THE DEAD WILL RISE by Don Giuseppe Tomaselli

INTRODUCTION

Hearing about death, hell and other great truths is not always pleasing, especially to those who want to enjoy life. Yet it is necessary to think about it! Everyone would like to go to Heaven, that is, to eternal enjoyment; to get there, however, you must also meditate on certain truths, because the great secret to save one's soul is to meditate on the very new, that is, what awaits us immediately after death. Remember your new ones, says the Lord, and you will not sin forever! Medicine is disgusting, but it gives health. I thought it well to do a work on the Divine Judgment, because it is one of the very new ones that most shakes my soul and I think it will be useful to many other souls. I will deal in a special way with the Last Judgment, because it is not known as it deserves from the people.

The resurrection of the dead, which will accompany this judgment, is a staggering novelty for certain souls, as I have seen in the exercise of the Sacred Ministry.

I hope to succeed with divine help.

WHAT IS LIFE?

Who is born ... has to die. Ten, twenty, fifty ... one hundred years of life, I'm a soflo. When the last moment of earthly existence has arrived, looking back, we must say: Man's life on earth is short!

What is life in this world? A continuous struggle to maintain existence and to resist evil. This world is rightly called "valley of tears", even when some ray of fleeting and flattering joy illuminates the human creature.

The writer found himself hundreds and hundreds of times at the bed of the dying and had the opportunity to seriously meditate on the vanity of the world; he saw young lives die out and he experienced the stench of the rotting corpse. It is true that you get used to everything, but certain phenomena usually make an impression.

I want you to watch, or reader, the disappearance of some person from the world scene.

THE DEATH
A magnificent palace; a nice one: villa at the entrance.

One day this house was the attraction of the pleasure-seekers, because they spent their time there in games, dances and banquets.

Now the scene has changed: the owner is seriously ill and is fighting against death. The doctor at the bedside does not let him comfort him. Some faithful friends visit him, wishing health; family members look at him anxiously and let furtive tears escape. Meanwhile, the sufferer is silent and observes while meditating; he has never looked at life as in these moments: everything seems funeral.

So, says the poor man to himself, I am dying. The doctor does not tell me, but makes him glimpse. I will soon be dead! And this building? ... I'll have to leave it! and my riches? ... They will go to others! And the pleasures? ... They are finished! ... I am going to die ... So soon I will be nailed into a box and taken to the cemetery! ... My life has been a dream! Only the memory of the past remains!

While thus thinking, the Priest enters, called not by him but by some good soul. Do you want, she says, to be reconciled with God? ... Do you think you have a soul to save!

The dying person has a heart in bitterness, a body in spasms and has little desire for what the Priest tells him.

However, in order not to be rude and not to leave the impression of having refused religious comforts, he admits the Minister of God to the bedside and more or less coldly absent from what is suggested to him.

Meanwhile, the evil gets worse and the breathing becomes more labored. All the eyes of those present are turned to the agonizing, who pales and with supreme effort emits the last breath. She's dead! says the doctor. What agony in the heart of the family! ... How many cries of pain!

Let's think about the corpse says someone.

While a few minutes before that body was the object of caring for and was tenderly kissed by intimate people, as soon as the soul left, that body creeps; you would never want to look at it, in fact there are those who no longer dare to set foot in that room.

A bandage is put around the face, so that the face remains less deformed before the stiffening; he puts on that body for the last time and lies on the bed with his hands over his chest. Four candles are placed around it and so the funeral chamber is set up.

Allow me, man, to make healthy reflections on your corpse, reflections that perhaps you never did while you were alive and that could have benefited you greatly!

REFLECTIONS
Where are you, rich sir, your friends right now?

Some in this instant are perhaps among the hobbies, unaware of your fate; others wait with relatives in the other room. You are alone ... lying on the bed! ... Only I am near you!

This slightly bent garment of yours has lost its usual arrogance and pride! Your hair, the object of vanity and one day so fragrant, is slimy and disheveled! Your eyes so penetrating and accustomed to the command ... grazed for many years in immorality, shamefully laid on things and people ... these eyes are now dull, glassy and half covered by the eyelids!

Your incartapécorite ears rest. They no longer hear the praises of flatterers! ... They no longer listen to scandalous speeches! ... Too many have already heard!

Your mouth, man, lets you see a little bruised and almost dangling tongue, slightly in contact with the slobbering teeth. You made a lot of work ... Swearing, murmuring and vomiting blasphemies ... The lips, red and silent ... internally illuminated by a weak lamp ... a Crucifix on the wall ... some boxes placed here and there ... What a dismal scene! Ah! if the dead could speak and express their impressions of the first night spent in the Cemetery!

Who are you, the rich lord would say, who are you who have the honor of being close to me?

I am a poor worker, who lived at work and died of an accident! ... Then move away from me, who is one of the richest in the city! ... Move away immediately, because you are stinky and I can't resist! ... Brother, it seems that the other says, we are now the same thing! There was a distance between you and me outside the cemetery; in here, no! The same thing ... the same stench ... the same worms! ...

The following morning, in the early hours, some pits are prepared in the large Camposanto; the coffins are removed from the deposit and brought to the burial site. The poor are buried without any ceremonial, except the blessing that the priest gives. The wealthy lord still deserves a consideration, which will be the last. On behalf of the deceased's family, two friends come to do the reconnaissance of the corpse before the burial. The coffin opens and the nobleman passed away appears. The two friends take violence to look at him and immediately order to close the case. They regretted having targeted it! The dissolution of the corpse has already begun. The face has swelled enormously and the lower part, from the nostrils downwards, is covered with putrid blood, which has come out of the nose and mouth.

The coffin has gone down; the workers cover it with earth; soon other workers will come to place a beautiful monument.

O noble man, here you are in the bosom of the earth! Rotten ... serve your grazing meats to worms! ... Over time your bones will pulverize! What the Creator said to the first man is fulfilled in you: Remember, man, that you are dust and to dust you will return!

The two friends, with the specter of the corpse in their mind, thoughtfully leave the Camposanto. As it boils down, one exclaims. Dear friend, what can we do! ... So is life! You no longer knew our friend! ... We forget everything! ... Woe if we were to think about what we saw!

HOLY RESOLUTION
O reader, the pale description of a funeral scene perhaps struck you. You are right! But take advantage of this healthy impression of yours to take some better life resolution! For all, the thought of death was the motive for fleeing a serious occasion of sin; ... for giving oneself to the fervent practice of the Holy Religion ... to detach oneself from the world and its fallacious attractions!

Some even became Saints. Among them we remember a nobleman of the Count of Spain, who had had to look at the corpse of Queen Isabella before the burial; he was so impressed that he resolved to leave the pleasures of the court, gave himself to penance and consecrated himself to the Lord. Full of merit, he started from this life. This is the great San Francesco Borgia.

And what do you resolve to do? ... You have nothing to correct in your life? ... Do you not caress your body too much at the expense of the soul? ... Do you not illicitly satisfy your senses? ... Remember that you have to die ... and you will die when the less you think ... Today in the picture, tomorrow in the burial! ... In the meantime you live as if you should never die ... Your body will rot under the ground! And your soul, which will have to live eternally, why don't you take more care of it?

THE SPECIAL JUDGMENT
SOUL
As soon as the dying man takes his last breath, some exclaim: He is dead ... everything is over!

It is not so! If earthly life is over, eternal life of spirit or soul has begun.

We are made of soul and body. The soul is the vital principle by which man loves, wants good and is free of his acts, therefore responsible for his action. By means of the soul the body performs all its functions of assimilating, growing and feeling.

The body is the instrument of the soul; as long as it vivifies it, we have the body in full efficiency; as soon as it leaves, we have death, that is, the body becomes a corpse, insensitive, destined for dissolution. The body cannot live without the soul.

The soul, made in the divine image and likeness, is created by God in the act of human conception; after dwelling for some time on this earth, she returns to God to be judged.

The Divine Judgment!… Let us, O reader, enter into a matter of utmost importance, far superior to that of death. I am hardly moved, or reader; the thought of Judgment, however, manages to move me. I say this so that you follow the topic I am about to deal with with particular interest.

THE DIVIN JUDGE
After the body dies, the soul continues to live; this is a truth of faith taught us by Jesus Christ, God and man. For he says: Fear not those who kill the body; but fear the One who can lose your body and soul! And speaking of a man who thought only of this earthly life, amassing wealth, He says: Foolish, tonight you will die and your soul will be asked of you! How much did you prepare who will it be? While he is dying on the Cross, he says to the good thief: Today you will be with me in Paradise! Speaking of the rich epulone, he asserts: The rich died and was buried in hell.

Therefore, as soon as the soul leaves the body, without any interval it finds itself before eternity. If she were free to choose, she would certainly go to Heaven, because no soul would want to go to hell. A judge is therefore required to assign the eternal residence. This judge is God himself and precisely Jesus Christ, the Eternal Son of the Father. He himself affirms it: The Father judges no one, but every judgment has left him to the Son!

Guilts were seen to tremble before the earthly judge, to sweat cold and even to die.

Yet it is a man who must be judged by another man. And what will it be when the soul appears before God to receive the irrevocable sentence for all eternity? Some Saints trembled at the thought of this appearance. It is told of a monk, who having seen Jesus Christ in the act of judging him, was so frightened that his hair suddenly became white.

St. John Bosco before dying. in the presence of Cardinal Alimonda and several Salesians, he began to cry. Why are you crying? asked the Cardinal. I think of the judgment of God! Soon I will appear before him and I will have to account for everything! Pray for me!

If this was done by the Saints, what should we do who have a conscience full of so many miseries?

WHERE WILL WE BE JUDGED?
The Doctors of the Holy Church teach that the Particular Judgment will be in the very place where death occurs. This is a terrible truth! To die while a sin is being committed and to appear there before the offended Supreme Judge!

Think, oh Christian soul, of this truth when temptation assails you! You would like to do a bad deed ... And if you died at that moment? ... You commit so many sins in your room ... above that bed ... Do you think that you will probably die on that bed and that right there you will see the Divine Judge! ... You therefore, or soul Christian, you will be judged by God inside your own house, if death catches you there! ... Meditate seriously! ...

THE CATHOLIC DOCTRINE
The Judgment that the soul undergoes as soon as it expires, is called "particular" to distinguish it from what will happen at the end of the world.

Let's go into the Particular Judgment, as far as humanly possible. Everything will happen in the blink of an eye, as St. Paul says; however, we try to describe the development of the scene in some more interesting details. It is not I who invent this scene of Judgment; they are the Saints who describe it, with Sant'Agostino at the head, supported by the sayings of Sacred Scripture. It is good to first expose the Catholic doctrine regarding the sentence of the supreme Judge: «After death, if the soul is in the grace of God and without the remainder of sin, it goes to Heaven. If he is in God's disgrace, he goes to hell. If she still has some debt to pay with Divine Justice, she goes to Purgatory until she is made worthy to enter Heaven. "

AN UNHAPPY SOUL
Let us witness together, o reader, to the judgment that a Christian soul undergoes after death, who, despite having received the Holy Sacraments many times, nevertheless led a life stained here and there with grave faults and sinned with the hope of being saved the same, thinking of dying at least in God's grace. Unfortunately she was caught by death while in mortal sin and here she is now before the Eternal Judge.

THE APPEARANCE
Jesus Christ Judge is no longer the tender Child of Bethlehem, the sweet Messiah who blesses and forgives, the meek Lamb who goes to death on Calvary without opening his mouth; but he is the proud Lion of Judah, the God of tremendous majesty, before which the most elect Heavenly Spirits fall in adoration and the infernal powers tremble.

The Prophets somehow glimpsed the Divine Judge in their visions and gave us pictures. They depict Christ the Judge with his face shining like the sun, with his eyes sparkling like flames, with a voice similar to the roar of the lion, with the fury like a bear whose children have been stolen. Alongside it has justice with two very right scales: one for good works and another for bad works.

To see him, the sinful soul would like to rush towards him, to possess him forever; it was created for him and tends towards him; but it is held back by mysterious force. It would like to annihilate itself or at least to flee so as not to support the gaze of a scorned God; but it is not allowed. Meanwhile, he sees before him the heap of sins committed in life, the devil at his side, who laughs ready to drag her with him and sees beneath the terrible furnace of hell.

Even before receiving the sentence, the soul already experiences its atrocious torment, considering itself worthy of the eternal fire.

What, will the soul think, what will I have to say to the Divine Judge, being so miserable? ... What patron do I have to beg to help me? ... Oh! unhappy me!

The ACCUSES
When the soul appeared before God, the accusation began at the same time. Here is the first accuser, the devil! Lord, he says, be right! ... You have condemned me to hell for one sin! This soul has committed so many! ... Make it burn with me eternally! ... O soul, I will never leave you! ... You belong to me! ... You have been my slave for a long time! ... Ah! liar and traitor! says the soul. You promised me happiness, presenting the cup of pleasure to my life and now I am lost to you! Meanwhile, the devil, as Saint Augustine says, reproaches the soul for the sins committed and with an air of triumph reminds her of the day, the time and the circumstances. Remember, Christian soul, that sin ... that person ... that book ... that place? ... Do you remember how I excited you to evil? ... How obedient you were to my temptations! Here comes the Guardian Angel, as Origen says. O God, he exclaims, what I have done for the salvation of this soul! ... I spent many years by his side, lovingly guarding her ... How many good thoughts I inspired her! ... At first, when she was innocent, she listened to me. Later, falling and falling into serious guilt, she became deaf to my voice! ... She knew it was hurting ... and yet she preferred the suggestion of the devil!

