# Hunolt Sermons/Volume 10/Sermon 54

FIFTY-FOURTH SERMON.
ON THE FREQUENT RECOLLECTION OF AND MEDITATION ON HEAVEN.
Subject.
We should often think of heaven and desire it. First, because it is only right to do so; secondly, because we are forced to do so if we desire to gain heaven.—Preached on the feast of the dedication of a church.
Text.
Vidi sanctam civitatem Jerusalem novam, descendentem de cœlo a Deo.—Apoc. xxi. 2.
“I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God.”
Introduction.
Not without reason is this lesson about the heavenly city of Jerusalem read on the feast of the dedication of a church, for as the yearly recurrence of the feast reminds us of the benefits we have received during the year in the churches that we may return due thanks to God for them, so also whenever we appear in the churches, we should remember the heavenly Jerusalem, of which the sacred edifice is a symbol, and the eternal joys that ​are there prepared for us, in order to meditate on them, to inflame our desires for them, and to encourage ourselves to serve God zealously. And, my dear brethren, this is but right; for heaven truly deserves our frequent consideration, our unceasing desires. Nay, this is even necessary for us if we really desire to enter heaven, as I now proceed to show.
Plan of Discourse.
We should often think of heaven and desire it; it is only right that we should do so. This I shall prove in the first part. We are forced to do so if we wish to enter heaven; as I shall prove in the second part.
Heavenly Father, we sigh and pray to Thee in the words of Thy holy Catholic Church, “that Thou wouldst raise up our minds to heavenly desires.” We beseech Thee to hear us through the intercession of Mary, the Queen of heaven, and the princes of heaven, our holy guardian angels.
Everything has a natural tendency towards the place to which it belongs. Everything has a natural inclination and tendency to the place to which it belongs and for which nature has intended it. Wild beasts always seek their caves and deserts; the birds frequent the lofty regions of the air, and although they may be comfortable and well-fed in a cage, they have neither rest nor peace until they find some opening by which they may escape and fly into the air again. Fish cannot live except in the water. A stone falls with the utmost velocity towards its centre on the earth. Fire always seeks its centre on high; if you try to confine it, it will force a passage for itself with violence, and overthrow the loftiest tower, as we know by experience to be the case when powder is exploded. The rivers flow back to their origin in the sea. And if all these creatures had reason, they would think and desire nothing but the end proposed for them; nor would they find rest or peace until they have actually reached the place intended for them by nature. Almost all men like to live in their native land, where they are well off; and if one has sometimes to seek a foreign shore, he often thinks and speaks of the town in which he was born, and eagerly listens to what others have to tell him of it. The whole year long students are looking forward to the holidays, when they can again go back to their father’s house. What sailor does not long for the harbor when his ship is tossed about by the waves? What traveller does not wish to return to ​the place from which he set out? Every step he takes, every movement of his body, is directed to the sole end of returning home.
Our end and home is heaven. My dear brethren, what is the end and object for which we are created? It is a well-known question, one that can never be either sufficiently proposed or answered: why are we in this world? We are here to serve God during this life, to keep His commandments, and after this life to rejoice with God forever in the kingdom of heaven. Such is the answer to that question. Heaven is the place to which we really belong; it is our centre outside of which we cannot find rest; heaven is the eternal home towards which we must daily travel in this life, as on a pilgrimage, and we travel here as strangers and pilgrims. Heaven is the harbor to which we are making our way over the stormy, dangerous ocean of the world; heaven is the home of our Father to whom we pray daily: “Our Father, who art in heaven.”
