"Knowest thou not that the benignity of God leadeth thee to penance?" Rom. 2:4
FIRST POINT
God is Merciful, but He is also Just
We read in the parable of the cockle, that the servants of the good man of the house, seeing that it had grown up in the field along with the wheat, wished to pluck it up. Wilt thou, said they, that we go and gather it up? [Matt. 13:24] No, replied the master; suffer it to grow up, and then it shall be gathered and cast into the fire. In the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers: Gather up first the cockle, and bind it in bundles to burn. [Ibid. 30] In this parable we see, on the one hand, the patience with which the Lord treats sinners; and on the other, the rigor with which He chastises the obstinate. St. Augustine says that the devil deludes men in two ways, by despair and hope. After the sinner has offended God, the enemy, by placing before his eyes the terror of Divine justice, tempts him to despair; but before he sins, the devil encourages him to sin with the hope of Divine mercy. Hence the Saint gives to all the following advice: "After sin, hope for mercy; before sin, fear justice." He who abuses God's mercy to offend Him, is undeserving of mercy. God shows mercy to those who fear Him, but not to those who avail themselves of His mercy to banish the fear of God from their hearts. Abulensis says that he who offends justice may have recourse to mercy; but to whom can he have recourse, who offends mercy itself?
It is hard to find a sinner so sunk in despair as to wish for his own damnation. Sinners wish to sin, without losing the hope of salvation. They sin and say: God is merciful, I will commit this sin, and will afterward confess it. They say. observes St. Augustine, "God is good, I will do what I please." Behold, the language of sinners: but, O God, such too was the language of so many who are now in Hell.
Say not, says the Lord, that the mercies of God are great; that however enormous your sins may be, you will obtain pardon by an act of contrition. And say not: The mercy of the Lord is great: He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins. [Ecclus. 5:6] Say it not, says the Lord; and why? For mercy and wrath quickly come from Him, and His wrath looketh upon sinners. [Ibid.] The mercy of God is infinite; but the acts of His mercy, or His mercies are finite. God is merciful, but He is also just. "I am just and merciful," said our Lord to St. Bridget; "but sinners regard Me only as merciful." St. Basil writes that sinners wish to consider God only as good and merciful. To bear with those who avail themselves of the mercy of God to offend Him, would not, says Father M. Avila, be mercy, but a want of justice. Mercy is promised, not to those who abuse it, but those who fear God. And His mercy, said the Divine Mother, to those that fear Him. [Luke 1:50] Against the obstinate, threats of just retribution have been pronounced; and, says St. Augustine, as God is not unfaithful to His promises, so He is not a liar in his threats.
Beware, says St. John Chrysostom, when the devil, not God, promises you Divine mercy, that he may induce you to commit. sin. "Never attend to that dog that promises to you the mercy of God." "Woe," says St. Augustine. "to him who hopes in order to sin." Oh! how many, says the Saint, has this vain hope deluded and brought to perdition! "They who have been deceived by this shadow of vain hope cannot be numbered." Miserable the man who abuses the mercy of God to offer new insults to His majesty! St. Bernard says that Lucifer's chastisement was accelerated, because he rebelled against God with the hope of escaping punishment. King Manasses sinned; he afterward repented, and obtained pardon. His son Ammon, seeing that his father's sins were so easily forgiven, abandoned himself to a wicked life with the hope of pardon: but for Ammon there was no mercy. Hence, St. John Chrysostom asserts that Judas was lost because he sinned through confidence in the benignity of Jesus Christ. In fine, God bears, but He does not bear forever. Were God to bear forever with sinners, no one would be damned: but the most common opinion is that the greater part of adults, even among Christians, are lost. Wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are that go in thereat. [Matt. 7:13] According to St., Augustiue, he who offends God with the hope of pardon is a scoffer, not a penitent."
But St. Paul tells us that God does not
allow Himself to be mocked. [Gal. 6:7] To continue to offend God as
often
and as long as the sinner pleases, and afterward to gain Heaven,
would be to mock God. For
what things a man shall sow, those also he shall reap. [Ibid. 8] He that sows sin, has no
reason to hope for anything
else than chastisement and Hell. The net with which the devil drags
to Hell almost all Christians who are damned, is the delusion by
which he leads them into sin with the hope of pardon. Sin freely, he
says to them; for, after all your iniquities, you will be saved. But
God curses the man that sins with the hope of mercy. The hope of
sinners after sin is pleasing to God, when it is accompanied with
repentance; but the hope of the obstinate is an abomination to the
Lord. [Job. 11:20] As the conduct of a servant who insults his master
because
he is good and merciful, irritates the master, so such hope provokes
God to inflict vengeance. Affections and Prayers
Ah, my God! I have been one of those who have offended Thee because Thou wert bountiful to me. Ah, Lord! Wait for me, do not abandon me. I am sorry. O infinite Goodness! for having offended Thee, and for having so much abused Thy patience. I thank Thee for having waited for me till now. Henceforth I will never more betray Thee, as I have hitherto done. Thou hast borne with me so long. that Thou mightest one day see me a lover of Thy goodness. Behold, this day has, I hope, arrived: I love Thee above all things, and esteem Thy grace more than all the kingdoms of the world: rather than lose it, I am ready to forfeit life a thousand times. My God! for the love of Jesus Christ, give me holy perseverance till death, along with Thy holy love. Do not permit me ever again to betray Thee, or to cease to love Thee. Mary! thou art my hope: obtain for me this gift of perseverance. and I ask nothing more.
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