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The Time After Pentecost
“Nothing is wanting to you in any grace” (Epistle). So with confidence we await the return of the
Lord. He “will confirm you unto the end” (Epistle). He will crown His graces and consolations
with the grace of final perseverance. We shall lose what we have, but we expect with confidence
that He “will confirm [us] unto the end.” We are joyfully confident that “we shall go into the
house of the Lord” (Introit). Heaven is open to us.
“Give peace, O Lord, to them that patiently wait for Thee” (Introit), to us who are waiting
for Thy return now in the celebration of the Mass and at Holy Communion, and likewise at
the hour of our death. “I rejoiced at the things that were said to me: We shall go into the house
of the Lord” (Introit).
Prayer
Let the operation of Thy mercy, we beseech Thee, O Lord, direct our hearts; for without Thee
we cannot please Thee. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Thursday
“Nothing is wanting to you in any grace, waiting for the manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Who also will confirm you unto the end without crime, in the day of the coming of our Lord
Jesus Christ” (Epistle). The grace of God is given to us in Christ. God will also complete what
He has commenced in us; He will give us the greatest of all graces, the grace of perseverance
until the end, the grace to enter eternal life through a happy death. “I rejoiced at the things that
were said to me: We shall go into the house of the Lord” (Introit).
He “will confirm you unto the end” (Epistle). We have received rich graces from God. The
ecclesiastical year that is slowly drawing to an end has been a year of blessing to us. May we
expect further graces from God in spite of our abuse, neglect, and misuse of many graces? May
we count on perseverance unto the end? Must not the word of the Apostle fill us with fear: “He
that thinketh himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall” (1 Cor 10:12)? And again, “I will
have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will show mercy to whom I will show mercy. So
then it is not of him that willeth nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy” (Rom
9:15 f.). It would be futile to try to learn whether or not we should persevere without crime
unto the end. We need not worry about the future; let us provide for the present. We cannot
merit the grace of final perseverance, although we may with good reason expect that God in
His mercy will give us the grace of counsel, which will lead us safely through the temptations
of life. The more faithfully we cooperate with grace, the more assurance we have that God will
give us more effectual graces and helps. Do we, then, doubt His providence? Did not the Son
of God die for each one of us? Would not He be willing to relive His difficult life on earth and
suffer His passion once more for us only to save us? “He that spared not even His own Son, but
delivered Him up for us all, how hath He not also, with Him, given us all things?” (Rom 8:32.)
We may well believe: “He will confirm you unto the end.” “For I know whom I have believed”
(2 Tm 1:12). “Who will have all men to be saved” (1 Tm 2:4).
“But he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved” (Mt 10:22). Perseverance to the
end is an unmeritable grace of God. However, we can and we must work for this most precious
of all God’s graces. The first means for obtaining the grace of final perseverance is continual
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