So that we should always long for it. What then should we do with our thoughts and desires if we do not often fix them on heaven? Why do we not look with joy on this our greatest inheritance, our happiest home? Why should we not pray hourly with the utmost fervor: “Father, Thy kingdom come”? Is it not surprising that we should desire anything else but this fatherland of ours? that we do not direct all our thoughts and desires thither the whole day? For daily and hourly we experience that we have not here a lasting dwelling, that this is not the place to which we belong, that in this sorrowful vale of tears we are beset on all sides with miseries and troubles, so that we have good reason for looking on the earth with disgust, and for longing and sighing all the more eagerly for the place of joys, the haven of eternal rest? And that is the chief reason why the God of infinite goodness, who loves us, His adopted children, far more tenderly than any father loves his offspring—that is the reason why He fills our lives with so many trials and miseries; He wishes to compel us, as it were, to desire the end of all this wretchedness and the glorious future that awaits us in His kingdom. Therefore He says to us daily in the holy Mass: “Lift up your hearts.” Therefore He caused His apostle St Paul to warn us so emphatically to “seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God.” Why should your desires grovel on this earth? This is not the ​place of your rest: “Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the earth.”
In heaven infinite goods and joys are prepared for us. Oh, if we had a true and lively faith in the greatness of the goods and joys that await us in heaven, we should not need such exhortations, but should feel drawn thither of ourselves. In olden times, as Julius Cæsar writes, the Swiss, hearing that Gaul was a fruitful country, had such a great desire to get possession of it that they not only left their homes, but even burnt them to ashes, so that having no hope of returning, they might be compelled to live in the beautiful land they were so anxious to get hold of. “Glorious things are said of thee, O city of God!” What wonderful things we have already heard of thee! And what a superabundance of goods and pleasures faith tells us we shall find in thee, and that too forever! Shouldst thou not then form the object of our most eager desires? And yet we long so little for thee, we think of thee so seldom!
So that God may well be indignant with us for thinking so little of it. Christians! must it not be a just cause of indignation to the Almighty to see that we have such little desire, that we think so rarely of the eternal reward that He has prepared for us? Sometimes a father says in play to his child: to-morrow you shall come with me to hunt the hare; and the child’s only wish is that the morning should come; he dreams of the promised pleasure; there is no fear of his forgetting it; and early in the morning he is awake and up to remind his father of his promise. And our heavenly Father has pledged His own infallible, divine word, that if we only love Him, in a short time we shall enter into His kingdom, and be and live forever with Him in all imaginable joys of body and soul. Now, if we rarely rejoice at the thought of this promise, feel but little desire for its fulfilment, and seldom think of it, that is a clear sign that we either do not quite believe in the divine promise, or else that we care but little for the heavenly goods that await us. In either case the Almighty has just cause for indignation; especially since He has built the palace of heaven more on our account than on His own. God was not in need of heaven; He was as happy during a long eternity before heaven was as He is now; He has created it for His dear creatures that they may have a dwelling-place in which they can share in His infinite happiness. Therefore I say again: since He means so well with us, it must annoy Him to ​see that we have so little desire for or thought of this heaven.
How He punishes that carelessness. And that is what He complains of so bitterly by the Psalmist: “They set at naught the desirable land.” The ungrateful Jewish people had often and grievously sinned against God, but He patiently overlooked their vices and acted as if He did not see them; there was one thing, however, that He could not bear, and that was when on the journey to the promised land they thought of and sighed for the onions and garlic of Egypt, and valued them more highly than the heavenly manna that was rained down on them in the desert; on that account He punished several thousand of them with death. Much greater will His indignation be if He sees that we have little desire for the true and eternal happiness of heaven and its infinite delights, and that our thoughts and desires are sunk in the onions and garlic of this world. St. Gregory, the Venerable Bede, Cardinal Ballarmine, and others are of the unanimous opinion that in purgatory there is a special place where there is nothing else to suffer but an insatiable, intolerable, painful longing to see the face of God; and that is the place of punishment for those souls who during life had not a sufficient recollection of and desire for eternal happiness, although they owe no other satisfaction to the divine justice. Father Eusebius Nierenberg writes of Father John Fernandius, of our Society, that when he was professing theology in Rome, and was speaking of the mystery of the Blessed Trinity on which he had often and deeply pondered, he was inflamed with a most vehement desire to behold the supreme Godhead; whereupon he was ravished in spirit, and after many wonderful things had been shown to him, he was brought into a beautiful garden where he saw a soul adorned in the most splendid manner; the soul told him that he was one of our brethren who had spent seven years in the Society, but on account of his little desire for heaven and the beatific vision he had to suffer in that part of purgatory from a constantly increasing and constantly disappointed desire.
