St. Irenaeus, Bishop, Martyr
Amos 3:1-8,4:11-12 | Psalm 5:5-8 | Matthew 8:23-27
“Prepare to meet your God!”
An ominous end to today’s reading, no doubt inspiring the more recent “prepare to meet thy maker” that prefixed a thousand on-screen death blows.
Even we Christians are troubled by this phrase. We proclaim “blessings on the coming kingdom of our father David” (Mark 11:10), yet when confronted with the real possibility of journeying towards that kingdom (i.e. imminent death), we hesitate, deviate…or run screaming in the opposite direction. All those crass thoughts and harsh words, all those naughty things we did and the good we didn’t do, O LORD HAVE MERCY ON US JESUS MARY JOSEPH ALL THE SAINTS IN HEAVEN AND HELL PRAY FOR US…
(Desperate last-minute prayers tend to be very fervent, but not very coherent.)
This should be a wake-up call to us all of the need to walk with God every step of every day, giving and receiving love without fear or favour, always doing that which pleases the Lord. We may not achieve perfection in this life, but by doing our level best and leaving the rest to God, we can at least be one with St. Francis of Assisi, who concluded his masterful Canticle of the Sun with:
Be praised, my Lord, through our sister Bodily Death,
from whose embrace no living person can escape.
Woe to those who die in mortal sin!
Happy those she finds doing Your most holy will.
The second death can do no harm to them.Praise and bless my Lord, and give thanks,
and serve Him with great humility.
Amen.