Antichrist and the Conversion of the Jews

 

From the Book by Fr. Charles Arminjon, The End of the Present World and the Mysteries of the Future Life. First published in 1881.

 

“Reading this book was one of the greatest graces of my life”. (St Thèrésa of Lisieux)

 

Second conference

 

The Persecution by the Antichrist

and the Conversion of the Jews

 

And then that wicked one shall be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus shall kill with the spirit of His mouth and shall destroy with the brightness of His coming. (Cf. 2 Thessalonians 2:8)

 

The world will have an end. This is a truth we have established, and which faith and reason alike prove.

 

The end of the world, and the subsequent final coming of the Son of God, will happen unexpectedly, with the rapidity of lightning, rending the clouds as it darts from east to west.

 

However, precisely when that day will come is a secret, hidden in the depths of the divine intelligence. We know neither the day nor the hour, and Jesus Christ, the ambassador of the Divinity on earth, tells us that He has been explicitly commanded not to disclose them to us.

 

Accordingly, all the options that learned and pious personages at different periods have permitted themselves to express on this question are no more than personal, private sentiments, assertions resting on mere conjecture, the error and futility of which has been demonstrated more than once by events.

 

St Cyprian and Tertullian,¹ considering the fury of the persecutors and the violence of the war of extermination waged to the utmost against the Christians, designated these calamities and all these horrors as signs of the proximity of the last judgement.

 

“The end of the world is not far off,” said St John Chrysostom.^{2 “}The earthquakes and the chilling of charity are, as it were, the forerunners and omens of that terrible event.”

 

We all know that, at the time of the fall of the Roman Empire and the social disillusion that accompanied that great cataclysm and, subsequently, at the beginning of the year 1000 of the Christian era, people believed they were close to the period foretold, and thought they were seeing the prelude of the final destruction in the public disasters and collapse of institutions.

 

Earlier, in the time of St Paul, the same terror had gripped people’s minds. Visionaries and leaders of factions interpreted the word of St Matthew’s Gospel in a grossly literal sense. Convinced that the destruction of the world would follow closely upon the destruction of Jerusalem, they indulged in a rash of extravagant predictions, filling people’s imagination with horror. They drew men away from the fulfilment of their civil and religious duties, invited them not to marry, not to build, but to abandon themselves to a mind-softening inertia, while awaiting the catastrophe that was to strike them.

 

St Paul felt obliged to correct these beguiled and erring souls, and said to them, “We beg you, brothers, not to be so easily agitated or terrified… into believing that the day of the Lord is here… since the mass apostasy has not yet occurred nor the man of lawlessness been revealed – that son of perdition and adversary who exalts himself above every so-called god proposed for worship, he who seats himself in God’s temple and even declares himself to be God.”³

 

Here, then, is a definite, fact, given by the Holy Spirit and clearly announced by St Paul, in order to dispel the fears to which some were abandoning themselves, and to help faithful Christians guard against false systems and uncertain, hazardous predictions.

 

What is clear and undeniable from the passage we have just quoted is that, before the end of the world, there will appear on earth a profoundly evil man, invested with a quasi-superhuman power, who, challenging Christ, will wage an impious and foolish war against Him. Through the fear this man will inspire, and particularly, by his stratagems and seductive genius, he will succeed in conquering almost the entire universe; he will have altars erected to himself and will compel all peoples to adore him.

 

Will this strange man, unique in his evil, be one of our race? Will his face have the features of man, and will the same blood as ours flow in the veins of this ringleader of error and corruption? Or, as some have understood, will he be an incarnation of Satan, a demon thrown up from hell, and disguised in human form?

 

Or again, as other Doctors have maintained, is this wicked creature just a myth, an allegorical personage, in whom Holy Scripture and the Fathers intended to portray, in a single image, the totality of tyrants and persecutors – to set out prominently the collective image of all the wicked and all the heretics who have fought against Christ and His Church, since the beginning of time?

 

These various interpretations cannot be reconciled with the definite, precise text of the Sacred Books. Almost all the Doctors and Fathers, St Augustine, St Jerome, and St Thomas,⁴ clearly maintained that this terrifying malefactor, this monster of impiety and depravity, will be a human person. The learned Bellarmine shows that it is impossible to give any other meaning to the words of St Paul and those of Daniel 11:36–37.⁵ St Paul designates this great adversary by a noun, calling him a man: “the man of sin, the son of perdition.”

 

Daniel informs us that the Antichrist will attack all that is holy and worthy of respect, exalt himself boldly against the God of gods and consider as nothing the God of his Fathers: “Is Deum partum suorum non reputabit.”⁶ The apostle Paul adds that Christ will kill him. All these various aspects and characteristics evidently cannot be applied to an ideal, abstract being; they can fit only an individual of flesh and blood-a real, definite personage.