Much more angry will He be with those who despise heaven, and there are many such. Now if this purgatory awaits those friends of God whose only fault was that their desire for heaven was not eager enough, what shall become of those who hardly ever think of heaven? of those who never deign to raise up their hearts and minds thither? of those who actually despise heaven, and look on all that is said of it as a fanciful invention? And finally, what is to become of ​those who would willingly renounce all the riches and delights of a happy eternity if they could only live forever here below; nay, what is still more astonishing, who would barter heaven for the sake of enjoying themselves during this life, short as they know it to be? Like the mart of whom Father Drexelius writes: he had been drinking in a tavern and began to blaspheme in his cups; if, he said, God allowed me to enjoy my wealth and to have my own way for a thousand years, I would let Him keep His heaven; and then he began to sing: “The heaven of heaven is the Lord’s, but the earth He has given to the children of men.” The wretched Martin Luther in his Table Talk has vomited forth similar blasphemies; a thousand years of a joyful life would be worth any amount of heaven to him. Elizabeth, one of the most cruel persecutors of the Catholics in England, used to say: let me only reign for forty years and I will not trouble about heaven. God granted her a longer time than that; she reigned for forty-four years, and then lost both life and kingdom. But for a long time after many people saw on the river a most doleful apparition that kept on crying out: wo! wo! alas! I have reigned for forty years, and now must suffer in hell forever! Would to God that there were none to be found among Catholic Christians who are of the same opinion as those people, and who would willingly give up all claim to heavenly glory if they had not eternal flames to fear! “They set at naught the desirable land;” that blessed land, the inheritance of the children of God, the reward of our labor and trouble, the beautiful heaven that others so long for and sigh after, and for which they shed so many hot tears; that they set at naught; that they have no desire for, and hardly think of it once in the day.
This want of desire for heaven comes from love of the world, and despair in trials. And what on earth is the reason of this? Why is it that we so seldom think of heaven, and have so little desire for it, although the way thither is open to our thoughts and desires at any and every moment? Because, my dear brethren, either our hearts are too much attached to the things of this world and its pleasures, or else we forget ourselves and allow ourselves to be driven almost to desperation by the miseries of this life. Thus there are, generally speaking, two classes of men who make no account of the joys of heaven. The first comprises those who allow their minds and hearts to be completely captivated by temporal happiness, so that they have no thought of heaven; the ​second consists of those whom misfortunes have driven to despair. Both classes are to be pitied and bewailed. But for that very reason, and that none of us may belong to either class, I say now that it is not only right but most necessary often to think of heaven and to raise our desires thither, as I shall now show in the
Second Part.
Most men value temporal things too highly; hence they care little for heaven. He whose weight drags him downwards requires a support to be able to keep upright. The afflicted man who cannot help himself is in need of consolation to encourage him not to give way to despair or to become too down-hearted in his trouble. This twofold help we must seek, and we shall find it in the frequent recollection of the promised joys of heaven. For in the first place, how comes it that we make so much of the goods, honors, and pleasures of the world, and snap at them greedily, like a hungry beast at its food? Is it not because we attend only to what we see before us with our bodily eyes, what we feel and know by experience to be pleasing and agreeable to the senses? Because nothing better or more agreeable than those worldly goods and pleasures presents itself to us, we set our whole and only happiness in them, and imagine we are wonderfully well off if we can have a share of them. In this respect we are like children who, when they get some butter and milk, or bread and honey, think they are in heaven and imagine there is nothing better to be had in the whole world, because they have never tasted anything better, and know nothing of more delicate or savory food. If sometimes a thought of heaven occurs to us, oh, it hardly lasts a moment, and it is so dim and cloudy that it makes no impression, leaves no desire in the heart, and so is unable to muster the idea we have of the goods and joys of this world.
