst them whose bodies have been devoured by
wild beasts! How many who have been drowned and eaten by
fishes! How many whose remains have decayed in the earth!
And all that shall remain over of their bodies shall be burned up by
fire; and yet those same bodies shall rise again in their former
stature, such as they were in this life, and thus come again to
life. Thus the same God who shall show His power by the destruction of creatures shall give still clearer proof of it in their
resurrection, and publicly show that He is absolute Lord and Mas
ter over His whole creation; for He can create and destroy it
when, where, and how He pleases.
Moreover, on that day the justice of God, which is now so often overlooked and frequently despised by men, shall be most gloriously proved before the whole world. Then shall all see how bitter is the hatred. God has against sin and the sinner, and how He will not allow the smallest transgression to go unpunished; for He will demand an account even of an idle word or thought; no, He will judge the justices and holiest works of men, and put them to the proof to see if they are according to His will and pleasure. All shall then see that God has no respect for persons; rich and poor, noble and lowly, prince and peasant, master and servant, mistress and maid; great and small shall be cited before Him in the same order, without distinction of rank, and each one shall receive the reward or punishment due to his works. Therefore the Prophet Isaias calls this day cruel: " Behold, the day of the Lord shall come, a cruel day, and full of indignation, and of wrath, and fury, to lay the land desolate, and to destroy the sinners thereof out of it." The Prophet Joel calls it great and terrible: " The day of the Lord is great and very terrible: and who can stand it?" "A day of darkness, and of gloominess, a day of clouds and whirlwinds: the like to it has not been from the beginning, nor shall be after it. "'s In the same sense the Prophet Amos speaks of this day: " Woe to them that desire the day of the Lord: to what end is it for you? This day of the Lord is darkness, and not light. " Sophonias calls it a day of wrath and misery: " The great day of the Lord is near." And what sort of a day is it to be? "That day is a day of wrath, a day of tribulation and distress, a day of calamity and misery, a day of darkness and obscurity, a day of cloud and whirlwind. " In a word, it shall be a day on which the strict justice of God shall rule untempered by mercy, in order to humble the pride of men and to avenge His injured honor and glory.
Besides, how has not the honor of Jesus Christ suffered; how does it not still suffer among most men? Despised and contemned by publicly persecuted, unjustly condemned, He was seen hanging on a disgraceful cross in the presence of a multitude. The Jews still look on Him as a blasphemous imposter, who was justly sentenced by their forefathers on account of His crimes, and nailed to a cross; infidels refuse to acknowledge Him as their God; and how many wicked, proud, and tepid Catholic Christians are there not who are ashamed of Him and of His humble Gospel? Who hardly deign to bend the knee before His altar in the public churches where He is exposed for adoration?
Who in His presence, by their talking, laughing, and disrespectful demeanor, show Him far less reverence than they would to a mortal man from whom they might have a favor to expect? Who think it would be degrading in them to accompany Him publicly in the Blessed Sacrament? It is but right, then, that Christ should one day appear on His throne of glory and honor before the whole world, and receive the homage due to Him from all creatures.
Truly that must and shall be the case. " He," says St. Augustine, " who has been unjustly judged shall one day judge the world in justice." For the same reason He has selected the valley of Josaphat as the scene of this judgment, as the holy Fathers and interpreters of Scripture infer from the words of the Prophet Joel: "I will gather together all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Josaphat: and I will plead with them there." For that place is in the neighborhood of the scene of Jesus sufferings for the salvation of the world. There men have seen Him in the extremity of torment and degradation; and in the same place He must be seen in the height of hon or and glory. To this the Prophet Elias alluded when saying in a mysterious sense to King Achab: " In this place, wherein the dogs have licked the blood of Naboth, they shall lick your blood also; " that is, as the Gloss says, in the place where the Jews and soldiers shed the blood of Christ, there the demons shall still their thirst with the blood of those who put Christ to death. "And then they shall see the Son of man coming in a cloud with great power and majesty, " in order to take vengeance on His enemies for the injuries they inflicted on Him. Then shall all peoples and nations adore Him whom before they either did not know, or did not wish to know, or having known Him, did not honor as they should have done. "Every knee shall bow to Me," in heaven, on earth, and under the earth, "and every tongue shall confess to God." There, my dear brethren, we have the first just reason why there should be a general judgment appointed for the whole world; namely, that restitution of His injured honor may be made publicly to our God and Saviour. "The Lord alone shall be exalted in that day." And at the same time He will publicly justify His admirable providence with which He governs the world. And this is the second reason for the general judgment on the part of God, as we shall see in the
Second Part.