 

The Fathers and Doctors endeavoured to ascertain the origin of the Antichrist, and to discover from what parents and race he will come. They unanimously expressed the opinion that he will be born of Jewish parents, and some declare that he will be of the tribe of Dan. Such is the interpretation they give of the passage of Genesis, “Let Dan be a snake in the way, a serpent in the path”;⁷ and of this other one from Jeremiah: “The snorting of his horses was heard from Dan.”⁸ They also surmise that St John, in Revelation, failed to mention the tribe of Dan through hatred of the Antichrist.

 

But all these suppositions are uncertain. What seems beyond doubt is that the Antichrist will be of Jewish birth. St Ambrose, in his commentaries on the letter to the Thessalonians, says that he will be circumcised. Sulpicius Severus, in book II of his Dialogues, says that he will compel all his subjects to submit to circumcision.

 

Moreover, all concur in saying that at the beginning of his reign he will succeed, by means of his trickery and fame, in making the Jews believe that he is the Messiah whom they have unceasingly awaited, and they, in their blindness, will hasten to receive him and honour him as such. That is how Suarez and most of the commentators interpret this saying of our Lord Jesus Christ, in St John 5:43: “I have come in my Father’s name, and yet you do not accept me; but let someone come in his own name and him you will accept.”⁹

 

The same meaning must be given to these other words of St Paul to the Thessalonians: “because they have not opened their hearts to the truth in order to be saved. Therefore God is sending upon them a perverse spirit which leads them to give credence to falsehood.”¹⁰ Now, is it is likely that the Jews would acclaim as Messiah a man who did not belong to their race, and had not been circumcised? The Antichrist, then, will be a Jew.

 

Will he be born of an illegitimate union? The theologian Suarez tells us that it is uncertain. Nevertheless, it may be presumed that a man so utterly evil, so opposed to Christ in his life and morals, will have an infamous origin; and, just as Jesus Christ had the Immaculate Virgin as His mother, so we may conclude, by analogy and induction, that His avowed adversary will be born of an impure union, and will be the offspring of an unchaste woman. “He will be a child of fornication,” says St John Damascene, “and his birth will be saturated with the breath and spirit of Satan.”¹¹

 

What may be safely asserted of this man of iniquity is that, right from his most tender years, he will be completely possessed by the spirit and genius of the Devil. The lion of the abyss, which, in the last ages of mankind, God will unleash in His inscrutable justice in order to punish the infidelity of men, will unite himself with him in a certain way, infusing him with the fullness of his evil. No doubt he will not be deprived of the assistance of his guardian angel, nor of the necessary help of sufficient grace, which God bestows in this life upon every single man;¹² but his hatred of God will be so violent, his aversion for every good work so invincible, and his association and commerce with the spirit of darkness so close and continual that, from his cradle to his last breath, he will remain immutably hostile to all divine invitations, and grace from above will never penetrated his heart.

 

St Thomas tells us that, in his person and his works, he will reveal himself as the reverse of the son of God, and will parody His miracles and works.

 

Since his origin, the evil spirit has ever pursued one single goal: to usurp the place of the Omnipotent God, to form a kingdom for himself here below, in compensation for the kingdom of heaven from which he is excluded by his rebellion; and, says Tertullian, the more surely to attain this goal, he is in the habit of making himself the ape of God, counterfeiting all His works.

 

The adversary of the last times, then, will not only set himself up as the avowed, personal enemy of Jesus Christ: he will aim openly to dethrone Him, to replace Him in the homage and veneration of men and have directed to himself the worship and glory that are due to the Creator alone. He will declare, says St Thomas, that he is the supreme, eternal being, and, by virtue of this, he will ordain that honours and a cult of worship shall be accorded him. Thus, he will have priests, he will have sacrifices offered to him, he will demand that his name should be invoked in oaths, and that men should use it to guarantee the security of treaties: Ita ut ostendens se tanquam sit Deus.¹³

 

In order to lend greater credence to this belief, he will counter the divine revelation with false revelations; in opposition to the ceremonies of divine worship, he will set up its own impious rights; and, against the eternal Church founded by Christ, he will constitute an abominable society, of which he will be the leader and pontiff. St Thomas adds that, just as the fullness of divinity dwells corporally in the Incarnate Word, so the fullness of all evil will dwell in this terrible man, whose mission and works will be but an imitation in reverse, and an execrable counterfeit, of the mission and works of Christ.

 

Through him Satan will put the seal on his wickedness. He will make this living figure the quintessence, as it were, of all the sinister schemes he has formed against mankind, and will not cease to arouse in him the burning, implacable hatred of God that moves him; and the Lord of heaven, in His hidden councils, will allow this firebrand from hell to prevail for a time.

