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Let us tremble at the thought of relapsing into sin, and let us take care not to avail ourselves of the mercy of God to continue to offend Him. “He,” says St. Augustine, “Who has promised pardon to those who repent, has promised repentance to no one.”
Oh, would to God that men kept Death always before their eyes! If they did they certainly would not lead such sinful lives. Poor sinners! They put away the thought of Death whenever it presents itself, and think only of living for pleasure and amusement, as if they were never to die. But one day the end will come for all.
We must endeavour, above all, to find out what is our predominant passion. He who conquers it conquers all his passions; he who allows himself to be overcome by it is lost. God commanded Saul to destroy all the Amalecites, along with all their animals and all their property. He destroyed everything that was vile or cheap, but spared the life of King Agag, and preserved all that was valuable and beautiful.
Would not that general be thought mad who did not begin to lay in stores of provisions and arms till the city was besieged by the enemy? And the captain of the ship insane who neglected to provide anchors and cables till overtaken by the storm? Such, precisely, is the folly of the Christian who waits till the hour of death to settle the affairs of his conscience.
St. James exhorts us to treat the body and its lusts as we would treat a horse. We put a bridle in the mouth of a horse, and we bring him wherever we please. We put bits in the mouths of horses, that they may obey us, and we turn about their whole body (James iii. 3). Hence, as soon as we feel the cravings of any bad passion, we must restrain it with the bridle of reason; for, if we yield to its demands, it will bring us down to the level of brute animals that obey not the dictates of reason but the impulse of their appetites.
A dying man may appear to have true and sincere sorrow for the wickedness of his past life. But is his sorrow true sorrow? The wailings of many careless Christians on their death bed do not proceed from sorrow but from fear. As St. Augustine says; They are not afraid of sin but of burning.
Our passions are not of themselves bad or hurtful. When regulated according to the dictates of reason and prudence, they do us no injury, but are, on the contrary, profitable to the soul; but, when disorderly, they are productive of irreparable mischief to those who obey them; for, when any passion takes possession of the heart, it obscures the truth, and makes the soul incapable of distinguishing between good and evil. Ecclesiasticus implored the Lord to deliver him from a mind under the sway of passion. Give me not over to a shameless and foolish mind (Ecclus. xxiii. 6). Let us, then, be careful not to allow any bad passion to rule over us.
One of the greatest causes of distress and anguish to the careless Christian at the hour of death is the remembrance of the bad use he made of the time he should have employed to acquire merits for Heaven, but which he used, alas, only to heap up punishment for himself in hell. Oh, that I had time to repair the past! Time shall be no longer!
In the Gospel for the Fifteenth Sunday After Pentecost the Mass reminds us that having received the Holy Ghost at the Feast of Pentecost and Jesus in Holy Communion, our souls and bodies should be moved by the Spirit and entirely obedient to the operation of the divine gift of the Eucharist, so that it be no longer our own nature but the effect of this sacrament that dominates in us (Postcommunion).
Let us tremble at the thought of relapsing into sin, and let us take care not to avail ourselves of the mercy of God to continue to offend Him. “He,” says St. Augustine, “Who has promised pardon to those who repent, has promised repentance to no one.”