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The Light of the World
purpose and allows it to exist, although He despises it, that He may show His mercy to sinners
and lead the virtuous to greater virtue through the molestations of evil men. On the Day of
Judgment all will be forced to confess: “Thou art just, O Lord, and Thy judgment is right” (Ps
118:137); “All the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth” (Ps 24:10). The Day of Judgment will
see the separation of all that is unclean, false, and unjust from all that is good, true, clean, and
sublime. In that day truth will triumph over falsehood, justice over injustice, faith over unbelief,
adherence to Christ over apostasy. The cockle shall be gathered into bundles to be burned, and
the wheat into the barns of the Lord.
Christus vincit; Christus regnat; Christus imperat. “Christ conquers; Christ reigns; Christ
commands.” In this belief we await His coming. “Thy kingdom come.” Because of our faith
in His return in power and glory, we accept willingly the difficulties we meet in the world,
many of which are hard for us to understand. Our faith is tested without ceasing; but we
shall not go astray. We know that the day of the harvest is to come, the day when darkness
will be separated from the light. “Walk then as children of the light” (Eph 5:8) with Christ
and His Church.
Prayer
Be propitious, O Lord, to our supplications and . . . turn all our hearts unto Thee, that being
delivered from earthly desires, we may pass on to heavenly desires. Through Christ our Lord.
Amen. (Secreta.)
Friday
During the final week of the ecclesiastical year the language of the liturgy becomes very earnest
and impressive. The Last Judgment with all its terrors is approaching. It is foreshadowed by
the destruction of the city of Jerusalem seventy years after Christ’s death. Do penance; “walk
worthy of God, in all things pleasing; . . . strengthened with all might according to the power
of His glory” (Epistle).
Christ once passed judgment on the city of Jerusalem: “If thou also hadst known, and that in
this thy day, the things that are to thy peace; but now they are hidden from thy eyes. For the days
shall come upon thee; and thy enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round,
and straiten thee on every side, and beat thee flat to the ground, and thy children who are in
thee; and they shall not leave in thee a stone upon a stone” (Lk 19:42–44). “When therefore you
shall see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet standing
in the holy place; . . . then they that are in Judea, let them flee to the mountains; and he that is
on the house top, let him not come down to take anything out of his house,” but make his flight
at once. “For there shall be then great tribulation, such as hath not been from the beginning
of the world until now, neither shall be; and unless those days had been shortened, no flesh
should be saved” (Gospel). Such is the sentence Christ passed on Jerusalem. The armies of
Titus surrounded the city, and those who tried to flee the doomed city, perished with fearful
pain and anguish on crosses. Within the city, mothers driven mad by hunger slaughtered their
own children. The terrible siege continued for two years, until finally the Romans broke into
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