The devil represents to them temporal goods as greater than heavenly. Explained by a simile. Besides, the devil, who cannot bear to see us lifting up our minds to the serious meditation of heavenly things, paints in our imaginations the pleasures and riches of this life in such lively and agreeable colors, and the joys of heaven on the other hand as so uncertain and trivial, that we have no taste for the latter, and fix our affections exclusively on the former. There are geographers who can describe the whole earth and its different countries on maps and globes. There are also astronomers who can map out the courses of the heavenly bodies and the whole firmament on a wooden or metal plate. Now suppose some ​ignorant peasant were to ask the geographer to bring him round the earth and show him the different countries on the map; the geographer shows him a large map, and points with his finger to Asia, America, Africa, Europe; then he brings out map after map and shows him the different seas, rivers, provinces, kingdoms, and principalities of the whole world. Wonderful! exclaims the peasant; I had no idea the world was so big. He then goes to the astronomer to learn something of the heavens; the astronomer turns round the celestial globe, and shows him all sorts of circles and straight and curved lines; there, he says, in that lowest circle is the moon's orbit; in the next one this planet; in this the sun has its orbit; above these orbits comes the firmament, where the fixed stars are, and so he goes on describing the whole heavens in detail. The peasant stares open-mouthed. But, ho asks, what is that in the middle of the globe? pointing to a small sphere no larger than a hazelnut. That, answers the other, is the earth, the world in which we live. But, my dear sir, replies the peasant, I have just come from a geographer who has shown me on his maps that the world is a huge globe, and now you wish to persuade me that it is only the size of a nut? Which am I to believe? Suppose now that some one overhears this, and whispers in his ear: do not be surprised at what you hear; the first man you went to was a geographer; this one is an astronomer; they have different branches of science to deal with; the former showed you only the earth and nothing more; this one shows you the heavens and the earth at the same time. He who considers the earth alone looks on it as wonderfully great and of vast extent, but he who contemplates the courses of the heavenly bodies and sees the earth at the same time will soon be aware that the latter is only a small affair in comparison with the heavens.
So does the devil deceive us. My dear brethren, the devil is a most skilful geographer, who well knows how to depict everything that belongs to the earth as most beautiful, glorious, and great. He did not hesitate to show his map even to our divine Lord, with the intention of thereby leading Him to indulge in greed of earthly goods; he led Him to the top of a high mountain, "and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: All these will I give Thee if falling down Thou wilt adore me." So he acts daily with us mortals; see, he says to our im​agination, what a beautiful thing to be held high in honor and the esteem of the world! What a fine thing to possess much money and property, to live in abundance, to wear magnificent clothing! What a paradise it is to enjoy one’s self, to indulge in sensual pleasures! All these things he describes most cleverly. Now if we believe him; if we consider only the goods he proposes to us, then indeed we shall form a very high opinion of them, and since most people fix all their thoughts and attention on them, their hearts and desires are completely buried in them, so highly do they value such things.
It is therefore necessary for us often to think of heaven. But after all the devil is only a deceiver, a lying geographer. Let us see what the astronomer has to say; then will the earth appear to us miserably small and mean. Let us take counsel of our faith, and ponder deeply on what it tells us of heavenly goods; let us often fix our thoughts on heaven, raise our eyes thither, and say to ourselves: behold the firmament; see how great and magnificent are the very lowest parts of the city of God; what must then be the glory of the divine palace itself? All that I can desire, hope for, wish for, possess, enjoy on earth is but transitory; it lasts only a short time; it is uncertain whether I shall ever have what I wish to have, and if I get it, it is equally uncertain whether I shall be master of it for one hour. There in heaven a boundless ocean of wealth, honors, and pleasures awaits me, and they will never come to an end; there I shall be safe from all evil and fear forever; there I shall enjoy for eternity whatever can delight my soul and my body with its five senses, and I shall enjoy myself to complete satiety; there I shall possess the God of infinite majesty and beauty as my own property and inheritance, and according to my own good will and pleasure for all eternity. True, I have not yet seen all this, but I am more certain of it by my faith than if my eyes had beheld it; I have the infallible written word of God for it that all these heavenly goods shall be mine if I serve Him truly for a short time during this life. What then would it profit me to gain the whole world with all its goods, honors, and pleasures if I had to suffer the loss of an eternal heaven?