At this point the soul, tormented by remorse and anger, does not know who to rush! Yes, he will say, the fault is mine!

THE EXAM
Rigorous interrogation has not yet taken place. Illuminated by the light that emanates from Jesus Christ, the soul sees all the work of its life in detail.

«Give me account, says the Divine Judge, of your wicked works! How many defilements of the festive day! ... How many shortcomings against others ... taking advantage of other people's stuff ... cheating at work ... borrowing money and demanding more than the right! ... How many counterfeits in trade, altering the goods and weight! ... And those revenge taken after such and such offense? ... You didn't want to forgive and you asked for my forgiveness!

«Give me account of the faults against the Sixth Commandment! ... I had given you a body even if you served it well and you instead profaned it! ... How many unworthy freedoms of a creature!

«How much malice in those scandalous glances! ... How many miseries in your youth ... in your engagement ... in your wedding life, that you should have sanctified! ... You thought, O unhappy soul, that everything was lawful! ... You didn't think that I saw everything and warned you of the my presence with remorse!

The cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were incinerated by me by fire because of this sin; you too will be eternally burned in hell and will discount those bad pleasures taken; you will burn on your own, afterwards your body will come too!

«Give me account of this insult you launched into anger when you said: God does not do the right things! ... He is deaf! ... He does not know what he does! ... Miserable creature, you dared to treat your Creator like this! ... I had you given the language to praise me and you used it to insult me ​​and to offend your neighbor! ... Give me an account now of the slanders ... of the murmurs ... of the secrets you have manifested ... of the curses ... of the lies and the oaths! ... of your idle words! ... Lord, exclaims the soul terrified, even of this? ... And yes? Have you not read in my Gospel: Of every idle word that men will have said, they will sing me on the day of Judgment! ...?

"Give me account also of thoughts, of impure desires voluntarily kept in the mind ... of thoughts of hatred and enjoyment of the evil of others! ..:

"How did you fulfill the duties of your state! ... How much neglect! ... You got married! ... But why didn't you fulfill the serious obligations inherent? ... You refused the children I wanted to give you! ... Of someone, who you accepted, you didn't have due spiritual care! ... I covered you with special favors from birth to death ... you recognized it yourself ... and you paid me with such ingratitude! ... You could have saved yourself, and instead! ...

«But the closest account is required of the souls you have scandalized! ... Miserable creature, to save souls I went down from Heaven to earth and died on the Cross!: .. To save one, if necessary, I would do the same! ... And you, on the other hand, have kidnapped my souls with your scandals! ... Do you remember those scandalous speeches ... those gestures ... those provocations to evil? ... In this way you pushed innocent souls to sin! ... They also taught others evil, helping the work of Satan! ... Give me an account of each soul! ... You tremble! ... You had to tremble first, thinking of those terrible words of mine: Woe to those who give scandal! It would be better if a millstone were tied around the neck of the scandalous man and fell into the depths of the sea! Lord, says the soul, I have sinned, it is true! But it wasn't just me! ... Others also operated like me! The rest of them will have their own judgment! ... Lost soul, why don't you leave those bad friendships at the time? ... Human respect, or fear of criticism, has kept you in the wrong and instead of being ashamed of giving scandal ... you were laughing silly! ... But go your soul to eternal perdition for the souls you have ruined! You suffer so many hells, how many are those you have scandalized!

God of tremendous justice, I recognize I have missed! ... But keep in mind the passions that have raped me! ... And why didn't you take the chances away? You instead put the wood on the fire! ... All fun, lawful or not, you made it yours! ...

In your infinite justice, remember, O Lord, the good works I have done! ... Yes, you have done good works ... but you have not done them for my sake! You worked to make yourself seen ... to earn the esteem or praise of others! ... You received your reward in life! ... You did other good works but you were in a state of sinful sin and what you did was not meritorious! ... The last serious sin committed ... what you foolishly hoped to confess before you die ... that last sin has stripped you of all merit! ...

How many times, O merciful God; in life you have forgiven me! ... Forgive me even now! The time of mercy is over! ... You have already abused my goodness too much ... and for this you are lost! ... You sinned and you fished ... thinking: God is good and forgives me! ... Unfortunate soul, with the hope of forgiveness you returned to pierce me ! ... And you ran to my Minister for absolution! ... Those confessions of yours were not acceptable to me! ... Do you remember how many times you hid some sin in shame? ... When you confessed it, you were not entirely repentant and immediately fell back! ... How many poorly made Confessions! ... How many sacrilegious Communions! ... You, O soul, were esteemed as good and pious by others but I who know the heart of the heart, judge you as perverse! ...

THE SENTENCE
Righteous you are, O Lord, exclaims the soul, and righteous is your judgment! ... I deserve your anger! ... But aren't you the God all love? ... Would you not pour out your Blood on the Cross for me? ... This propitiatory Blood I invoke on me! ... Yes, let him punish you from my wounds! ... And go, cursed, away from me, in the eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his followers!

This sentence of eternal curse is the greatest pain for the miserable soul! Divine, immutable, eternal sentence!

Unless you say, given the sentence, here is the soul grasped by demons and dragged with mockery into eternal torture, among the flames, which burn and do not consume. Where the soul falls, it remains there! Every torment falls upon it; the greatest however is remorse, the rodent worm of which the Gospel speaks to us.

THERE IS NO EXAGERATION
In this judgment I expressed myself humanly; however, reality is far superior to any human word. God's conduct in judging the sinful soul may seem exaggerated; however one must persuade oneself that Divine Justice is a severe punisher of evil. It is enough to observe the punishments that God sends to humanity because of sins, and not only for the serious, even for the light. Thus we read in Sacred Scripture that King David was punished for a feeling of vanity with three days of plague in his kingdom; the Prophet Semefa was torn to pieces by a lion for disobedience to orders received from God; Moses' sister was struck by leprosy because of a murmur made against her brother; Ananias and Sapphira, husband and wife, were punished with sudden death for a simple lie told to St. Peter. Now, if God judges those who commit a pious lack of will worthy of so much punishment, what will he do with those who commit serious sins?

And if in earthly life, which is usually a time of mercy, the Lord is so demanding, what will it be after death when there is no more mercy?

Besides, it is enough to recall a few parables that Jesus Christ tells about it, to convince us of the seriousness, of his judgment.

THE PARABLE OF THE TALENTS
A gentleman, says Jesus in the Gospel, before leaving his city, called the servants and gave them talents: to whom five, to whom two and to whom one, to each according to his own ability. After some time he returned and wanted to deal with the servants. Those who had received five talents came to him and said to him: Behold, sir, I have gained five more talents! Bravo, good and faithful servant! Since you have been faithful in the little, I make you master over the much! Enter the joy of your lord!

He likewise said to the one who had received two talents and gained two more.

Whoever had received only one presented himself and said to him: Lord, I know that you are a severe man, because you demand what you have not given and reap what you have not sown. Being afraid of losing your talent, I went to bury him. Here I will return it as it is! Unjust servant, said the lord, I condemn you with your own words! You knew that I am a severe man! ... Why then did you not give the talent to the banks and so on my return you would have received the interests? ... and he gave orders that the poor servant should be tied hands and feet and be thrown into the outer darkness, between tears and the grinding of the teeth.

We are these servants. We have received the gifts from God with variety: life, intelligence, body, wealth, etc.

At the end of the mortal career if our High Donor sees that we have done good, he judges us kindly and rewards us. If, on the other hand, he sees that we have not done well, indeed we have transgressed his orders and have offended him, then his judgment will be terrible: the eternal prison!

AN EXAMPLE
And here it is to be noted that God is most just and in judging he does not look in the face of anyone; it gives everyone what is due, regardless of human dignity.

The Pope is the representative of Jesus Christ on earth; sublime dignity. Well, he too is judged by God like other men, indeed with more rigor, since the more you have been given, the more you will be required.

The Supreme Pontiff Innocent III was one of the greatest popes. He was most zealous of the glory of God and performed marvelous works for the good of souls. But he committed slight faults, which, as Pope, he should have avoided. As soon as he died, he was severely judged by God. He then appeared in Saint Lutgarda, all surrounded by flames and said to her: I was found guilty of some things and I was sentenced to Purgatory until the day of the Last Judgment!

Cardinal Bellarmino, who later became a saint, shivered thinking about this fact!

PRACTICAL FRUIT
How much care is not taken in temporal affairs! The merchants and those who run some business, put a lot of concern to earn; not happy with this, in the evening they usually take a look at the account book and from time to time they make the most accurate calculations and, if necessary, take measures. Why don't you, o Christian soul, do the same for spiritual affairs, for the accounts of your conscience? ... If you don't, it is because you have little care for your eternal salvation! ... Rightly Jesus Christ says: The children of this century are, in the their kind, more wise than the children of light!

But if for the past, o soul, you have been neglected, do not be neglected for the future! Make a magazine of your conscience; however, choose the most peaceful time to do this. If you recognize that you have a good standing with God, stay calm and follow the good path you are on. If, on the contrary, you see that there is something to be fixed, open your soul to some zealous Priest to have absolution and receive an exact address of the moral life. Take firm resolutions of a better life and never step back! ... You know how easy it is to die! ... At any moment you protest to find yourself in the divine court!

MAKE YOUR FRIEND JESUS
Jesus loved Jerusalem, the holy city. How many miracles he did not work! It should have corresponded to such great benefits, but it did not. Jesus was very saddened by it and one day wept over his fate.

Jerusalem, he said, Jerusalem, how many times did I want to gather your children as the hen gathers her chicks under the wings and you did not want! ... Oh! if you knew exactly on this day what is beneficial to your peace! Instead they are now hidden from your eyes. But there will be punishment for you, as days will come, in which your enemies will surround you with trenches, will surround you and hold you and your children who are in you and will not leave stone by stone!

Jerusalem, O soul, is your image. Jesus covered you with spiritual and temporal benefits; however, you have corresponded with ingratitude, offending him. Jesus perhaps weeps over your fate, saying: Poor soul, I loved you, but one day, when I have to judge you, I will have to curse you and condemn you to hell!

Convert, therefore, a good time! All Jesus forgives you, even if you have forgotten all the sins of the world, provided that you repent! All Jesus forgives those who really want to love him, as he generously forgave Madeleine, a scandalous woman, saying of her: Much has been forgiven her, because she loved much.

We must love Jesus not with words, but with deeds, observing his divine law. This is the means to make him friends for the day of Judgment.

MY NEED
I have spoken to you, O reader; at the same time I intended to turn it to myself, because I too have a soul to save and I will have to appear before God. Convinced of what I say to others, I feel the need to raise a warm prayer to Christ the Judge, so that be propitious to me on the day of my report.

INVOCATION
O Jesus, my Redeemer and my God, listen to the humble prayer that comes from the bottom of my heart! ... Do not enter into judgment with your servant, because no one can justify himself before you! Thinking about the judgment that awaits me, I tremble ... and rightly so! You have segregated me from the world and you make me live in a convent; however this is not enough to take away the fear of your judgment!

The day will come when I will leave this world and I will introduce myself to you. When you open the book of my life, have mercy on me! ... I who am so miserable, what can I tell you at that moment? ... You alone can save me, O King of tremendous majesty ... Remember, O merciful Jesus, who for me you are dead on the cross! So don't send me among the damned! I deserve an inexorable judgment! But you, Judge of just revenge, give me forgiveness of sins, even before the day of my statement! ... Thinking about my spiritual miseries, I should cry and I feel that my face is filled with shame. Forgive, O Lord, to those who humbly beg You! I know that my prayer is not worthy; But you hear it! I beg you with a humiliated heart! Give me what I ardently ask you: do not allow me to commit a single mortal sin! ... If you foresee this, send me any kind of death first! ... Give me room for penance and let it purify the soul with love and suffering mine before I introduce myself to you!

O Lord, you are called Jesus, which means Savior! Therefore save this soul of mine! O Most Holy Mary, I entrust myself to you because you are the refuge of sinners!

THE UNIVERSAL JUDGMENT
Someone died. The body has been buried; the soul was judged by God and went to the eternal abode, or Heaven or hell.

Is it all over for the body? No! After centuries have passed ... at the end of the world he will have to recompose himself and rise again. And will fate change for the soul?

No! The reward or punishment is eternal. But at the end of the world the soul will momentarily leave Heaven or hell, reunite with the body and go to attend the Last Judgment.

WHY A SECOND JUDGMENT?
A second judgment would seem superfluous, given that the sentence that God gives to the soul after death is inexorably immutable. Yet it is convenient that there is this other Judgment, called Universal, because it is done to all men gathered together. The sentence, which the Eternal Judge will then pronounce, will be the solemn confirmation of the first, received in the Special Judgment.

Our reason itself finds reasons why there is this second judgment.

THE GLORY OF GOD
Today the Lord is cursed. No person is as insulted as Divinity. His Providence, which works continuously, even in the smallest details, for the good of creatures, his Providence, which, however mysterious it is always adorable, is shamefully outraged by the vile man, as if God could not rule the world, or had abandoned it to himself. God has forgotten us! is exclaimed by many in pain. He no longer hears and sees nothing of what is happening in the world! Why doesn't it show its power in certain serious social situations of revolutions or wars?