Nothing is more incomprehensible to us mortals than the manner in which God acts with us in this world; and again, there is nothing that gives rise to more complaints, doubts, murmuring, no, even blasphemies, not merely amongst heathens and heretics, but Catholics too, than the wonderful inscrutability of the divine decrees. No, this very circumstance is the cause of there being so many atheists in the world, who think and say that there is no God, or that, if there be one, He takes no concern about the affairs of mortals; He allows things to go as they please; He permits the crooked to appear straight; everything in the world happens according to the free will of men; wind and weather, heat and cold, rain and sunshine, peace and war, happiness and misery, health and sickness, a short or along life all these things are the result of chance, or else of the action or wickedness of men. It is true, my dear brethren, that many things are ordained that seem quite irregular and unjust according to our ignorant views, so that it appears impossible that they should come from a God of infinite wisdom, justice, mercy, and love.
For we see, says St. Augustine, and learn by daily experience that, for instance, a young, clever, and learned man dies prematurely, although his life would have been useful and necessary; while on the other hand an old, worn-out man continues to live, although he is good for nothing, and only a burden to himself and others. We see a father in the bloom of age and health hurried off suddenly by death from his wife and children, the latter thus becoming poor orphans who have great difficulty in finding bread enough to keep off the pangs of hunger; but another remains alive who is like a roaring lion in his home, ill-treating wife and children, drinking all their earnings, and reducing them to beggary. The poor laborer is cast down on a bed of sickness for a long time, although his work is the only means he has of procuring a livelihood; while another who has no need to work is kept in good health, although he makes a bad use of it for sin and vice and public scandal. One abounds in wealth and makes a wrong use of it; another is poor who, if he had riches, would do much for the honor and glory of God. The rich man, the prince, the king, the emperor, whose sole desire is to have an heir for the good of the family and of the whole nation and kingdom, receives no children from God, although he may weary Heaven with prayers for years; while poor people who have hardly enough to eat have children enough, more than they can feed. The best, dearest, and most beautiful child, the one whom the parents are most anxious to keep alive, dies; while the stupid, ugly, decrepit child remains alive, although they would readily have given him to God. Children die before baptism, although if they had been kept alive for the space of one Our Father they would have been freed from original sin and have been happy in heaven; and on the other hand a young man dies in the state of sin who if he had been taken off at an early age would not have been lost forever.
We see, says St. John Chrysostom, not a few who, having: attained a high degree of perfection, fall into grievous sin and are lost eternally; while on the other hand many who have for a long time led bad lives are converted and go to heaven. We see how God chastises and punishes a man, although He allows another, who is equally deserving of punishment, to get off scot-free. In all public calamities the good and pious, who try by their prayers to avert the scourge from their fatherland, are generally much more severely smitten than the rich and the wicked, whose sins and vices have caused God to draw the sword of vengeance and to afflict the whole country with a plague. We see and generally experience that many sinners and wicked men enjoy prosperity, wealth, and honor in the world, and live in pleasures and delights; while most of the good and pious, who try to serve God faithfully and zealously, and to fulfil His holy will in all things, spend their days in poverty, misfortune, con tempt, and sorrow, overwhelmed with trials, persecuted by others, and oppressed on all sides; and there are countless similar dispensations of Providence.
