Revelation: - Knights of Columbus, Supreme Council

to triumph over the Roman Empire, which was its most power ful enemy in
John’s day. It has triumphed repeatedly since. It will triumph over its enemies
of our day, and so it will go on, until the final vindication and the glorification
which will be set in heaven.
As we have seen, it is funda mentally wrong to try to wrest from the
Apocalypse a projection into the future of detailed prophecies of dates and
years. John was giving voice to his faith based on the words of our Lord and of
the Bible. His numbers and his images are symbolical. He did not know, any
more than do we, precisely when would come the ultimate triumph, with the
glorious return of the Lord. He knew, as we know, that it will certainly come.
The Apocalypse repeats the same themes over and over. It is the product
of many separate visions which John has drawn up into a complicated and
intricate outline. Thus we see now one, now another aspect of the same general
teaching. But just as the Lord is eternal, as the Son of Man is forever in heaven
and on earth reigning in His Church, as the lamb is at one time slain yet
standing triumphant, it is in the same perspective that we must view the
visions of the Apocalypse. They relate truths that are applica ble to all times.
The “two witnesses” are the faithful servants of Christ in every generation; they
are not confined to any one period. They are with us today as they were with
John. They are being put to death in our age as in John’s. And as they were
“soon” to be raised triumphant in John’s own day, so will they rise in ours.
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