It is right that the Creator, in the presence of all peoples, make known the reason for his conduct. From this he will gain the glory of God, since on the day of Judgment all the good will acclaim with a voice: Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord, the God of armies! Glory be to him! Blessed be his providence!

THE HONOR OF JESUS ​​CHRIST
The Eternal Son of God, Jesus, made man while remaining true God, suffered the greatest humiliation by coming to this world. For the sake of men he subjected himself to all human miseries, except that of sin; he lived in a shop as a humble carpenter. Having proved his divinity to the world by means of an overwhelming number of miracles, however, out of jealousy he was led before the courts and accused of having made himself the Son of God. On that occasion he was spat, slapped, called a blasphemer and possessed, beaten to blood on the bare shoulders, crowned with thorns, compared to the assassin Barabbas and postponed to him; unjustly condemned by the Sanhedrin and the Praetorium to the death of the cross, the most humiliating and painful, and left to die naked among the spasms and insults of the executioners.

It is only right that the honor of Jesus Christ be publicly repaired, as he was publicly humiliated.

The Divine Redeemer thought of this great reparation when he was before the courts; in fact, speaking to his judges, he said: You will see the Son of man sitting at the right hand of the power of God and coming on the clouds of heaven! This coming on the clouds of heaven is the return of Jesus Christ to earth at the end of the world to judge everyone.

Furthermore, Jesus Christ was and always will be the target of the bad guys, who by diabolical instigation fight him with the press and with the word in his Church, which is his Mystical Body. It is true that the Catholic Church is always victorious, although always fought; but it is fitting that the Redeemer solemnly show himself to all his assembled opponents and humble them before the whole world, publicly condemning them.

SATISFACTION OF THE VOUCHERS
The troubled good and the triumphant bad are often seen.

Human courts, while saying that they respect justice, do not rarely trample on it. In fact, the rich, guilty and overbearing, manages to bribe the magistrates with money and after the crime continues to live in freedom; the poor, because deprived of means, cannot make his innocence shine and therefore he spends his life in the dark prison. On the day of the Last Judgment it is good that the advocates of evil are exposed and that the innocence of the slandered good shines.

Millions and millions of men, women and children over the centuries have suffered bloody persecution for the cause of Jesus Christ. Just remember the first three centuries of Christianity. A large amphitheater; thousands of bloodthirsty spectators; lions and panthers in great restlessness with hunger and await prey ... human flesh. The iron door opens wide and the ferocious beasts come out, rush against a group of Christians who, kneeling in the center of the amphitheater, die for the Holy Religion. These are the Martyrs, who have been stripped of their possessions and tempted into several wives to make them deny Jesus Christ. However, they preferred to lose everything and be torn to pieces by the lions, rather than denying the Redeemer. And isn't it right that Christ gives these Heroes the deserved satisfaction? ... yes! ... He will give it on that supreme day, before all men and all the Angels of Heaven!

How many spend their lives in hardship, enduring everything with resignation to the will of God! How many live in darkness exercising Christian virtues! How many virgin souls, renouncing the passing pleasures of the world, sustain for years and years the hard struggle of the senses, a struggle known only by God! The strength and intimate joy of them is the Holy Host, the Immaculate Flesh of Jesus, which they frequently feed on in Eucharistic Communion. For these souls there must be condemnation of honor! May the good done in secret shine before the world! There is nothing hidden, says Jesus, that is not manifested.

THE CONFUSION OF THE BAD
Your tears, the Lord says to good people, will be converted into joy! On the contrary, the joy of the bad guys will have to change in tears. And it is fitting that the wealthy see those poor, who have denied the stock of bread, shine in the glory of God, as the epulon saw Lazarus in Abraham's womb; that the persecutors contemplate their victims in the throne of God; may all the despicators of the Holy Religion aim for the eternal splendor of those who derided in life, calling them bigots and foolish people who did not know how to enjoy life!

The Last Judgment brings with it the resurrection of the bodies, that is, the reunion of the soul with the companion of mortal life. The body is the instrument of the soul, an instrument of good or evil.

It is right that the body, which has cooperated in the good done by the soul, be glorified while what has served to do evil is humiliated and punished.

And it is precisely on the last day that God has reserved for this purpose.

TRUTH OF FAITH
Since the Last Judgment is a great truth that we must believe, the only reason is not enough to be convinced of it, but the light of faith is necessary. By means of this supernatural light we believe in a sublime truth, not by the evidence of it, but by the authority of the One who reveals it, who is God, who cannot deceive himself and does not want to deceive.

Since the Last Judgment is a truth revealed by God, the Holy Church has inserted it in the Creed, or Apostolic Symbol, which is the compendium of what we must believe. Here are the words: I believe ... that Jesus Christ, dead and risen, went up to Heaven ... From there he has to come (at the end of the world) to judge the living and the dead, that is, the good ones who are considered alive, and the bad ones who are dead at the grace of God. I also believe the resurrection of the flesh, that is, I believe that on the day of the Last Judgment the dead will come out of the sepulcher, reassembling itself by divine virtue and reuniting with the soul.

Those who deny or question this truth of faith sin.

TEACHING OF JESUS ​​CHRIST
Let's take a look at the Gospel to see what the Divine Redeemer teaches about the Last Judgment, which is called by the Holy Church "day of anger, misfortune and misery; big and very bitter day ».

In order for what he teaches to remain more impressed, Jesus used parables or comparisons; thus even the least intellectuals could understand the finest truths. He made several comparisons regarding the Great Judgment, according to the circumstances under which He spoke.

PARABLES
Passing Jesus Christ along the sea of ​​Tiberias, while the crowd followed him to listen to the divine word, he will have seen some fishermen intent on withdrawing the fish from the nets. He turned the listeners' attention to that scene.

Behold, He said, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that throws itself into the sea and collects all kinds of fish. The fishermen then sit by the shore and make their choice. The good fish are put into the containers, while the bad ones are thrown away. So it will be at the end of the world.

Another time, crossing the countryside, to see the farmers applied to the threshing of the wheat, he took the opportunity to remember the Last Judgment.

The kingdom of heaven, he said, is similar to harvesting wheat. The peasants separate the wheat from the straw; the former is kept in the barns and instead the straw is put aside to be burned. The Angels will separate the good from the wicked and they will go to the eternal fire, where they will weep and grate their teeth, while the elect will go to eternal life.

To see some shepherds near the herd, Jesus found another parable for the end of the world.

The shepherd, He said, separates the lambs from the kids. So it will be on the last day. I will send my Lambs, who will separate the good from the bad!

OTHER TESTS
And not only in the parables did he remember Jesus the Last Judgment, also calling him "the last day", but in his speeches he often mentioned it. So to see the ingratitude of some cities he benefited from, he exclaimed: Woe to you, Coròzain, Woe to you Bethsaida! If the miracles performed in you had worked in Tire and Sidon, they would have done penance! So I tell you that the cities of Tire and Sidon on the day of Judgment will be treated with less rigor!

So also, seeing Jesus the malice of men in operating, he said to his disciples: When the Son of man comes in the glory of his Angels, then he will give each one according to his own works!

Together with the Judgment, Jesus also remembered the resurrection of the bodies. So in the synagogue of Capernaum to make known the mission entrusted to him by the Eternal Father, he said: This is the will of the One who sent me into the world, the Father, that all that He has given me does not have me to lose it, but instead you will raise him up on the last day! ... Anyone who believes in me and observes my law, will have eternal life and I will raise him up on the last day! ... And whoever eats my Flesh (in Holy Communion) and drinks my Blood, has eternal life; and I will raise him up on the last day!

THE RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD
I have already mentioned the resurrection of the dead; but it is good to treat the topic widely.

St. Paul, the first persecutor of the Christians and later to become a great Apostle, preached wherever he was on the resurrection of the dead. However, he was not always willingly listened to on this topic: in fact in Athens Areopagus, when he began to deal with the resurrection, some laughed at it; others said to him: We will listen to you again on this doctrine.

I don't think the reader wants to do the same, that is to estimate the topic of the resurrection of the dead worthy of being laughed at, or to listen to it unwillingly. The main purpose of this paper is the dogmatic demonstration of this article of faith: The dead will all have to rise again at the end of the world.

A PROPHETIC VISION
We read in Sacred Scripture the following vision that the Prophet Ezekiel had, several centuries before the coming of Jesus Christ into the world. Here is the narration:

The hand of the Lord came over me and led me into inspiration in the middle of a field full of bones. He made me walk between the bones, which were superabundant and very dry. The Lord said to me, O man, do you believe that these things will become alive? You know it, O Lord God! so I replied. And he said to me: You will prophesy around these bones and say: Dry bones, listen to the word of the Lord! I will send the spirit to you and you will live! I will nerve you, I will make your flesh grow, I will spread your skin on you, I will give you the soul and you will come back to life. So you will know that I am the Lord.

I spoke in the name of God as I had been commanded; the bones approached the bones and each went to his own joint. And I realized that the nerves, the flesh and the skin had gone over the bones; however there was no soul.

The Lord, Ezekiel continues, said to me. You will speak in my name to the spirit and say: The Lord God says this: Come, O spirit, from the four winds and go over these dead so that they rise again!

I did as I was ordered; the soul entered those bodies and they had life; in fact they rose to their feet and a very large multitude formed.

This vision of the Prophet gives us an idea of ​​what will happen at the end of the world.

THE ANSWER TO SADDUCEI

The Jews were aware of the resurrection of the dead. But not everyone admitted it; in fact, two currents or parties formed between the learned: Pharisees and Sadducees. The former admitted the resurrection, the latter denied it.

Jesus Christ came into the world, he began public life with preaching and among many truths he taught to be certain that the dead will have to rise again.

Then the question was more alive than ever, between the Pharisees and Sadducees. The latter however did not want to give in and sought arguments to contrast with what Jesus Christ taught in this regard. One day they believed they had found a very strong topic and publicly proposed it to the Divine Redeemer.

Jesus was among his disciples and among the multitude that crowded him. Some of the Sadducees came forward and asked him: Master, Moses left us written: If someone's brother will die being married and have no children, the brother will marry his wife and raise his brother's seed. So there were seven brothers; the first married and died childless. The second married the woman and he too died childless. Then the third married her and similarly later all seven brothers married her, who died without leaving children. Finally, delay the damage. In the resurrection of the dead, whose woman must she be having, having had all seven of her?

The Sadducees thought of closing the mouth to Jesus Christ, the highest wisdom, and of debunking him before the people. But they were wrong!

Jesus calmly replied: You are deceived, because you do not know the Holy Scriptures and not even the power of God! The children of this century marry and marry; in the resurrection of the dead there will be no husbands or wives; nor can they die any longer, in fact they will be like the Angels and they will be children of God, being children of the resurrection. That the dead will rise again, Moses declares as he finds himself at the burning bush, when he says: The Lord is the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. He is therefore not the God of the dead, but of the living, since everyone lives for him.

Hearing this answer, some of the Scribes said: Master, you have chosen well! The people meanwhile remained ecstatic before the sublime doctrine of the Messiah.

JESUS ​​RAISED THE DEAD
Jesus Christ proved his doctrine with miracles. Being God, he could command the sea and the wind and be obeyed; in his hands the loaves and fishes multiplied; at his nod the water became wine, the lepers healed, the blind regained their sight, the deaf hearing, the dumb the talkative, the lame straightened and the demons came out of the obsessed.

In front of these prodigies, operated continuously, the people remained drawn to Jesus and everywhere for Palestine they exclaimed: Never have such things been seen!

With each new miracle, a new wonder of the crowd. But when Jesus raised some dead, the amazement of those present reached the height.

Raising a dead ... seeing a corpse, cold, rotting, inside the coffin or lying on the bed ... and immediately afterwards, with a nod of Christ. to see him move, get up, walk ... how much amazement he shouldn't have aroused!

Jesus raised the dead to show that he was God, master of life and death; but he also wanted to prove that way. resurrection of bodies at the end of the world possible. This was the best answer to the difficulties facing the Sadducees.

The dead from Jesus Christ called to life were many; however, the Evangelists only handed down the circumstances of three resurrected deceased. It is not superfluous to report the narrative here.

THE DAUGHTER OF GIAIRO
The Redeemer Jesus had come down from the boat; people, as soon as he saw him, ran to him. While still near the sea, a man named Jairus, Archisynagogue, came forward. He was a father of the family, very sad because the twelve-year-old daughter was about to die. What would he not have done to save her!? ... Having seen human means useless, he thought of turning to Jesus, the miracle worker. So the Archisynagogue, without human respect, threw himself at Jesus' feet with tears in his eyes and said: O Jesus of Nazareth, my daughter is in agony! Come home immediately, lay your hand on it so that it is safe and alive!

The Messiah answered his father's prayer and went to his house. The multitude, which was large, followed him. Along the way, Jesus' garment was touched with faith by a woman who had suffered blood loss for twelve years. Instantly it was restored. Jesus later said to her: O daughter, your faith has saved you; go in peace!

While saying this, some come from the house of the Archisinagogue announcing the death of the girl. It is useless for you, O Jairus, to disturb the Divine Master! Your daughter is dead!

The poor father was in pain; but Jesus comforted him by saying: Do not be afraid; just have faith! meaning: For me it is the same thing to heal from a disease or to bring a dead man back to life!