my Lord and my God! what a wonderful arrangement is this! For it is You alone who have so ordered things! Art You not the common Father in this great household of the world? Are not all men the works of Your hands? Of what kind, then, is this providence of Thine? What are we to think of Your manner of acting? Such are the exclamations of the Prophet Jeremias, evoked by the consideration of only this last arrangement of Divine Providence. " You indeed, Lord, art just if T plead with You: but yet I will speak what is just to You, " with Your permission I will ask You a question. " Why does the way of the wicked prosper: why is it well with all them that transgress and do wickedly? You have planted them, and they have taken root: they prosper and bring forth fruit." Why is that? Why do You decree that he who serves You truly should live in sorrow and affliction, while he who contemns and despises You passes his life in repose, joy, and pleasure? "How long," asks David with astonishment, "how long shall the wicked, Lord ! how long shall the wicked make their boast? How long shall they utter and speak wrong things? How long shall all the workers of iniquity talk? " How long shall they exult in honors and riches? The drunken glutton sits at table clad in purple, and enjoys himself although he is a great sinner; while the just Lazarus is poor and despised, and cannot obtain even the crumbs thrown to the dogs. Why is that so? Why is virtue laughed at and oppressed, and vice exalted and honored? Why does wickedness sit on a throne, and justice lie on the bare earth? Why is this, Lord? What is the meaning of this decree of Thine?
But David decides the matter for himself without waiting for an answer from God. " I studied that I might know this thing, it is a labor in my sight;" but I will wait until I enter the holy place of God; then I shall know all about what I cannot now understand: "Until I go into the sanctuary of God: and understand concerning their last ends." It will all become clear to me at the last end of all things. So it is, my dear brethren; this is a reason why there must be a general judgment; namely, that the Lord God may publish and justify in the sight of heaven and earth the hidden decrees and dispositions of His Providence; that He may answer the questions and complaints that arise from the ignorance or wickedness of men, who do not now understand His arrangements; that He may show each one the weighty reasons
He had in acting as He has done; in a word, on that day He will cause all presumptuous blasphemers to wonder at the justice and holiness of those decrees that they looked on as unjust. He will cause all the angels of heaven, all men on earth, all the demons in hell to cry out with David: " thou art just, Lord, and Your judgment is right." " Your testimonies are justice for ever;" all Your decrees are and always have been just; You could st not have governed the world wiser, better, or with more equity than You have done; formerly many things that we could not understand seemed to us inconsistent and wrong, no, unjust and scandalous; but now we acknowledge their holiness and justice. " thou art just, Lord! "
Now while we are on earth God speaks to us, as Our Lord did to Peter at the Last Supper, when that apostle, surprised at the humility of his Master, refused to allow Him to wash his feet: " And Peter says to Him: Lord, do You wash my feet? Jesus answered, and said to him: What I do, you knowest not now, but you shalt know hereafter," and you shalt know what good reason I have for acting in such a way. This is what St. Paul writes to the Corinthians: "Therefore judge not before the time, until the Lord come," before forming an opinion on what you see; wait till the coming of the Lord at the end of the world, " who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts." Mark the words "bring to light the hidden things of darkness;" that is, as Cajetan says, He will make clear what is now dark. Then you will understand why the Prophet Malachy, speaking of Christ as our future Judge, calls Him the Sun of justice: " To you that fear My name the Sun of justice shall arise." How so? Will the Judge come like the sun? You know, my dear brethren, what occurs at sunrise. While night lasts one cannot distinguish one thing from another, nor tell what is white or black, green or red; for the darkness takes the color away from things and hides it from our eyes; but when the sun rises at the break of day we can easily distinguish objects as they appear in their own colors. So shall it be also with the Sun of justice; when He appears at the last day we shall see clearly in the works of Divine Providence what the night of this life renders us blind to now.
