ADVENT EVENING OF RECOLLECTION - THE FOUR LAST THINGS
 |
| Maarten van Heemskerck - The Four last Things, 1565. Royal Collection Trust, Windsor. |
The Evening Recollection was held at the Assumption Warwick Street on Tuesday 29th November. The evening began with sung Vespers of the Little Office Our Lady, followed by a most excellent talk by the Rector, Fr Mark Elliott-Smith, then Holy Hour, two priest were on hand to hear confessions, and ending with a fraternal party in the Chapter Room.
The text of the talk is given below. We are greatly indebted to Fr Elliott-Smith, a good friend of the Order, for his generous time and hospitality at the altar.
"DEATH, JUDGEMENT, HEAVEN AND HELL"
A rottweiler, a chihuahua, and a cat all die and appear before the Judgment Seat of Heaven. God asks the rottweiler, "Why should you get into Heaven?"
The rottweiler says, "I protected my family for years, and died saving them from a crazed killer."
God says, "Well done, boy. Come sit at my right hand. How about you, Mr. Snuffles?"
The chihuahua says "I didn't die heroically, but I did provide love and comfort to an elderly lady in her last years."
"Good enough. Come sit on my left." God turns to the cat. "How about you? Why should you get into Heaven?"
The cat looks up and calmly says, "because you're in my chair."
Well, it’s Advent, it’s an Evening of Recollection, it’s dark outside, and cold to boot. What better way to cheer you up than by thinking about death?
It’s November, and we have been praying for the Holy Souls, for our loved ones, for those who have no one left on earth to pray for them, and I hope we have been praying for those we haven’t liked very much as well. It’s at least as great, if not greater, spiritual work of mercy to pray for those whom we didn’t love that much: they probably need those prayers, and would undoubtedly be consoled by them, and we in our turn are doing our best to grow in holiness and charity. If the Lord, in the extremity of His agony, could plead forgiveness for his murderers, we can spare a prayer for those we didn’t like very much. And we have all reached the stage of our lives when we have said goodbye to many friends and family.
And that means, also, that we have become aware of the passing of time, and that there are fewer mornings ahead than behind.
Of those four last things, Death is not a matter of faith. It is a simple, stark fact, an inescapable reality. And that, in relation to the other three, is the important thing that can be said about it: one day, it will happen. Advent drums that truth home. You might almost say that Advent rubs our noses in it.
Because Advent reminds us, not only that Christ was born, and we prepare to celebrate that joyful night when the source of our redemption enters the world; but that He is not only the Redeemer and Saviour of mankind, but its just Judge.
Although we say or sing these words every Sunday, “He will come again in glory to judge both the quick and the dead” sometimes we will perhaps gloss over them. Words can do that. We repeat them so often that we forget their meaning from time to time. Holy Mother Church is wise and She gives us four weeks before Christmas to remember, yes, the joy of the Coming of the Saviour, but to cultivate that Godly fear which should be so much part of what it means to be a disciple.
Jesus came to save us.
It’s important to recall what He came to save us from.
Ourselves.
“Oh Adam’s sons, how cleverly you defend yourselves against all that might do you good!”
Like some of you, I’m sure, I was brought up on CS Lewis as a child. Fifty years later, I’m still struck by how clever a Christian apologist Lewis was. Memorable phrases from his Narnia books still come back to me and show how much he taught me and, oh so subtly. The words I’ve just quoted come from the Magician’s Nephew, which you may remember was the prequel to the whole series: it explains the beginnings of the comings and goings between here and Narnia, the origin of the magical wardrobe that became the portal between our world and it; most crucially, it explains the origins of the evil witch that imprisoned it in an never ending Winter; the death and resurrection of Aslan not only redeems the land but destroys the witch.
But the witch would never have got anywhere near the land had not a young boy given in to the temptation to bring her to life by ringing the bell placed near her. It was the original sin, the act that placed a new world in jeopardy.
Human beings have that uncanny ability, which comes from pride, and ultimately the devil: to press the button which it is forbidden to press, to ring that bell which you are told never to ring, to open that door: in other words, to eat from that tree, despite knowing it is wrong to do so, and to be given our marching orders from Paradise.
So, now the night is dark, and we are far from home.
And yet, we have been shown by Him, who is the way, the truth, and the life, that in His house there are many mansions, and He wants us to be in residence.
To get there, however, we will pass through that dark door. Before that happens however, we have another house to set in order: the house of our lives, to use the time that is left to us aright.
Because we believe the reality of Judgement. And here, I am talking about the Particular Judgement.