The Lord broke away from the crowd and the disciples and wanted only the three Apostles Peter, James and John to follow him.

When they arrived at Jairus' house, Jesus saw many people crying. Why are you crying? he told them. The girl is not dead, but sleeps!

ī relatives and friends, who had already contemplated the corpse, to hear these parales, took him for mad. Jesus gave orders for all to remain outside and wanted his father, mother and three Apostles with him in the room of the deceased.

The girl was really dead. It was as easy for the Lord to call back to life as it was for us to wake someone up asleep. In fact, Jesus approached the corpse, took his hand and said: Talitha cum !! I mean, girl, I'll tell you, get up! At these divine words the soul returned to the corpse and the. girl could get up and walk around the room.

Those present were taken aback, and at first they didn't even want to believe their eyes; but Jesus reassured them and to make them better convinced, he ordered that the girl be fed.

That body, a few moments before the cold corpse, had become vegeto and could perform its ordinary functions.

THE SON OF THE WIDOW
He went to bury a young man; he was the only son of a widowed mother. The funeral procession had reached the gate of the city of Naim. The crying of the mother touched everyone's heart. Poor woman! He had lost all good with the death of his only son; she was left alone in the world!

At that moment the good Jesus entered Naim, followed by a large crowd as usual. The Divine Heart did not remain insensitive to the mother's cries: Approaching: Donna, he said, do not cry!

Jesus ordered the coffin bearers to stop. All eyes fixed on the Nazarenes and on the coffin, anxious to see some prodigy. The author of life and death is close. It is enough that the Redeemer wants it and death will immediately give up its prey. That almighty hand touched the coffin and here is the miracle.

Young man, said Jesus, I command you, get up!

The dry limbs shake, the eyes open and the resurrected one gets up, sitting down on the coffin.

O woman, Christ will have added, I told you not to cry! Here is your son!

It is more to imagine than to describe what the mother did to see the son in her arms! The Evangelist says: To see this everyone was full of fear and glorified God.

LAZARUS OF BETHANY
The third and final resurrection that the Gospel narrates in the smallest details is that of Lazarus; the narrative is typical and deserves to be reported in full.

In Bethany, a village not far from Jerusalem, lived Lazarus with his two sisters, Mary and Martha. Mary had been a public sinner; but having repented of the evil done, she had given herself completely to following Jesus; and also wanted to offer him his home to host him. The Divine Master willingly stayed in that house, where he found three righteous hearts and docile to his teachings: Lazarus had become seriously ill. The two sisters, knowing that Jesus was not in Judea; some sent to warn him.

Master, they said to him, he whom you love, Lazarus, is gravely infirm!

Hearing this, Jesus replied: This infirmity is not for death, but for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified for it. However, he did not go immediately to Bethany and stayed two more days in the Jordan region.

After this, he said to his disciples: Let's go to Judea again ... Ours

friend Lazarus is already sleeping; but I'm going to. wake him. The disciples observed him: Lord, if he sleeps, he will certainly be in. saved! However, Jesus did not intend to speak of natural sleep, but of the death of his friend; therefore he clearly said: Lazarus is already dead and I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. So let's go to him!

When Jesus arrived, the dead man had been buried for four days.

Since the family of Lazarus was known and taken into consideration, the news of the death spread, many Jews had gone to visit the sisters Martha and Mary to console them.

Meanwhile, Jesus had come to the village, but had not entered it. The news of his coming immediately reached Marta's ear, who left everyone without saying the reason and ran to meet the Redeemer. Maria, unaware of the fact, stayed at home with her friends who came to comfort her.

Martha, seeing Jesus, exclaimed with tears in her eyes: O Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died!

Jesus replied: Your brother will rise again in the resurrection at the end of the world! The Lord added: the resurrection and the life are; whoever believes in me even dead will live! And whoever lives and believes in me, will not die forever. Do you believe this?

Yes, O Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the living Son of God, who came into this world!

Jesus told her to go and call her sister Mary. Martha returned home and said to her sister in a low voice: The Divine Master has come and wishes to speak to you; it is still at the entrance to the village.

Hearing this, Mary immediately got up and went to Jesus. The Jews who were to visit her, to see Mary suddenly get up and hurry out of the house, I said: Certainly she goes to her brother's sepulcher to cry. Let's go with it too!

When Mary came to Jesus, to see him, she threw herself at his feet, saying: If you, Lord, had been here, my brother would not have died!

Jesus, like God, could not be moved, because nothing was able to disturb him; but as a man, that is, having a body and a soul as we have it, he was susceptible to emotion. And in fact, to see Mary who wept and the Jews who came with her, weeping also, he shuddered in his spirit and was disturbed. Then he said: Where did you bury the dead? Lord, they answered, come and you will see!

Jesus was deeply moved and began to cry. Those present at this scene marveled and said: You can see that he loved Lazarus very much! Some added: But if he did so many miracles, could he not prevent his friend from dying?

We reached the sepulcher, which consisted of a cave with a stone at the entrance.

The emotion of Jesus increased; He . then he said: Remove the stone from the entrance of the sepulcher! Sir, exclaimed Martha, the corpse is rotting and stinks! He has been buried for four days! But did I not tell you, replied Jesus, that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?

The stone was removed; and here appears Lazarus, lying on a rise, wrapped in a sheet, hands and feet tied stench of the corpse was an evident sign that death had begun his destructive work.

Jesus, looking up, said: O Eternal Father, I thank you for hearing me! I knew that you always listen to me; but I said this for the people around me, so that I believe you sent me into the world!

Having said this, in a loud voice Jesus shouted: Lazarus, come out / On the instant the rotting body came to life. The Lord later said: Now untie him and let him come out of the tomb!

Seeing Lazarus alive was an immense wonder for everyone! What a consolation for the two sisters to return home with their brother! How much gratitude to the Redeemer, Author of life!

Lazarus lived many more years. After the Ascension of Jesus Christ, he came to Europe and was bishop of Marseille.

THE GREATEST TRIAL
In addition to resurrecting others, Jesus also wanted to resurrect himself and did this to prove his Divinity very clearly and to give humanity an idea of ​​the resurrected body.

Let us contemplate the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ in his details. The endless number of miracles performed by the Redeemer should have convinced everyone of his Divinity. But some did not want to believe and voluntarily closed their eyes to the light; among them were the proud Pharisees, who were envious of the glory of Christ.

One day they came to Jesus and said to him: But give us a sign that you come from Heaven! He replied that he had given many signs and that nevertheless he would have given a special one: As the Prophet Jonah stayed three days and three nights in the belly of the fish, so The Son of man will stay three days and three nights in the bowels of the earth and then he will rise! ... Destroy this temple, he spoke of his body, and after three days I will rebuild it!

The news had already spread that He would die and then rise again. His enemies laughed at him. Jesus arranged things so that his death was public and ascertained and that his glorious resurrection was proved by the enemies themselves.

THE DEATH OF JESUS
Who could have made Jesus Christ die as a man if He hadn't wanted to? He said it in public: Nobody can take my life if I don't want to; and I have the power to give my life and take it back. However, he wanted to die to make what the Prophets foretold of Him come true. And when St. Peter wanted to defend the Master with the sword in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus said: Put the sword in the sheath! Do you believe that I cannot have more than twelve armies of Angels at my disposal? This he said to mean that he spontaneously went to die.

The death of Jesus Christ was most atrocious. His body was bled to death due to the sweat of blood in the garden, the scourging, the crowning of thorns and the crucifixion with nails. While in agony, his enemies did not cease to insult him and among other things they said to him: You saved others; now save yourself! ... You said that you can destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days! ... Come down from the cross, if you are the Son of God!

Christ could have come down from the cross, but He had decided to die to rise again gloriously. But even standing on the cross, Jesus showed his Divinity with the heroic fortress with which everything suffered, with the forgiveness that he invoked, from the Eternal Father to his crucifixors, by making all the earth move by means of an earthquake in the act in which he took his last breath. At the same time the large veil of the temple in Jerusalem was torn in two parts and many bodies of holy people came out of the tombs and rose to the surface.

Seeing what was happening, those who guarded Jesus began to tremble and said; Truly this was the Son of God!

Jesus was dead. However, they wanted to ascertain better before letting his body be deposed from the cross: To this end one of the soldiers with the spear opened his side, piercing his heart and a little blood and water came out of the wound.

JESUS ​​RISES
The death of Jesus Christ admits no doubt. But is it really true that He rose from the dead? That it was not a trick of his disciples to put out this rumor?

The enemies of the Divine Nazarene, when they saw the victim die on the cross, calmed down. They remembered the words that Jesus had said in public, mentioning his own resurrection; but they believed it impossible that he himself could revive himself. However, fearing some trap by his disciples, they presented themselves to the Roman Procurator, Pontius Pilate, and obtained soldiers to be placed in custody of the tomb of the Nazarene.

The body of Jesus laid down by the cross was embalmed, according to the Jewish custom, and wrapped in a white sheet; he was well buried in a new sepulcher, dug in the living stone, not far from the place of the crucifixion.

For three days the soldiers had been looking at the sepulcher, which had been sealed and was not left unattended for even a moment.

When the moment flown by God has come, at the dawn of the third day, here is the predicted resurrection! A strong earthquake causes the earth to jump, the large sealed stone in front of the tomb falls, a very bright light appears ... and the Christ, Triumpher of death, makes its first appearance, while beams of light are released from those divine limbs!

The soldiers are stunned with fright and then, resumed their strength, they run away to tell everything.

THE APPARITIONS
Mary Magdalene, the sister of the risen Lazarus, who had followed Jesus Christ to Mount Calvary and had seen him die, found no comfort being far from the Divine Master. Not being able to have him alive, he contented himself with being, crying, near the sepulcher.

Unaware of the resurrection that had taken place, that same morning with some women she had gone early to the sepulcher; he found the entrance stone removed and did not see inside the body of Jesus. The pious women had remained there to watch in great dismay, when two Angels appeared in human form in a white robe and shining with light. Frightened, they lowered their eyes not bearing that splendor. But the Angels reassured them: Do not fear! ... But why do you come to look for the dead who is alive? He is no longer here; is risen!

After this, Mary Magdalene and the others went to warn the Apostles and the other disciples of everything; but they were not believed. The Apostle Peter wanted to go personally to the sepulcher and found according to what the women had told him.

Meanwhile, Jesus appeared to this and that person under different guises. He appeared to Mary Magdalene in the form of a gardener and called her by name, he made himself known. He appeared in the guise of a pilgrim to two disciples who went to the Castle of Emmaus; while they were at the table, he manifested himself and disappeared.

The Apostles were gathered in a room. Jesus, entered behind closed doors, showed himself saying: Peace be with you! Do not be afraid; it's me! Terrified of this, they believed they saw a ghost; but Jesus reassured them: Why are you troubled? What do you ever think? ... I am your Master! Look at my hands and my feet! Toccatemeli! The ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have! And since they were hesitant and full of orgasm for joy, Jesus continued: Do you have anything to eat here? They presented him with fish and a honeycomb. The Divine Redeemer, with infinite goodness, took of that food and ate it; with his own hands he also gave it to the Apostles. Then he said to them: What you now see, I have already told you about it. It was necessary that the Son of man suffered and that on the third day he rose from the dead.

In this apparition the Apostle Thomas was not found; when all was told, he refused to believe. But Jesus appeared again, Thomas present; and reproached him for his unbelief, saying: You believed because you saw! But blessed are those who without having seen have believed!

These apparitions lasted for forty days. In this period Jesus stood among his Apostles and other disciples as during his earthly life, comforting them, giving instructions, entrusting them with the mission of perpetuating his redemptive work in the world. Finally on Monte Oliveto, while everyone was crowning him, Jesus rose from the ground and blessing disappeared forever, surrounded by a cloud.

We have therefore seen that there will be the Last Judgment and that the dead will rise again.

Let us now try to get an idea of ​​how the end of the world will happen.

THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM
One day towards sunset Jesus came out of the temple in Jerusalem in the company of the disciples.

The magnificent temple had a roof made of gold foil and all covered with very candid marble; at that moment struck by the rays of the dying sun, he presented a picture worthy of admiration. The disciples, who stopped to contemplate, said to the Lord: Look, O Master, what a magnificence of factories! Jesus took a look and then added: Do you see all these things? Truly I say to you that it will not remain stone by stone without it being destroyed!

When they reached the mountain, where they used to retire in the evening, some disciples approached Jesus, who had already sat down, and asked him almost secretly: You told us that the temple will be destroyed. But tell us, when will this happen?

Jesus replied: When you see the abomination of desolation, predicted by the Prophet Daniel, placed in the holy place, then those who are in Judea; flee to the mountains; and whoever is in the attic, do not go down to take something from his house and hey he is in the field, do not return to take his garment. But woe to women who will have babies in their chests in those days! Pray that you do not have to flee in winter or on Saturday, for then the tribulation will be great!

The prediction of Jesus Christ came true sixty-eight years later. The Romans then came by order of Titus and besieged Jerusalem. The aqueducts were broken; food could not enter the city. There was despair! The historian Giuseppe Flavio tells that some mothers came to eat their children because of hunger. Before long, the Romans were able to enter the city and made a horrible massacre. Jerusalem was then regurgitating with the people, as an overwhelming number of pilgrims had arrived there on the occasion of Easter.