Then shall our hearts be drawn from the world, and fixed on O Christians! if we often recall this thought to our minds with a lively faith, how far different would be our judgment of earthly things! We should cry out with Saint Ignatius: “How vile the earth seems when I look up to heaven!” Nothing would be so dear or valuable to us that we would not willingly ​heaven, as was the case with other servants of God. sacrifice it to purchase this beautiful heaven, as the Eastern emperor Michael really did. He, as Baronius writes, was asked by the Patriarch through an ambassador to abdicate his crown. If I do so, said the emperor, what will the Patriarch give me for it? Heaven, was the answer. And without a moment’s delay he laid down sceptre and crown, and retired into solitude. If we often meditate on the joys of heaven we should have the greatest pleasure in reading and hearing of the eager desires that the saints, ravished out of themselves, as it were, used to send forth to heaven; we would unite our sighs with theirs, sometimes exclaiming with David: “As the hart panteth after the fountains of waters, so my soul panteth after Thee, O God!” When shall that wished-for time arrive? “When shall I come and appear before the face of God?” And again with St. Paul: “Having a desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ.” And with St. Augustine: “O heavenly country! land of safety! we see thee afar off; we sigh to thee from this vale of tears, and with our tears do we strive if happily we may come to thee. O glorious and desirable day! O day of joy that shall know neither night nor end! on which I shall hear the words: Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord! Enter into eternal joy, into the house of the Lord thy God,” where all good things shall be, and no evil shall be found; where there shall be true life, a sweet and most pleasant life, a most joyous, eternal life! Ah, I faint for very love of thee, and my desire exhausts my strength! See how necessary it is for us often to think of heaven that our hearts and affections may not remain attached to this earth.
The thought of heaven is also necessary for the afflicted, that they may learn patience. With regard now to the other class of men who are already against their will excluded from a share in the happiness of this world, and are overwhelmed with trials and crosses, the recollection of heaven is almost the only means by which they can keep themselves right. For where else can they find consolation? On earth there is none. What better then can they do than often to meditate on the everlasting joys of heaven which await them as a reward for what they suffer here? This is the only medicine against all the ills of life, and Christ Himself prescribes it to all the afflicted. The apostles hardly ever experienced more sorrow or affliction than when Christ, their beloved Master, left them as poor orphans abandoned to wolves, yet Our ​Lord easily consoled them, and in no other way than by simply reminding them of the future glory of heaven: “So also you now indeed have sorrow, but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you.” Be satisfied, My dear disciples! It is true we are to be separated from one another; but after a few days of sorrow we shall be united again, and that forever in the kingdom where there is no sorrow; then your hearts shall be filled with joy; you shall be fully satisfied and no trouble shall ever come near you! Nay, on that very account He calls them blessed when they are tried here below in various ways: “Blessed are ye when they shall revile you and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you.” Blessed are you when you have to suffer poverty, hunger, and thirst, ay, when you have to weep and mourn: “Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in heaven.” If you only remember this all your trials will be sweetened.