In the beginning of the world, when God created light, He went, as the Scripture says, to see and examine it: "and God saw the light that it was good." He acted in the same manner with regard to His other works, the earth, the animals, the moon, the stars; each one He examined in particular and found it good. And when all things were created He looked at them all together: "And God saw all the things that He had made: and they were very good." Why so? Why did He examine all together after He had seen each one in particular and found it good ? " This," says Hugo of St. Victor, " was an image of what He is to do at the end of the world." At first God looked at each work in particular and then He considered all His works in general, and gave testimony that they were all very good; at the end He will show His works to men to be examined and considered: " He will bring forward His every work to judgment," says Hugo, but with this difference: in the particular judgment, which takes place immediately after the death of each one, He will show to the soul what He did specially for it, while on the last day He will bring on the stage all the works of His Divine Providence, and present them to men to be examined publicly, so that every one, convinced of their justice and wisdom, may confess that they are very good, that all that God has done with us from the beginning of the world is very good. Parents! you lost your beloved child by a premature death, while the decrepit one remained alive; but on that day when you shall examine the works of God you will confess that it is very good. my God! you will exclaim, how well and beautifully You have ordained this! Children! you have lost father or mother and have become poor orphans; on that day you will acknowledge that this decree of the Almighty was very good. That this man is rich, that one poor; this one healthy, another sickly; one well-formed, another crippled; one held in honor, another despised; one a servant, another the master; one leads a laborious, the other an idle life oh, truly, I cannot now explain this difference of conditions. But wait; wait till the works of God are all placed before our eyes on that day, then at last we shall confess that they are very good, that everything has been rightly and justly ordained, and that the world could not have been governed better. Pious Christians, who in the midst of your crosses and trials must see the wick ed prospering, and all their affairs apparently succeeding, be comforted with the thought of that day! Now you cannot see everything; but then you will understand all, and will say: now I behold all the works of God, and they are very good; everything without exception is most right and just. Then you will rejoice with the Prophet David: "We have rejoiced for the days in which thou have humbled us: for the years in which we have seen evils," and have had much suffering to bear. Now we rejoice at the happy days in which we were chastised and humbled by You, Lord! All that the Lord has done with us and in the whole world, is well done! Thus, my dear brethren, will God justify the providence with which He rules the world; and this is the second reason why there must be a general judgment.
And what conclusion shall we now draw from this for our instruction? It follows of itself; namely, that we must in the first place not scrutinize curiously the decrees and providence of the Almighty, much less should we murmur or complain on account of them, for we are now incapable of investigating or understanding them thoroughly, as we shall see in another sermon. In the them hum- next place, that we should always submit ourselves and all be longing to us in all circumstances to the holy will of God and to His all-wise Providence, perfectly confident that whatever He does with us must be for the very best, as we have heard already in a sermon on conformity with the will of God, and shall hear again in the two following sermons. Yes, Lord! such is my firm resolve; I give myself to You completely; do with me as You wilt! I do not now wish to see the reasons of Your decrees, although on account of my ignorance they sometimes seem strange to me; but I know that all Your works and dispensations in my regard could not be better than they are, simply because they are Thine; it is enough for me that I shall understand them all clearly on that day. Only grant me now Your powerful grace, that I may begin and continue so to serve my future Judge that on the last day I may not only know and confess the holiness and justice of Your Providence (for even the damned must do that), but that with Your elect I may praise and glorify that Providence in the joyful exit from the valley of Josaphat to Your eternal kingdom. Amen.
Another Introduction to the same sermon for the first Sunday of Advent.
Text.
"And then they shall see the Son of man coming in a cloud with great power and majesty." (Luke xxi. 27.)
Introduction.
It seems at first rather strange that the Son of God should come down from- heaven at the end of the world to judge and pronounce sentence on men in such a public manner. For we might reasonably ask why, etc. Continues as above.