History says that during the siege, about one million and one hundred thousand Jews were killed: who was put on the cross, who was passed by the sword and who was torn to pieces; ninety-seven thousand were also brought to Rome, slaves.

The grandiose temple in flames was completely destroyed.

The words of Jesus Christ came true. And here a note is not out of place. Emperor Julian, who denied the Christian religion and was called the Apostate, wanting to deny the words of the Divine Nazarene about the temple, ordered his soldiers to rebuild the temple of Jerusalem on the place where it stood and possibly with primitive material . As the foundations were excavated, heaps of fire came out of the bosom of the earth and many lost their lives. The unhappy emperor had to desist from his wicked idea.

THE END OF THE WORLD
We return to Jesus who spoke to the disciples on the mountain. He used the prediction of the destruction of Jerusalem to give an idea of ​​the destruction of the whole world on the occasion of the Universal Judge. Let us now listen with supreme reverence to what Jesus foretold for the end of the world. It is God who speaks!

THE PRINCIPLE OF PAIN
You will hear about wars and rumors of wars. Take care not to be troubled, as it is impossible that these things do not happen; however it is not yet the end. In fact people will rise against people and kingdom against, kingdom and there will be plagues, famines and earthquakes in this and that part. But all these things are the principle of pain.

Wars have never been lacking over time; the one of which Jesus speaks, must be almost universal. War brings disease, caused by fright and rotting corpses. By waiting to arms, the fields are not cultivated and hunger is increased, increased by the difficulty of communication. Jesus speaks of famines and makes it clear that the lack of rain will increase hunger. Earthquakes, which have never been lacking, will then be more frequent and in different places.

This anguished situation will only be the prelude to what is terrible is going to happen in the world.

PERSECUTIONS
Then they will throw you into tribulation and make you die; and you will be hated by all nations because of my name. Many will suffer scandal and will deny faith; one will betray the other and they will hate each other!

THE ANTICHRIST
If anyone then says to you: Here is, or here is the Christ! don't listen. In fact, false Christs and false prophets will arise and will perform great miracles and wonders, to deceive even the elect, if it were possible. Here I have told you.

In addition to the pains already described, other moral miseries will fall upon humanity, which will make the situation increasingly anguished. Satan, who has always hindered the work of good in the world, in that last time will put into effect all his evil arts. He will use wicked men, who will spread false doctrines about Religion and morals, saying that they are sent by God to teach this.

Then the antichrist will rise, who will do everything to show himself as a God. Saint Paul, writing to the Thessalonians, calls him a man of sin and son of perdition. The antichrist will fight everything that concerns the true God and will do everything to enter the temple of the Lord and proclaim himself God. Lucifer will support him so much as to make him perform false miracles. There will be those who allow themselves to be dragged along the path of error.

Elijah will rise up against the antichrist.

ELIA
In this part of the Gospel Jesus does not speak of Elijah; however in other circumstances he speaks clearly: Elijah will come first to tidy up everything.

He was one of the greatest prophets, who lived in the centuries before Jesus Christ. Sacred Scripture says that he was preserved from common death and disappeared from the world in a mysterious way. He was in the company of Elisha near the Jordan when a chariot of fire appeared. In a moment Elijah found himself on the cart and went up to Heaven in the midst of the whirlwind.

So before the end of the world Elijah will come and, having to reorder everything, he will carry out his mission with works and with the word especially against the antichrist. Just as St. John the Baptist prepared the way for the Messiah for his first coming into the world, so Elijah will prepare everything for the second coming of Christ on earth on the occasion of the Last Judgment.

The appearance of Elijah will be a stimulus for the elect to persevere in the good in the midst of trials.

BREAK IT OUT
On earth there will be the consternation of the peoples for the dismay produced by the sea. Men will be consumed by fear and by the expectation of what will happen in the whole universe, since the powers of the sky will be upset: the sun will darken, the moon will no longer give light and the stars will fall from the sky.

The whole universe will be shaken before judgment. The sea is now within the boundaries traced by God; at that time, however, the waves will pour onto the earth. The terror will be great both for the furious roar of the sea and for the floods. Men will flee to take refuge in the mountains. But they, from the present foreshadowing the much more terrible future, will be in great trouble. The tribulation will be great, as it has never been since the beginning of the world. Despair will take possession of men; and if God, by the grace of the elect, did not shorten those days, no one would be saved.

Immediately after that, the sun will lose its energy and darken; consequently also the moon, which sends the reflected light of the sun to the earth, will remain in the dark. The stars of the firmament today follow the law of the Creator and dance in wonderful order through the spaces. Before the Judgment the Lord will take away the law of attraction and

of repulsion, from which they are governed, and will collide with each other producing chaos.

There will also be destroying fire. Indeed, Sacred Scripture says: The fire will go before God ... The earth and the things that are in it will be burned. How much desolation!

A REFLECTION
As a consequence of all this, the earth will be similar to the desert and silent as an endless cemetery.

It is right that the earth, witness of all human iniquities, be purified before the Divine Judge makes his glorious appearance.

And here I make a reflection. Men struggle to gain a handful of ground. They manufacture. palaces, villas are built, monuments are raised. Where will these things go? ... They will serve to fuel the final fire! ... The kings make war and shed blood to enlarge their states. On that day of destruction all borders will disappear.

Oh, if men thought about these things, how badly they could avoid!

We would be less attached to the things of this world, we would act with more justice, we would not shed so much blood!

ANGELICA TRUMPET
The Son of man will send his Angels with a trumpet and very loud voice, who will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.

The Angels, faithful servants of God, will look after a mysterious trumpet and make their voices heard all over the world. This will be the sign of the universal resurrection.

It seems that among these Angels there must also be San Vincenzo Ferreri. He was a Dominican priest who frequently preached about the Last Judgment. His preaching took place, as was customary in his day, also along the squares. It is said in his life that, being he one day preaching outdoors on the Judgment in front of a large multitude, a funeral procession passed. The Saint stopped the bearers of the coffin and said to the deceased: In the name of God, brother, get up and tell this people if it is true what I preached on the Last Judgment! By divine virtue the dead man revived, got up on the coffin and said: What he teaches is true! Indeed Vincenzo Ferreri will be one of those Angels who, at the end of the world, will blow the trumpet to resurrect the dead! Having said that, he composed himself on the coffin. As a consequence of this, S. Vincenzo Ferreri is represented in the paintings with wings behind him and with a trumpet in his hand.

Therefore, as soon as the Angels blow in the four winds, there will be a movement everywhere, since the souls will come out of Heaven, hell and Purgatory, and will go to reunite with their own bodies.

Let's now, o reader, take a look at these souls and a look at the bodies, doing some. pious reflection.

THE BLESSED
Fifty, a hundred, a thousand years will have passed ... since the souls are in Paradise, in that ocean of happiness. A century is less than a minute for them, since time in the other life is not calculated.

God manifests himself to blessed souls, flooding them with perfect joy; and although the souls are all happy, each one however enjoys in relation to the good done in life. They are always satisfied and always greedy for happiness. God is so infinitely great, good and perfect, that souls always find new wonders to contemplate. Intelligence, made for the truth, sinks into God, Truth for essence, and enjoys without measure penetrating the divine perfections. The will, done for the good, is intimately united with God, the supreme good, and loves him without limit; in this love he finds perfect satiety.

In addition, souls enjoy the companionship of the Heavenly Court. They are endless armies of Angels distributed in nine choirs, which shine with arcane light, emanated by God, which make the Paradise echo of ineffable melodies, singing praises to the Creator. Mary Most Holy, the Queen of Paradise, shining in superiority over all the Blessed like the sun on the stars, enchants with her excellent beauty! Jesus, the Immaculate Lamb, the perfect image of the Eternal Father, illuminates Heaven, while the souls who have served him on earth are praising and blessing him!

They are hosts of innumerable virgins who follow the Divine Lamb wherever he goes. And they are martyrs and confessors and penitents, who loved God in life, all of whom unite themselves to praise the Holy Trinity, saying: Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord, God of Armies. Glory be to him for all eternity!

I have given a very pale idea of ​​what the blessed enjoy in Paradise. These are things that cannot be described. St. Paul was admitted to see Paradise, he was alive and questioned to say what he had seen, he replied: Human eye never saw, human ear never heard, human heart cannot understand what God has prepared for those who arm him! In short, all the joys of this world, produced by beauty, love, science and wealth, put together, are very small compared to what a soul in Paradise enjoys every moment! And so it is, because the joys and pleasures of the world are of a natural order, while those of Heaven are of a supernatural order, which requires almost infinite superiority.

So, while the souls in Paradise will be immersed in the most perfect happiness, here is the mysterious sound of the trumpet that will call to Judgment. All souls will then come out joyfully from Paradise and go to inform their own body, which by divine virtue will recompose itself in the blink of an eye. The body will acquire new perfections and will be similar to the resurrected Body of Jesus Christ. How ineffable that meeting will be! Come, the blessed soul will say, come, body, to reunite with me! ... These hands served me to work for the glory of God and for the good of one's neighbor; this language helped me to pray, to give good advice; these limbs were obedient to me in accordance with right reason!… In a little while, after the Judgment, we will go to Heaven together! If you knew how great the reward for that little good done on earth! Thank you, my body!

For its part, the body will say: and I am grateful to you, O soul, because in life you governed me well! ... You kept my senses in check, so that they would not operate badly! You mortified me with penance and so I was able to keep purity! You denied me the illicit pleasures .. and now I see that the enjoyments that are prepared for me are far superior ... and I will have them eternally! .. Or happy penance! Happy hours spent in work, in the exercise of charity and in prayer!

THE SOULS OF THE PURGATORY
In Purgatory, or place of expiation, souls awaiting Paradise will suffer. When the trumpet of judgment is sounded, purgatory will cease forever. Souls will come out jubilant, not only because temporary suffering will end, but much more because Heaven will await them immediately. Completely purified, beautiful in the beauty of God, they too will join the body to witness the Last Judgment.

THE DAMNED
Tens of years and centuries will have passed since souls have plunged into hell. For them, pain and despair are immutable. Fallen into that infernal abyss, the soul is forced to stand in the midst of the unquenchable fire, which burns and does not consume. In addition to the fire, the soul suffers other horrible pains, as hell is called by Jesus Christ: The place of torments. They are the desperate screams of the damned, they are the terrifying scenes, which without any respite or diminution make the soul tormented! More than anything, it is the curse that he hears resounding continuously: Lost soul, you were created to enjoy God and instead you must hate him and suffer eternally! ... How long will this torment last? says the desperate soul. Always! the demons respond. In the grip of agony, the wretched part of herself and feels the remorse of having voluntarily damned herself. I'm here because of me ... for the sins I've done! ... And to say that I could have been happy forever!

While the damned in hell suffer like this, the sound of the angelic trumpets echoes: It's time for the Last Judgment! … Everyone before the Supreme Judge!

Souls will immediately have to come out of hell; but their pains will not stop, indeed the torment will be greater, thinking of what awaits them.

Here is the meeting of the damned soul with the body, which will emerge from the tomb in a horrible form, sending an unheard of stench. Miserable body, the soul will say, putrid flesh, do you still dare to be with me? ... Because of you I damned myself! ... You dragged me into the mud of your vices in life! ... For several centuries, between flames and incessant remorse, those pleasures that you, o rebellious body, asked of me!

And now will I have to reunite with you? ... But, albeit! Thus, o dissolute body, you too will come to wail in the eternal fire! ... Thus will pay the evil done and the impurities committed these two shameless hands, this scandalous tongue and these impure eyes! ... Wretched companion ... a few moments of enjoyment on earth ... a eternity of pain and despair!

The body will feel horror to join the soul, which will be horrible like the devil ... but the force majeure will bring them together.

EXPLANATIONS
It is good to clarify some difficulties regarding the resurrection of the bodies. As mentioned above, it is the truth of faith revealed by God that the dead will rise again. Everything will happen miraculously. Our intelligence wonders: Do we have any examples or comparisons of this renewal of bodies in nature? And yes! But the comparisons fit up to a certain point, especially in the supernatural field. We therefore consider the grain of wheat put underground. It gradually rots, it seems that everything has gone bad ... when one day the sprout breaks the clod of the soil and is full of energy in the sunlight. Consider the chicken egg, which is commonly taken as a symbol of Easter or the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The egg does not have life per se, but has it in germ. One day or another the eggshell breaks and a beautiful chick comes out of it, full of life. So it will be on the day of Judgment. The silent cemeteries; hotel of corpses, at the sound of the angelic trumpet they will populate living beings, since the bodies will recompose themselves and will come out of the sepulcher full of life.

It will be said: Being the human body under the earth tens and tens of years and centuries, it will be reduced to very minute dust and will become confused with the elements of the soil. How will the whole body recompose itself at the end of the world? ... And those human bodies left unburied because at the mercy of the waves of the sea, then fed to the fish, which fish in turn will have been eaten by others ... these human bodies will come back? ... Of course! In nature, scientists say, nothing is destroyed; bodies can only change form ... Therefore the constituent elements of the human body, although subject to many variations, will not lose anything in the universal resurrection. If then there were some deficiencies, the divine omnipotence will compensate by covering every gap.

THE RESURRECTED BODIES
The bodies of the elect will lose the physical defects they had accidentally in earthly life and will be, as theologians say, at a perfect age. Therefore they will not be blind, lame, deaf and dumb, etc ...