The saints used this means. Shown from the Old Testament. Before the time of Our Lord the same recollection lightened the burden of poverty for the elder Tobias. Be comforted, he said; “Fear not, my son: we lead indeed a poor life, but we shall have many good things” hereafter in heaven, if only here in our poverty “we fear God, and depart from all sin, and do that which is good.” Was there ever a man in the world who had such pain and affliction to endure as Job on the dung-hill? All possible misfortunes seem to have conspired against him; the devil put forth every effort to crush him, but all he said was: “Blessed be the name of the Lord.” The mere hope and remembrance of the vision of God that awaited him was the medicine that gave him that wonderful courage and constancy. “In my flesh I shall see my God.” Hardly can one refrain from shedding tears when reading the history of the heroic mother of the Machabees, consoling and encouraging her seven sons in their painful martyrdom. “I beseech thee, my son,” said she to the youngest, who was the only one now left her, “look upon heaven;…so thou shalt not fear this tormentor.” ​The wicked king promises you worldly goods if you transgress the law; but be not deceived; “look upon heaven;” there you will possess goods of far greater worth. He threatens you with rods and scourges; the frying-pan is ready to roast you alive like your brothers; “look upon heaven,” my child. Your tongue will be torn out, but fear not, as long as your eyes are left you, “look upon heaven;” it is worth all the torments you can suffer. The skin will be torn from your head, your hands and feet will be cut off, and thus maimed you will be slowly roasted to death; but have courage; “look upon heaven;” your pains will not last long, and in heaven we shall meet again. Thus this pious mother comforted her children in their terrible torments, and looked on with joyful heart while her own flesh and blood was thus cruelly mangled and cut to pieces. “Who beheld her seven sons slain in the space of one day, and bore it with a good courage for the hope that she had in God,” until she in turn died a martyr’s death.
Confirmed by an example. The martyrs of the New Testament furnish me with countless examples of a similar constancy resulting from the consideration of heaven; I shall content myself with adducing one which St. Celsus, still a little boy, left for the admiration of posterity. He was born of a very noble family, and was brought up by his father Martianus, a most obstinate pagan and fierce persecutor of the Christians, and his mother, Marianilla, who was also a bigoted heathen; they reared him up to the worship of idols, so that he should inherit not only their riches, but also their impiety. But things turned out quite differently. While still a boy he was determined to become a Christian, and made open profession of the faith before his cruel father, remaining constant to it during the most terrible torments which ended his heroic childhood and his life together. Neither the threats of his father nor the caresses and tears of his mother, beset as he was by both, could turn him away from Christ. He was cast into a caldron of boiling pitch and resin, over a great fire, the flames of which rose thirty yards high; but all this could not terrify the brave child. After the lapse of some hours he was taken out unhurt, and put into a filthy, gloomy dungeon, and finally, after he had been brought a few times before the tribunal of his cruel father, he was condemned to be thrown to the wild beasts in the public amphitheatre. But ​the beasts refused to touch him, and showed him every mark of respect; and at last he was beheaded, and thus ended by death his glorious combat. How did such a tender youth become so brave? Simply because he had once seen a small token from the kingdom of heaven. For when the holy martyr Julian us was by the command of Martianus being led through the streets of Antioch, laden with chains and covered with wounds, and exposed to the mockery of all, the little Celsus happened to be looking out of the window of his school, and he saw on the martyrs head a precious crown, while from all his wounds shone a most resplendent light, and by his side walked thirty persons of noble aspect who accompanied him. The boy was astonished at the sight, and turning to his master and school-fellows, cried out: Oh, what do I see? there is that condemned Christian whom the executioners are leading away, and I see on his head a golden crown set with diamonds, while a light comes from him that outshines the sun. Our lictors are leading him to public disgrace and martyrdom; but his God gives him noble companions. Truly a God of that kind must be the true God; I acknowledge Him as such and find in this profession the utmost contentment of mind. For His sake I will suffer what I see this Christian suffering; the same God that he adores I will also look on as my God! For what is there worth having in this life, where everything passes away and comes to an end with time? I will earn for myself a time that shall never end. I will strive for a light and a crown that no one will ever take from me. So saying he threw down his books and school utensils, and ran after the martyr. The teacher and his school-fellows hurried after him to restrain him, but to no purpose. He tore himself out of their hands, ran up to Julianus, embraced him, kissed his wounds, weeping most tenderly, and begged of him earnestly to take him as his inseparable companion and worshipper of his God. In vain did the soldiers try to drive him away, and at last they made him fast to the chains with which Julianus was bound, and brought him before Martianus. Thus he suffered the same martyrdom and received the same crown as Julianus. Marianilla, his mother, although she had been a most bitter pagan, became a zealous Christian, for she too saw a very small token of heaven. When she went to her son Celsus in prison in the hope of bringing him back to the worship of idols, the holy youth and all his fellow-prisoners for the faith prayed earnestly for her conversion; then she saw ​a brilliant light, and was sensible of a most sweet perfume which was so delicious that she acknowledged she never experienced such pleasure in her whole life. Thereupon she declared herself a Christian; she braved the wrath of her tyrannical husband, offered her head to the executioner, and gained for her soul eternal joys. See how powerful is even a dim recollection of heaven.