Here’s what the Catechism of the Catholic Church has to say:
Death puts an end to human life as the time open to either accepting or rejecting the divine grace manifested in Christ. 590. The New Testament speaks of judgment primarily in its aspect of the final encounter with Christ in his second coming, but also repeatedly affirms that each will be rewarded immediately after death in accordance with his works and faith. the parable of the poor man Lazarus and the words of Christ on the cross to the good thief, as well as other New Testament texts speak of a final destiny of the soul -a destiny which can be different for some and for others.
1022. Each man receives his eternal retribution in his immortal soul at the very moment of his death, in a particular judgment that refers his life to Christ: either entrance into the blessedness of heaven-through a purification or immediately,-or immediate and everlasting damnation.
Now that is a sobering thought.
I’m not wanting to give you nightmares, but it is sometime salutary to remember that, while we can always count on the Lord’s mercy, complacency about the certainty of Heaven should never be allowed to take hold. On the other hand, neither should we ever despair of the Lord’s mercy. That, too, should never be allowed to take hold. That, in fact, is a sin against the Holy Spirit. The Gospels are too full of prodigal sons, breast beating publicans, repentant tax collectors, and women taken in adultery for the penny not to drop about one very simple fact: the minute we show that we are sorry, the minute we show we want to do and be better, is the minute that the Lord reaches out to us, picks up and says: “Neither do I condemn you.”
Nonetheless, he adds “Go away, and sin no more.”
We often forget that bit, and it has, I think, skewed our understanding of mercy. Mercy is not saying that what we have done doesn’t matter, and we shouldn’t worry our little heads about it.
It is about almost the complete opposite. Mercy is about the fact that sin does matter. Sin does put a barrier between us and God. The wonderful mercy is that, despite the fact that it matters, God takes the initiative and does for us what we cannot do for ourselves. Put it right. Restore us to our rightful home.
As we labour along the road that leads there we know that our particular judgement will reveal ourselves to ourselves, and in the presence of the Crucified and Risen one. And we will, know, in the words of Newman, that the Flame of everlasting love doth burn ere it doth transform.
Some people, the Saints, will hear the words “Well done, good and faithful servant. Enter into your master’s joy.”
There are those, and it’s an uncomfortable thing to ponder, who have so definitively rejected God’s mercy and love, who have shielded themselves from all that might have done them good, who will be eternally separated from Him. Universalists don’t like this thought: they either think hell doesn’t exist, or that it’s empty.
No one likes to think that hell might actually have people as well as demons in it. In fact, it’s a terrifying thought, but we cannot avoid the possibility that free will can be used in such a way as to put souls beyond the possibility of redemption.
Let us, then, always want, with our whole hearts, our minds, souls and bodies, to be within the scope of redemption, and within reach of the everlasting arms.
But, if we might be acutely aware there are aspects of ourselves that not make us immediately fit to be out and about in the neighbourhood that is Heaven, “This perfect life with the Most Holy Trinity - this communion of life and love with the Trinity, with the Virgin Mary, the angels and all the blessed - is called ‘heaven.’ Heaven is the ultimate end and fulfillment of the deepest human longings, the state of supreme, definitive happiness.” (CCC 1024)
For most of us, hopefully, Purgatory beckons:
‘The Church gives the name Purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned. The Church formulated her doctrine of faith on Purgatory especially at the Councils of Florence and Trent. The tradition of the Church, by reference to certain texts of Scripture, speaks of a cleansing fire:
‘“As for certain lesser faults, we must believe that, before the Final Judgment, there is a purifying fire. He who is truth says that whoever utters blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will be pardoned neither in this age nor in the age to come. From this sentence we understand that certain offences can be forgiven in this age, but certain others in the age to come.”’
Although we shouldn’t look on Purgatory as a crammer for those who didn’t do their homework here, it is comforting to know that those of us who fall well short of sanctity here have the opportunity to make for what is lacking. But I don’t think we should underestimate the pains of Purgatory: it will be hard to correct the attitudes, the habits, the bits of pride and selfishness that stick like barnacles to the soul. As the Divine Physician will say, entirely truthfully, “This won’t hurt a bit.” Removing them will hurt! I don’t know how, because this will happen in a region without the busy beat of time, or with bodies to feel, but the process of becoming what we are meant to be, and being purified of what shouldn’t be, must, in some sense, be painful, a good pain to be sure, but a pain nonetheless.
So, Advent is here to help focus minds and souls, not morbidly, or scrupulously, but realistically. Compline, the Night Prayer of the Church, always reminds us of the need “to be sober and watchful”, to be mindful of the wiles of the evil one. That very awareness, however, puts us in the presence of the Good one, the Holy one, the One who saves us from ourselves, at the cost of His life. In the end, we are saved by love, and it is love, and our capacity to show it, and live by it, that will lead us to Heaven.
May Mary, Mother of Divine Love, pray for us, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ. Amen.