Furthermore, glorified bodies, as Saint Paul teaches, will acquire new qualities. They will be impassive, that is, they will no longer be able to suffer and will remain immortal. They will be resplendent, because the light of eternal glory, with which blessed souls will be clothed, will also redound in bodies; this splendor of the various bodies will be greater or lesser in relation to the degree of glory achieved by each soul. The glorified bodies will also be agile, that is, in a moment they can go from one place to another, disappear and reappear. Furthermore, they will be spiritualized, as St. Thomas says, and therefore they will not be subject to the functions proper to the human body. By virtue of this spirituality the glorified bodies will do without nutrition and generation and will be able to pass through any body without any obstacle, as we see, for example, in the "X" rays that pass through the bodies. What the Risen Jesus could enter behind closed doors in the Upper Room, where the fearful Apostles stood.

The bodies of the damned, on the other hand, will not enjoy any of these qualities, indeed they will be deformed in relation to the wickedness of the soul to which they belonged.

THE VALLEY OF JUDGMENT
Where the flesh is, the eagles will gather there. Given the sign of the resurrection, creatures will arise from every corner of the earth, from cemeteries, seas, mountains and plains; all will go to the same place. And where? In the valley of judgment. No creature will lag behind or get lost, as they will all be mysteriously attracted by comparison with the complexion. He says: As robbery birds are attracted by the smell of rotting meat and gather there, so will men do on the day of judgment!

THE TWO TABS
Even before Jesus Christ appears in Heaven, his Angels will come down and separate the good from the bad, making them two great hosts. And here it is good to remember the words of the Redeemer already, quoted: As the shepherds separate the lambs from the kids, the farmers in the farmyard the wheat from the straw, the fishermen the good fish from the bad, so will the Angels of God at the end of the world .

The separation will be clear and inexorable: the elect on the right, the damned on the left. How heartbreaking that separation must be! One friend on the right, the other on the left! Two brothers among the good guys, one among the bad guys! The bride among the Angels, the groom among the demons! The mother in the luminous rank, the son in the dark one of the wicked ... Who can ever say the impression of the good and the bad looking at each other ?!

EVERYTHING WILL BE MANIFESTED
The ranks of the good will be resplendent, for those who make it up will be bright. The sun in the noon is a weak image. Among the good people will be seen men and women of all races, ages and conditions. The sins committed by them in life will not appear because they are already forgiven. The Lord says so: Blessed are those whose sins have been covered!

The host of the damned on the contrary will be horrible to look at! There will be found every category of sinners, without distinction of class or dignity, in the midst of the demons that will torment.

The sins of the reprobate will all appear in their malice. Nothing, says Jesus, is hidden from you that is not manifested!

What humiliation will not cause bad guys to be publicly shamed!

The good ones, focusing their eyes on the damned, will say: Here is that friend! She seemed so good, and devoted, she attended the Church with me ... I believed her to be a holy soul! ... Look instead for what sins she did! ... Who would have said that? ... She deceived the creatures with her hypocrisy, but she could not deceive God!

Here is my mother! ... I regarded her as an exemplary woman ... yet she was far from it! How many miseries! ...

How many acquaintances I see among the damned! ... They were friends in my youth, lost because of sins kept silent in Confession! Workmates, neighbors! They are damned! ... How many, impurities committed! ... Unhappy! ... You did not want to manifest your sins in confession to the Master of God and now you are ashamed to make them known to the whole world ... and moreover you are damned ! ...

Here are my two children ... and the groom! ... Oh! How many times have I begged them to get back on track! ... They didn't want to listen to me and I damned myself!

On the other hand, the wicked, contemplating the lucky ones of the right wing with infernal anger, will exclaim: Oh! foolish that we have been! ...

… We believed that their lives were foolish and their end without honor and here they are now numbered among the children of God!

Look there, a damned man will say, how happy is that poor man whom I denied charity! How resplendent, someone else will say, those acquaintances of mine! .. I mocked them when they went to church ... I mocked them when they didn't take part in scandalous speeches ... I called them fools because they didn't give themselves like me to worldly fun ... and now ... they save ... and I don't ... Ah, if I could be born again! ... But I have now only despair! Here there, exclaims a third, an accomplice of my fouls! ... We sinned together! ... He now in Heaven and I in hell! ... Lucky he who repented and changed his conduct! ... Instead I felt remorse and continued to sin.

... Ah! .. If I had followed the example of the good ... I had listened to the advice of the confessor ... I had left that opportunity! ... By now everything is over for me; I have eternal remorse!

HOT RECOMMENDATION
Moms, who have children astray and still love; fervent young people, whom you venerate your parents, who however do not observe the law of God; o all of you, who love some people deeply, remember to do everything to convert those who are far from the Lord! Otherwise, you will be together with your loved one in this short life and then you will have to eternally separate from each other!

So work zealously around your loved ones, spiritually needy! For their conversion, pray, give alms, have Holy Masses celebrated, embrace penances and do not give peace until you succeed in the intent, at least by bringing them a good death!

DO YOU WANT TO SAVE YOURSELF?
How I would like at this moment to penetrate your heart, or reader, and touch the intimate strings of your soul! ... Remember that those who do not think first, finally sigh!

I who write and you who read, we will have to find each other on that terrible day in those ranks. Will we both be among the blessed? ... Will we be among the demons? ... Will you be among the good and I counted among the wicked?

How troubling this thought is! ... To secure a place among the elect, I have abandoned everything in this world, even the most loved ones and freedom; I voluntarily live in the silence of a convent. But all this is little; I could do more, I would do it, as long as I can ensure eternal salvation!

And you, O Christian soul, what do you do to get a place in the ranks of the elect? ... Do you want to save yourself without sweat? ... Do you want to enjoy your life and then claim to be saved? ... Remember that you reap what you have sown; and those who sow wind gather storms!

THE THOUGHT OF THE JUDGMENT
An illustrious scholar, philosopher and great knowledge of languages, lived in Rome freely and did not spare himself pleasures: His life did not please God. Remorse often touched his heart, until he surrendered to the voice of the Lord. The thought of the Last Judgment terrified him greatly and did not fail to meditate often on that great day. To secure a place among the elect, he left Rome and the hobbies of life and went to retire to solitude. There he began to do penance for his sins and in the ardor of repentance he beat his chest with a stone. With all this he was still very afraid of the Judgment and therefore exclaimed: Alas! Every moment I seem to have in my ears the sound of that trumpet that will be heard on the day of Judgment: "Arise, dead, come to the Judgment". And there, what fate will touch me? ... Will I be with the elect or with the damned? ... Will I have the sentence of blessing or of curse?

The thought of the Judgment, deeply meditated, gave him the strength to persevere in the desert, to break bad habits and to reach perfection. This is Saint Jerome, who became one of the greatest Doctors of the Catholic Church for his writings.

THE CROSS
Then the sign of the Son of man will appear in heaven and all the tribes of the earth will mourn!

The Cross is the sign of Jesus Christ; and this will appear as a testimony to all peoples. That Cross of the Nazarene was imbued with Divine Blood, with that Blood that could have erased all the sins of humanity with a single drop!

Well that Cross at the end of the world will make its glorious appearance in Heaven! It will be very bright. All the looks of the elect and the damned will be turned to it.

Come, the good people will say, come, O blessed cross, the price of our ransom! At your feet we knelt to pray, drawing strength in the trials of life! O Cross of Redemption, in your kiss we died, under your sign we waited in the sepulcher for the long-awaited resurrection!

On the other hand, the bad guys aiming for the Cross will tremble, thinking that the appearance of Christ is near.

That Sacred Sign bearing the cracks in the nails will remind them of the abuse made of the Blood shed solely for their eternal salvation. They will therefore look at the Cross not as a sign of redemption, but of eternal reprobation. At this sight, as Jesus says, the damned of all the tribes of the world will cry ... not out of repentance, but out of desperation and will shed tears of blood!

THE GREAT KING
The peoples will see the Son of Man descend on the clouds of heaven with great power and majesty.

Immediately after the appearance of the Cross, while the eyes will still be turned upwards, Heaven opens up and the Great King appears on the clouds, God made man; Jesus Christ. It will come in the splendor of its glory; surrounded by the Celestial Court and in the company of the Apostles, to judge the twelve tribes of Israel. Jesus, Splendor of the Father, will then show himself, as it should be thought, with the five wounds emanating streams of heavenly light.

Before the Great King, so he loves to call himself Jesus on that occasion, even before the Great King speaks to creatures, He will have spoken to them with the mere presence.

Behold Jesus, the good ones will say, the One we served in life! He was our peace in time ... our food in Holy Communion ... the strength in temptations! .. In the observance of his law we spent the days of trial! ... O Jesus, we belong to you! In your glory we will remain forever!

O God of mercies, even the already penitent thunder will say, O God Jesus, we too belong to it, although once sinners! Inside Your Holy Wounds we took refuge after guilt and we could mourn our miseries! ... Now, Lord, we are here, prey to your merciful love! ... Eternally we will sing your mercies!

Those on the left wing will not want to look at the Divine Judge, but will be forced to do so out of greater confusion. To see the angered Christ, they will say: O mountains, fall on us! And you, o necks, crush us!

What will not be the confusion of the damned at that moment?!? ... In his historical language, the Judge will say: I am the one you blasphemy ... I ... the Christ! ... It is I who you, or Christians of only name, were ashamed of before men ... and now I am ashamed of you before my Angels! ... It is I, the Nazarene, the one you outraged in life by sacrilegiously receiving the Sacraments! ... It is I, the King of Virgins, He whom you, o princes of the earth, persecuted by killing millions of my followers!

Behold, O Jews, it is I, the Messiah that you postponed to Barabbas! ... O Pilate, or Herod, or Caiaphas, ... I am the Galileo derided by the mob and condemned by you unjustly! ... O my crucifixors, or you who stuck the nails in these hands and in these feet, ... look at me now and recognize me for your Judge! ...

Saint Thomas says: If in the Garden of Gethsemane in saying Jesus Christ "It is I", all the soldiers who had gone to bind him fell to the ground, what will it be when He, sitting as the supreme Judge, will say to the damned: Behold, it is I the ones you despised! ...?

THE PRECEPT OF CHARITY
The Last Judgment will concern all mortals and all their works. But on that day Jesus Christ will focus his judgment in a particular way on the precept of charity.

The King will say to those on his right:

Come, blessed of my Father, take possession of the kingdom prepared for you since the foundation of the world; because I was hungry and you fed me; I was thirsty and gave me a drink; I was a pilgrim and you admitted me; naked and dressed me; sick and you visited me; prisoner and you came to see me! Then the righteous will answer: Lord, but when did we see you hungry and feed you, thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a pilgrim and receive you, naked and put on you? And when did we see you sick? He will answer: Verily I tell you that whenever you did something to one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did it to me!

After the king will say to those who will be on the left: Get away from me, or cursed; go into the eternal fire, which was prepared for Satan and his followers; for I was hungry and you did not feed me; I was thirsty and you didn't give me a drink. I was a pilgrim and you did not receive me; naked and you didn't dress me; sick and inmate and you didn't visit me! Even the bad guys will answer him: Lord, but when did we see you hungry or sibling or pilgrim or naked or sick or inmate and we didn't give you assistance? Then he will answer them like this: Verily I tell you that whenever you did not do this to one of these little ones, you did not do it to me either!

These words of Jesus need no comment.

THE ETERNAL SEPARATION
And the righteous will go to eternal life, while the reprobate will go to eternal torture.

Who will ever be able to express the joy that the good people will feel when Jesus pronounces the sentence of eternal blessing!? ... In a flash they will all rise and fly to Paradise, crowning Christ the Judge, together with the Blessed Virgin Mary and all the choirs of the Angels . New hymns of glory will echo, as the Great Triumpher will enter Heaven with an endless host of chosen ones, the fruit of his redemption.

And who can ever describe the consternation of the damned to hear the Divine Judge say, with the face inflamed with fury: Go, damned, into the eternal fire! They will see the good ones rise to Heaven, they will want to be able to follow them ... but the divine curse will hold them back.

And here comes a deep chasm, which will lead you to hell! The flames, lit by the wrath of the outraged God, will surround those wretched ones and here they all fall into the abyss: irreligious, blasphemers, drunkards, dishonest, thieves, murders, sinners and sinners of all kinds! The abyss will close again and will never open forever.

O you who enter, leave all hope of going out!

EVERYTHING WILL COME TRUE!
Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away!

You, o Christian soul, have followed the narrative of the final judgment. I don't think she was indifferent! This would be a bad sign! But I fear that the devil will take away the fruit of the consideration of such a terrifying truth, by making you think that in this writing there is an exaggeration. I am warning you against this. What I said about the judgment is a small thing; the reality will be far superior. I have done nothing but comment briefly on the same words of the Lord.

So that no one can question the details of the Last Judgment, Jesus Christ concludes the preaching of the end of the world, with absolute confirmation: Heaven and earth may fail, but none of my words will fail! Everything will come true!

NO ONE KNOWS THE DAY
If you, O reader, had been present at Jesus' speech regarding the Judgment, perhaps you would have asked him the time of fulfillment; and the question would have been natural. We know that one of those present at the speech asked Jesus: On what day will the Last Judgment be? He was answered: As for that day and time, nobody knows, not even the Angels of Heaven, except the Eternal Father.