Exhortation and resolution to think of heaven in all circumstances. My dear brethren, let us often make use of this medicine, for it is useful, nay, necessary in the prosperous as well as the adverse circumstances of this life in order to keep us faithful to the service of God. “Look upon heaven” in all occurrences, like the mother of the Machabees. Let us raise the eyes of the mind to heaven in prosperity that our hearts may not become attached to worldly goods. Let us raise them thither in trouble and adversity that we may bear everything with patience and courage. Palladius tells us that whenever the Abbot Apollo saw any of his brethren sad and melancholy, he used to speak to him as follows: My dear brother, why should we be sad? Let those give way to sadness who care only for the things of earth and to whom the hope of heaven brings no comfort. Jesus Christ has promised us eternal happiness; our hope does not deceive us, we are going to heaven; what then should we trouble about? The same words I should like to say to every afflicted Christian who is downcast and almost driven to desperation either by poverty, or constant illness, or because he is abandoned by all, or by the loss of temporal goods, or by the trials and annoyances that he has daily to contend with: How is this, dear brother, dear sister? why do you moan and weep? Why are you so downhearted? Is your conscience perhaps not right before God? If so, then weep away, for you have good reason! But if that is not the case; if you are heartily sorry that you have ever offended God; if you have candidly confessed your sins and are determined to serve God faithfully in future, why, then, should you be sad? Only think of the everlasting joys of heaven that will be your inheritance, and you will forget this short-lived sorrow. And these words I shall also apply to myself in future; and that they may recur to my mind all the quicker in every circumstance, I will acquire the holy habit of every day frequently raising my heart to heaven; I will think of it when I rise in the morning, and sigh forth: ah, when will the time come for me to ascend thither in order to see my God? I will ​think of it when I retire to rest in the evening; in heaven I shall find eternal rest! I will think of it when dressing or undressing; ah, I must be careful not to lose the wedding-garment of sanctifying grace, that I may one day be adorned with the garment of glory in heaven. I will think of it when eating or drinking. I shall be satiated, O Lord! when I shall see Thy glory in heaven. I will think of it in trouble or affliction; by this I can earn heaven as a reward. In cold and heat, in hunger and thirst I will think: I shall have nothing of this to suffer in heaven. When I hear or see anything pleasing I will say to myself: O heaven! what beauty I shall behold in thee! what sweet sounds I shall hear in thee! Whenever people speak to me of the happiness of this world, how rich that man is, how highly he is esteemed by the great, etc., what! I will say to myself, is that worth talking of? Far different is the happiness that awaits me in heaven. When I enter the church either to pray or to hear a sermon, I will think: by hearing this sermon I will encourage myself in the divine service in order that I may gain still more happiness in heaven; and I will pray, with the Catholic Church, “that Thou lift up our minds to heavenly desires, we beseech Thee to hear us!” “Thy kingdom come!” Thus, like the holy apostle St. Paul, although I am still on earth amongst men I shall be always in heaven in desire, and shall be able to say: “Our conversation is in heaven,” until I actually possess what I have so often longed for and desired, and enter body and soul into the eternal joys of heaven, to which my thoughts and wishes are always tending. Amen.