However, Jesus gave some clues to argue for the end of the world, saying: This gospel will be preached throughout the earth, as a testimony to all nations; and then the end will come.

The gospel has not yet been preached everywhere. In recent times, however, the Catholic Missions have taken a great development and many peoples have already received the light of the Redemption.

THE FIGURE COMPARISON
After speaking of the forerunners of his glorious coming into the world, Jesus made a comparison, saying: From the fig tree learn this similarity. When the fig branch softens and leaves sprout, you know that summer is near; so again, when you see all these things, know that the Son of Man is at the door.

The Lord wants men to live in anticipation of the great final day; why this thought must put us back on the right path and persevere in the good; men attached to interest and pleasure, however, do not take care of it; and even when the end of the world approaches, they, or at least many of them, will not notice. Jesus; foreseeing this, it reminds everyone of a scriptural scene.

AS IN THE TIME OF NOAH
We read in Sacred Scripture that God, to see humanity's moral corruption, decided to destroy it by means of the flood.

But he spared Noah, because he was a just man, and also his family.

Noah was commissioned to build an ark that could float on the water. People laughed at his concern about waiting for the flood and continued to live in the most shameful vices.

Jesus Christ, after foretelling the Judgment, said: As in the days before the flood, men were eating and drinking, marrying and giving their women husband until that day when Noah entered the ark and thought until the flood that killed all came, so it will be at the coming of the Son of man.

TRAGIC END
There is a story of a great tyrant, Muhammad II, who was overly strict in giving orders. He had commanded that no one hunt in the imperial park.

One day he saw two young men from the palace, going up and down the park. They were his two sons, who, believing that the prohibition of hunting did not extend to them, were enjoying themselves innocently.

The emperor could not distinguish the physiognomy of the two offenders from a distance and was far from thinking that they were his own children. He called a vassal and ordered him to arrest the two hunters immediately.

I want to know, she told him, who these offenders are and afterwards they will be put to death!

The vassal, returned, did not feel the courage to speak; but forced by the proud gaze of the emperor, he said: Majesty, the two young men are locked in prison but they are your children! It doesn't matter, exclaimed Muhammad; they have transgressed an order of mine and therefore they must die!

Majesty, added the vassal, allow me to point out that if you have both your children killed, who will be your heir in the empire? Well, once the tyrant ended, fate will come: one will die and the other will be the heir.

A room was prepared for the draw; the walls were in mourning. In the middle of it was a table with a small urn; on the right of the table was the imperial crown, on the left a sword.

Muhammad, seated on a throne and surrounded by his court, gave orders that the two culprits be introduced. When he had them in his presence he said: I did not believe that you, my children, could transgress my imperial orders! Death was decreed for both of them. Since an heir is needed, each of you take a policy from this urn; on one it is written: "life", on the other "death". Once the draw is made, the lucky one will put the crown on the head and the other will receive a sword stroke!

At these words the two young men began to tremble to the point of delirium. They stretched out their hand and extracted their fate. A moment later, one was acclaimed as the heir to the throne, while the other, received a fatal blow, lay dead flooded in his own blood.

CONCLUSION
If there was a small urn with two policies inside, "Heaven" and "Hell" and you had to get one, oh! how you would tremble with trepidation, more than the children of Muhammad!

Well if you want to go to Heaven, think often about the Divine Judgment and rule your life in the light of this great truth.

ANNA AND CLARA

(Letter from Hell)

IMPRIMATUR
And Vicariatu Urbis, die 9 aprilis 1952

+ OLOYSIUS TRAIL

Archie.us Caesarien. Vicesgerens

INVITATION
The fact set out here is of exceptional importance. The original is in German; editions have been made in other languages.

The Vicariate of Rome gave permission to publish the writing. The "Imprimatur" of Rome is a guarantee of the translation from German and the seriousness of the terrible episode.

They are quick and terrible pages and tell of a standard of living in which many people of today's society live. The mercy of God, allowing the fact narrated here, raises the veil of the most frightening mystery that awaits us at the end of life.

Will souls take advantage of it? ...

RECITALS
Clara and Annetta, very young, worked in one: a commercial company in *** (Germany).

They were not linked by deep friendship, but by simple courtesy. They worked. every day next to each other and an exchange of ideas could not be missing: Clara declared herself openly religious and felt the duty to instruct and recall Annetta, when she proved to be light and superficial in terms of religion.

They spent some time together; then Annetta contracted marriage and left the company. In the autumn of that year, 1937, Clara spent her holidays on the shores of Lake Garda. In mid-September, Mum sent her a letter from her hometown: "Annetta N has died ... She was the victim of a car accident. They buried her yesterday in the "Waldfriedhof" ».

The news frightened the good young lady, knowing that her friend had not been so religious. Was she prepared to present herself before God? ... Dying suddenly, how did she find herself? ...

The following day he listened to Holy Mass and also made Communion in southern suffrage, praying fervently. The following night, 10 minutes after midnight, the vision took place ...

«Clara, don't pray for me! I'm damned. If I communicate it to you and I refer to you rather long; not. believe that this is done by way of friendship: We no longer love anyone here. I do it as forced. I do it as "part of that power that always wants evil and does good".

In truth I would like to see »and you too will land in this state, where I have now dropped my anchor forever:

Don't get angry with this intention. Here, we all think so. Our will is petrified in evil in what you call "evil". Even when we do something "good", as I do now, opening my eyes to hell, this does not happen with good intention.

Do you still remember that four years ago we met in * * *? You counted then; 23 years old and you were there. for half a year when I got there.

You got me out of some trouble; as a beginner, you gave me good addresses. But what does "good" mean?

I then praised your "love of neighbor". Ridiculous! Your relief came from pure coquetry, as, moreover, I had already suspected since then. We do not recognize anything good here. In none.

You know the time of my youth. I fill certain gaps here.

According to my parents' plan, to be honest, I shouldn't even have existed. "A misfortune happened to them." My two sisters were already 14 and 15 years old, when I tended to light.

I had never existed! I could now annihilate myself and escape these torments! No voluptuousness would match that with which I would leave my existence, like an ash suit, lost in nothingness.

But I must exist. I must exist as I made myself: with a failed existence.

When dad and mom, still young, moved from the countryside to the city both had lost contact with the Church. And it was better this way.

They sympathized with people not tied to the church. They met at a dancing meeting and half a year later they "had to" get married.

During the wedding ceremony, a lot of holy water remained attached to them, which the mother went to church for Sunday Mass a couple of times a year. He never taught me to really pray. He was exhausted in the daily care of life, although our situation was not uncomfortable.

Words, like praying, Mass, religious education, church, I say them with an unequaled whole repugnance. I abhor everything, as hatred: those who attend church and in general all men and all things.

From everything, in fact, there comes torment. Every knowledge received at the point of death, every: memory of things lived or known, is for us a prickly flame.

And all the memories show us that side which, in them: it was grace. and which we despised. What torment is this! We don't eat, we don't sleep, we don't walk with our feet. Spiritually chained, we look dazed "with screams and grinding teeth" our life gone 1n smoke:: hating and tormented!

Do you hear? Here we drink hatred like water. Also towards each other. Above all, we hate God.

I want you ... to make it understandable.

The Blessed in heaven must love him, because they see him without a veil, in his dazzling beauty. This beats them so much that it cannot be described. We know it and this knowledge makes us furious. .

Men on earth who know God from creation and revelation can love him; but they are not forced to. The believer says this by gritting his teeth which, brooding, contemplates Christ on the cross, with his arms outstretched, will end up loving him.

But the one whom God approaches only in the hurricane; as punisher, as righteous avenger, because one day he was repudiated by him, as happened to us, he can only hate him, with all the impetus of his evil will, eternally, by virtue of the free acceptance of beings separated from God: resolution with which, dying, we exhaled our soul and that even now we withdraw and we will never have the will to withdraw.

Do you understand now why hell lasts forever? Because our obstinacy will never melt away from us.

Forced, I add that God is merciful even to us. I say "forced". Because even if I say these things deliberately, I am not allowed to lie as I would like to. I affirm many things against my will. I also have to throttle the heat of insults, which I would like to vomit.

God was merciful to us by not letting our evil will run out on earth, as we would have been ready to do. This would have increased our sins and pains. He killed us prematurely, like me, or made other mitigating circumstances intervene.

Now he shows himself, merciful to us by not forcing us to get closer to him than we are in this remote hellish place; this lessens the torment.

Every step that would bring me closer to God would cause me a greater pain than what would bring you a step closer to a burning stake.

You got scared, when I once, during the walk, I told you that my father, a few days before my first Communion, had said to me: «Annettina, try to deserve a nice little dress; the rest is a frame. "

To your fright I would almost have even been ashamed. Now I laugh about it. The only reasonable thing in that frame was that admission to Communion was only twelve years old. I, then, was already quite taken by the craze of worldly entertainment, so that without scruples I put religious things into a song and I did not attach great importance to the first Communion.

That several children are now going to Communion at the age of seven, makes us furious. We do everything we can to make people understand that children lack adequate knowledge. They must first commit some mortal sins.

Then the white Particle no longer does so much harm in them, as when faith, hope and charity still live in their hearts! this stuff received in baptism. Do you remember how he already supported this opinion on earth?

I mentioned my father. He was often in dispute with mom. I alluded to it only rarely; I was ashamed of it. What a ridiculous shame of evil! For us, everything is the same here.

My parents didn't even sleep in the same room anymore; but me with mom, and dad in the adjoining room, where he could come home freely at any time. He drank a lot; in this way he squandered our heritage. My sisters were both employed and they themselves needed, they said, the money they earned. Mom started working to earn something.

In the last year of his life, dad often beat his mom when she didn't want to give him anything. To me instead. he was always loving. One day I told you and then, then, you bumped into my whim (what didn't you bump into about me?) One day he had to bring back, twice, the shoes bought, because the shape and the heels were not modern enough for me.

The night when my father was stricken with deadly apoplexy, something happened that I, for fear of a disgusting interpretation, never managed to confide in you. But now you need to know. It is important for this: then for the first time I was attacked by my current tormenting spirit.

I slept in the room with my mother. His regular breaths said his deep sleep.

When I hear myself called by name. An unknown voice tells me: «What will it be if Dad dies? ».

I no longer loved my father, since he treated his mother so rudely; as, moreover, I did not love absolutely anyone since then, but I was only fond of some people, who were good towards me. The hopeless love of earthly exchange, lives only in the souls in the state of Grace. And I wasn't.

So I answered the mysterious question, without realizing where it came from: «But it doesn't die! ».

After a short pause; again the same clearly perceived question. "But

it doesn't die! He ran away from me again, abruptly.

For the third time I was asked: "What if your father dies? ». It occurred to me how daddy often came home quite drunk, screeched, mistreated mom, and how he put us in a humiliating condition in front of people. So I screamed. «And it's fine! ».

Then everything was silent.

The next morning, when Mum wanted to put Father's room in order, she found the door locked. Around noon the door was forced. My father, half-dressed, lay dead on the bed. When he went to get the beer in the cellar, he must have had some accident. It had been sickly for a long time. (*)

(*) Had God tied the father's salvation to the good work of his daughter, towards which that man had been good? What responsibility for each one, to give up the opportunity to do good to others!

Marta K ... and you led me to join the "Youth Association". Actually, I never hid that I found the instructions of the two directors, young ladies X, in tune with fashion, parochial ...

The games were fun. As you know, I had a direct part in it. This suited me.

I also liked the trips. I even let myself be led a few times to go to Confession and Communion.

Actually, I had nothing to confess. Thoughts and speeches didn't matter to me. For more gross actions, I was not yet corrupt enough.

You admonished me once: «Anna, if you don't pray, go to perdition! ». I prayed very little and this too, only listlessly.

Then you were unfortunately right. All those who burn in hell did not pray, or did not pray enough.

Prayer is the first step towards God. And it remains the decisive step. Especially the prayer to the one who was the Mother of Christ, the name of which we never mention.

Devotion to her snatches countless souls from the devil, which sin would infallibly hand over to him.

I continue the story, consuming myself and only because I have to. Praying is the easiest thing man can do on earth. And it is precisely to this very easy thing that God has tied everyone's salvation.

To those who pray with perseverance he gradually gives so much light, fortifies him in such a way that in the end even the most bogged down sinner can definitely get up again. It was also flooded in the slime up to the neck.

In the last years of my life I no longer prayed as I should and I deprived myself of the graces, without which no one can be saved.

Here we no longer receive any grace. Indeed, even if we receive them, we will give them back

we would sniff cynically. All the fluctuations of earthly existence have ceased in this other life.

From you on earth man can rise from the state of sin to the state of Grace and from Grace fall into sin: often out of weakness, sometimes out of malice.

With death this rise and fall ends, because it has its root in the imperfection of earthly man. Now. we have reached the final state.

Already as the years go by, changes become rarer. It is true, until death you can always turn to God or turn your back on him. Yet, almost carried away by the current, man, before passing away, with the last weak remains in his will, behaves as he was used to in life.

Custom, good or bad, becomes second nature. This drags him with it.

So it also happened to me. For years I had lived far from God. This is why in the last call of Grace I resolved myself against God.

It wasn't the fact that I often sinned that was fatal to me, but that I didn't want to rise again.

You have repeatedly warned me to listen to the sermons, to read books of piety. "I don't have time," was my ordinary reply. We needed nothing more to increase my internal uncertainty!