Another introduction to the same sermon for the third Sunday after Epiphany.
Text.
Multi ab oriente et occidente venient et recumbent cum Abraham et Isaac et Jacob in regno cœlorum.—Matt. viii. 11.
“Many shall come from the east, and the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven.”
Introduction.
Shall strangers then possess this beautiful heaven while the children of the kingdom are cast out into the exterior darkness? ​Yes; so it shall be. By the children of the kingdom are meant the Jews who in those days were still the chosen children of God, to whom Christ, Our Lord, first preached the Gospel Himself and by His apostles; bat as that people obstinately refused to believe through malice and perversity, they were abandoned by the disciples of Christ, and the heathens had the happiness of being instructed in the Christian faith and converted to God. Paul and Barnabas openly reproached the Jews with this: “To you it behoved us first to speak the word of God: but because you reject it, and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life, behold we turn to the gentiles;” they will believe in Christ and many of them will inherit His kingdom. My dear brethren, we in this country are descended from heathens. Oh, more than happy they who, wherever they come from, shall possess the kingdom of heaven! Hitherto we have been considering its infinite joys and delights by way of meditation in order to inflame our desires for it all the more; but what will all that avail us if, as is usually the case after sermons, we forget all about it again? Ah, dear Christians, let it not be so with us! Heaven, although we may never hear a sermon about it, is well worth often thinking of and desiring constantly. My object to-day is to excite you and myself to this constant recollection and desire of heaven. Plan of discourse as above.
* ↑ Quæ sursum sunt quærtte, ubi Christus est in dextera Dei sedens.—Coloss. iii. 1.
* ↑ Quæ sursum sunt sapite, non quæ super terram.—Coloss. iii. 2.
* ↑ Gloriosa dicta sunt de te, civitas Dei.—Ps. lxxxvi. 3.
* ↑ Pro nihilo habuerunt terram desiderabilem.—Ps. cv. 24.
* ↑ Cœlum cœli Domino: terram autem dedit filiis hominum.—Ps. cxiii. 16.
* ↑ Et ostendit ei omnia regna mundi et gloriam eorum, et dixit ei: hæc omnia tibi dabo, si cadens adoraveris me.—Matt. iv. 8, 9.
* ↑ Quemadmodum desiderat cervus ad fontes aquarum, ita desiderat anima mea ad te Deus. Quando veniam et apparebo ante faciem Dei?—Ps. xli. 2, 3.
* ↑ Desiderium habens dissolvi et esse cum Christo.—Philipp. i. 23.
* ↑ Nunc quidem tristitiam habetis, iterum autem videbo vos, et gaudebit cor vestrum: et gaudium vestrum nemo tollet a vobis.—John xvi. 22.
* ↑ Beati estis cum maledixerint vobis, et persecuti vos fuerint, et dixerint omne malum adversum vos; gaudete, et exsultate, quoniam merces vestra copiosa est in cœlis.—Matt. v. 11, 12.
* ↑ Noli timere, fili mi; pauperem quidem vitam gerimus, sed multa bona habebimus, si timuerimus Deum, et recesserimus ab omni peccato, et fecerimus bene.—Tob. iv. 23.
* ↑ Sit nomen Domini benedictum.—Job i. 21.
* ↑ In carne mea videbo Deum meum.—Ibid. xix. 26.
* ↑ Peto nate, ut aspicias ad cælum; ita fiet, ut non timeas carnificem istum. Pereuntes septem filios sub unius diei tempore conspiciens, bono animo ferebat propter spem quam in Deum habebat.—II. Mach. vii. 20.
* ↑ Nostra conversatio in cœlis est.—Philipp. iii. 20.
* ↑ Vobis oportebat primum loqui verbum Dei: sed quoniam repellitis illud, et indignos vos judicatis æternæ vitæ, ecce convertimur ad gentes.—Acts xiii. 46.