Moreover, I must note this: since it was now so advanced, shortly before my exit from the "Association of Young People", it would have been enormously difficult for me to put myself on another path. I felt uneasy and unhappy. But a wall stood before the conversion.

You must not have suspected it. You represented it so simple when one day you said to me: "But make a good confession, Anna, and everything is fine."

I felt it would have been so. But the world, the devil, the flesh already held me too firmly in their claws. I never believed the influence of the devil. And now I testify that he has a strong influence on people who were in the condition I was in then.

Only many prayers, of others and of myself, combined with sacrifices and sufferings, could have snatched me from him.

And this too, only gradually. If there are few obsessed externally, of os, sexes internally there is a tingling. The devil cannot abduct the free will of those who give themselves to his influence. But in pain of their methodical apostasy from God, so to speak, he allows the "evil one" to nest in them.

I also hate the devil. Yet I like him, because he tries to ruin the rest of you; him and his satellites, the spirits that fell with him at the beginning of time.

They are counted in the millions. They wander the earth, dense as a swarm of midges, and you don't even notice it

It is not for us to try again to tempt you; this is, office of the fallen spirits. This really increases their torment every time they drag a human soul down here to hell. But what does hate never do?

Although I walked on paths far from God, God followed me.

I prepared the way to Grace with acts of natural charity which I did not infrequently by inclination of my temperament.

Sometimes God attracted me to a church. Back then I felt like a nostalgia. When I treated the sick mother, despite the office work during the day, and in some way I really sacrificed myself, these enticements of God acted powerfully.

Once, in the church of the hospital, where you had led me during the midday break, something came upon me that would have been a single step for my conversion: I cried!

But then the joy of the world passed again like a stream over Grace.

The wheat choked between the thorns.

With the declaration that religion is a matter of sentiment, as was always said in the office, I also trashed this invitation of Grace, like all the others.

Once you reproached me, because instead of a genuflection down to the ground, I just made a shapeless bow, bending my knee. You thought it an act of laziness. You did not even seem to suspect that since then I no longer believed in the presence of Christ in the Sacrament.

Hours, I believe it, but only naturally, as we believe in a storm whose effects can be seen.

In the meantime, I had made myself a religion in my own way.

I supported the view, which was common in the office, that the soul after death rises again into another being. In this way he would continue to pilgrim endlessly.

With this the anguished question of the afterlife was at once put in place and made harmless to me.

1 Why didn't you remind me of the parable of the rich man and the poor Lazarus, in which the narrator, Christ, sends, immediately after death, one to hell and the other to heaven? ... After all, what would you get? Nothing more than grin your other bigotry talk!

Gradually I created myself a God: sufficiently gifted to be called God; far enough from me to not have to maintain any relationship with him; I wander enough to leave myself, according to need, without changing my religion; resemble a pantheistic God of the world, or let himself be poetized as a solitary God.

This God had no paradise to give me and no hell to inflict on me. I left him alone. This was my adoration for him.

We like to believe what we like. Over the years I kept myself fairly convinced of my religion. This way you could live.

Only one thing would have broken my neck: a long, deep pain. IS

this pain did not come!

Do you now understand what it means: "God chastises those I loved"?

It was a Sunday in July, when the Association of young women organized a trip to * * *. I would have liked the tour. But those silly speeches, that bigoted i

Another simulacrum quite different from that of the Madonna of * * * recently stood on the altar of my heart. The handsome Max N…. of the adjacent shop. We had joked several times before.

Just for that, on Sunday, he had invited me on a trip. The one she usually went with was lying sick in the hospital.

He understood well that I had set my eyes on him. Marrying him I didn't think about it then. He was comfortable, but he behaved too kindly to all the girls. And I, until then, wanted a man who belonged only to me. Not just being a wife, but an only wife. In fact, I always had a certain natural etiquette.

In the aforementioned trip Max lavished himself on kindness. Eh! yeah, no pretense conversations were held as between you!

The next day; in the office, you reproached me for not having come with you to * * *. I described my amusement to you on that Sunday.

Your first question was: "Have you been to Mass? »Foolish! How could I, given that the departure was set for six ?!

You still know, like me, excitedly I added: «The good God does not have a mentality as small as your pretacks! ».

Now I must confess: God, despite his infinite goodness, weighs things with greater precision than all priests.

After that first trip with Max, I came once again to the Association: at Christmas, 'for the celebration of the party. There was something that enticed me to return. But internally I had already moved away from you:

Cinema, dance, trips went on and on. Max and I quarreled a few times, but I always knew how to chain him back to me.

The other lover succeeded in harassing me. After returning from the hospital, she behaved like an obsessed woman. Really luckily for me; for my noble calm made a powerful impression on Max, who ended up deciding, that I was the favorite.

I had been able to make him hateful, speaking coldly: on the outside positive, on the inside spewing poison. Such feelings and such demeanor prepare excellently for hell. They are diabolical in the strictest sense of the word.

Why am I telling you this? To report how I definitively detached myself from God. Not already, moreover, that between me and Max it has come very often to the extremes of familiarity. I understood that I would have lowered myself to her eyes if I had let myself go completely ahead of time; therefore I was able to hold back.

But in itself, whenever I thought it useful, I was always ready for anything. I had to conquer Max. Nothing was too expensive for that. Furthermore, we gradually loved each other, possessing both not a few precious qualities, which made us esteem each other. I was skilled, capable, of pleasant company. So I firmly held Max in my hand and managed, at least in the last months before the wedding, to be the only one, to possess him.

In this consisted my apostasy to give God: to raise a creature to my idol. In no way can this happen, so that it embraces everything, as in the love of a person of the opposite sex, when this love remains stranded in earthly satisfactions. This is what forms the. its attractiveness, its stimulus and its, poison.

The "adoration" which I paid to myself in the person of Max became for me a lived religion.

It was the time when in the office I poisoned myself against church churches, priests, indulgences, the muttering of rosaries and similar nonsense.

You have tried, more or less wisely, to take the defense of such things. Apparently without suspecting that in the innermost part of me it was not really about these things, I was rather looking for support against my conscience then I needed such support to justify my apostasy also with reason.

After all, I turned against God. You did not understand him; it holds me, I still call you a Catholic. Indeed, I wanted to be called that; I even paid ecclesiastical taxes. A certain "counterinsurance", I thought, could not harm.

Your answers may have hit the mark sometimes. They didn't hold on to me, because you didn't have to be right.

Because of these distorted relationships between the two of us, the pain of our detachment was petty when we separated on the occasion of my marriage.

Before the wedding I confessed and communicated once again, It was prescribed. My husband and I thought the same on this point. Why shouldn't we have completed this formality? We also completed it, like, the other formalities.

You call such an Communion unworthy. Well, after that "unworthy" Communion, I was more calm in my conscience. Moreover, it was also the last.

Our married life was generally in great harmony. On all points of view we were of the same opinion. Even in this: that we did not want to bear the burden of the children. Actually my husband would have gladly wanted one; no more, of course. In the end, I was also able to turn him away from this desire.

Dress, luxury furniture, tea hangouts, trips and car trips and similar distractions mattered more to me.

It was a year of pleasure on earth that passed between my wedding and my sudden death.

We went out by car every Sunday, or visited my husband's relatives. I was ashamed of my mother now. They floated to the surface of existence, neither more nor less than us.

Internally, of course, I never felt happy, however externally I laughed. There was always something indeterminate inside me, which was gnawing at me. I wished that after death, which of course must still be very far away, everything was over.

But it is just like that, as one day, as a child, I heard in a sermon: that God rewards every good work that one does, and when he cannot reward it in the other life, he does it on earth.

Unexpectedly I had an inheritance from Aunt Lotte. My husband happily managed to bring his salary to a substantial sum. So I was able to order the new home attractively.

Religion only sent its light, lackluster, weak and uncertain, from afar.

The city's cafes, hotels, where we went on trips, certainly didn't bring us to God.

All those who frequented those places lived, like us, from the outside. inside, not from inside to outside.

If during the holidays we visited some church, we tried to recreate ourselves. in the artistic content of the works. The religious breath that expired, especially the medieval ones, I knew how to neutralize it by criticizing some ancillary circumstances: a clumsy converse friar or dressed in an unclean way, who acted as a guide; the scandal that monks, who wanted to pass for pious, sold liquor; the eternal bell for the sacred functions, while it is a question of making money ...

So I was able to continually chase away from me the Grace every time he knocked. I let free rein in my mood especially on certain medieval representations of hell in cemeteries or elsewhere, in which the devil roasts souls in red and incandescent brage, while his long-tailed companions drag new victims to him. Clara! Hell you can make a mistake in drawing it, but you never go overboard.

I have always targeted the fire of hell in a special way. You know how during an altercation, I once held a match under your nose and said sarcastically: "Does it smell like this?" You quickly put out the flame. Here nobody turns it off.

I tell you: the fire mentioned in the Bible does not mean torment of conscience. Fire is fire! It is to be understood literally what he said: «Away from me, damn you, in the eternal fire! ». Literally.

«How can the spirit be touched by material fire? You will ask. How can your soul suffer on earth when you put your finger on the flame? In fact it does not burn the soul; yet what torment the whole individual feels!

In a similar way we are spiritually related to fire here, according to our nature and according to our faculties. Our soul is deprived of its natural

wing beat; we cannot think what we want or how we want. Don't be surprised by these words of mine. This state, which says nothing to you, burns me without consuming me.

Our greatest torment consists in knowing with certainty that we will never see God.

How can this torment so much, since one on earth remains so indifferent?

As long as the knife lies on the table, it leaves you cold. You see how sharp it is, but you don't feel it. Dip the knife in the meat and you will start screaming in pain.

Now we feel the loss of God; before we only thought it.

Not all souls suffer equally.

With how much more evil and the more systematically one has sinned, the more serious the loss of God weighs on him and the more the creature he has abused suffocates him.

Damned Catholics suffer more than those of other religions, because they mostly received and trampled more. thanks and more light.

Those who knew more, suffer more severely than those who knew less.

Those who sinned through malice suffer more acutely than those who fell out of weakness.

Nobody ever suffers more than he deserved. Oh, if this were not true, I would have a reason to hate!

You told me one day that nobody goes to hell without knowing it: this would have been revealed to a saint.

I laughed. But then you will trench me behind this statement.

"So, in case of need, there will be enough time to make a" turn ", I said to myself secretly.

That saying is correct. Actually, before my sudden end, I didn't know what hell is like. No mortal knows it. But I was fully aware of it: "If you die, go into the world beyond as straight as an arrow against God. You will bear the consequences."

I did not turn back, as I said, because dragged by the current of habit. Driven by that. conformity whereby men, the older they get, the more they act in the same direction.

My death happened like this.

A week ago I speak according to your calculation, because compared to the pain, I could say very well that I have already been ten years since I burned in hell a week ago, therefore, my husband and I went on a Sunday trip, the last one for me.

The day had dawned radiant. I felt better than ever. A sinister feeling of happiness invaded me, which wound through me throughout the day.

When suddenly, on the way back, my husband was dazzled by a flying car. He lost control.

"Jesses" (*), he ran away from my lips with a shiver. Not as a prayer, only as a cry.

(*) Crippling of Jesus, frequently used among some German-speaking populations.

An excruciating pain compressed me completely. In comparison with that present a bagatella. Then I passed out.

Strange! Inexplicably, that thought arose in me that morning: "You could once again go to Mass." It sounded like an entreaty.

Clear and resolute, my "no" cut the thread of thoughts. «With these things we must end once. All the consequences are on me! ». Now I bring them.

You know what happened after my death. The fate of my husband, that of my mother, what happened to my corpse and the conduct of my funeral are known to me in their details through natural knowledge that we have here.

Moreover, what happens on earth we know only nebulously. But what somehow affects us closely, we know. So I also see where you stay.

I myself woke up suddenly from the dark at the instant of my passing. I saw myself as flooded by a dazzling light.

It was in the same place where my corpse lay. It happened as in a theater, when the lights suddenly go out in the hall, the curtain divides loudly and an unexpected, horribly illuminated scene opens. The scene of my life.

As in a mirror my soul showed itself to me. The graces trampled from youth until the last "no" before God.

I felt like a murderer, to whom, during the judicial process, his lifeless victim is brought before him. Repent? Never! Ashamed? Never!

But I couldn't even resist before the eyes of God, rejected by me. Not

I only had one thing left: escape. As Cain fled from Abel's corpse, so my soul was pushed away by that sight of horror.

This was the particular judgment: the irreducible Judge said: "Get away from me! ». Then my soul, like a yellow shadow of sulfur, fell into the place of eternal torment.

CLARA CONCLUDES
In the morning, at the sound of the Angelus, still trembling with the frightening night, I got up and ran up the stairs to the chapel.

My heart was throbbing right down my throat. The few guests, kneeling near rne, looked at me; but maybe they thought I was so excited about the run down the stairs.

A good-natured lady from Budapest, who had observed me, said after smiling:

Miss, the Lord wants to be served calmly, not in a hurry!

But then he realized that something else had excited me and still kept me agitated. And while the lady addressed me other good words, I thought: God alone is enough for me!

Yes, he alone must suffice me in this and the other life. I want one day to be able to enjoy it in Paradise, for how many sacrifices it can cost me on earth. I don't want to go to hell!