 

St Thomas characterises this delegate of Satan by calling him “caput omnium malorum”:¹⁴  the prince and instigator of all the covetousness of the flesh and all the aberrations of the mind – so much so that the masters of lies and the architects of evil who have followed one another in the course of the ages will seem, by comparison with this man, mere pygmies beside a giant. Thus, he will repeat the infamous deeds of Nero: he will be filled with the hatred and violence of Diocletian; he will have the cunning and duplicity of Julian the Apostate; he will resort to intimidation and will bend the earth beneath his sceptre like Mohammed; he will be a learned man, a philosopher, a skilful orator, outstanding in the arts and in the manufacturing sciences; he will handle mockery and ridicule like Voltaire. Lastly, he will work wonders, and rise into the air and like Simon Magus.¹⁵

If you ask why Divine Providence will allow him to exercise such power and seduction, St Paul the Apostle gives us the reason: “Because they have not opened their hearts to the truth in order to be saved. In punishment, God is sending upon them a perverse spirit which leads them to give credence to falsehood, so that all who have not believed the truth but have delighted in iniquity will be condemned.”¹⁶ Suarez says that God will permit the coming of the Antichrist particularly in order to punish the incredulity of the Jews. The latter, not having wished to worship the true Messiah, nor to be convinced by His doctrine and miracles, God will permit, for their punishment, to be attached to a false Messiah, accord credence to his impious deeds and doctrine, and follow him in his dissolute life.

 

At that time, the peril for souls will be great, and the scandal of the contagion universal. Nevertheless, in order that those who are taken by surprise may not attribute their misfortune to anyone but themselves, the Holy Spirit has sought to give us an outline in advance of the principal stages of that terrible, decisive trial, the climax of all those that mankind has undergone.

 

First of all, in order to make us understand the violence and ferocity of the man of sin, and the skill with which he will conduct the war he has undertaken against the saints, St John the apostle depicts him in Revelation 13 under the figure of a monstrous beast, having ten heads or diadems on his horns and, written on each of these diadems, the name of a blasphemy. According to interpreters, these ten heads and ten diadems signify ten dependent kings who will be his lieutenants and will act as executors of his trickery and cruelty.

 

Moreover, St John tells us that he will be invested with absolute sovereignty, and that his power will extend over all tribes and peoples, over men of every nation and language.¹⁷

 

As he succeeds in overcoming the saints by a persecution carried to the extreme limit, he will simultaneously give free rein to all kinds of licentiousness, and there will be no freedom except for evil.

 

Lastly, he will be a master in the occult sciences and in the art of magic, and, through the agency of demons, he will perform wonderful deeds, which deluded men will take for true miracles.

 

The first of these miracles mentioned by St John will be an apparent resurrection. In one of the wars where the Antichrist will appear as if mounted on a chariot of light and fire, he will be mortally wounded in the head. For a time he will be seen lifeless, apparently dead. Then, suddenly, he will rise, and his wound will be instantaneously healed. At the sight of this the deluded men, the unbelievers and free-thinkers of that time who, like those of our own day, lacking any faith in the supernatural and in revealed truth, will spurn miracles as implacably condemned by science and reason – these men, I say, will reinforce faith in the hoax. They will exclaim, with enthusiasm and admiration, “Who is like unto the beast? Who shall be able to fight and conquer the beast?”

 

Secondly, the man of sin will make fire come down from heaven, in order to create the belief that he is the master of nature, the ruler of seasons, and that he has dominion over the sky and the stars.¹⁸

 

Thirdly, he will make a statue speak; demons will use a tree or a lifeless piece of wood as an instrument, with whose aid they will utter the fabrications and false oracles. Pieces of furniture will also be seen to move and run around of themselves, mountains will change their position in an instant, and demons, transformed into angels of light, will appear in the air.

 

Then, by an incomprehensible judgement of God, the freethinkers and the great sceptics of the last times will take these impostures and conjuring tricks seriously. Duped by their own presumption and credulity, they will plunge headlong into all the follies of necromancy and divination, thus vindicating, in the face of the world, the oracle of the Sacred Books: “the spirit distinctly says that in later times some will turn away from the faith and will heed deceitful spirits and things taught by demons.”¹⁹

 

Lastly, it is written that the pride of the man of sin will be boundless. He will open his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme His Name, His tabernacle, and the saints in heaven. Daniel says that he will think himself entitled to abolish the customs of the times and the laws.²⁰ That is, he will suppress feast days and Sunday observance, alter the order of months and the length and division of weeks, and remove Christian names from the calendar, replacing them with the emblems of the lowest animals. In a word, this counterfeit of Christ will be an atheist in the full sense of the term. He will make away with the Cross and every religious symbol; as Daniel again declares, he will substitute abominable rights for the Christian sacrifice in every church. Pulpits will be silent; teaching and education will be lay, compulsory, and godless. Jesus Christ will be banished from the child’s cradle, from the altar where spouses are united, from the bedside of the dying. Over the whole surface of the earth, worship of any god other than this christ of Satan will not be tolerated.

 

In his impenetrable designs, God will allow men to undergo this supreme, terrible trial in order to teach them how great the power of the Devil is, and how immense their own weakness; He desired to announce it is to us so that we might prepare ourselves even now to sustain it by having recourse to Him through prayer, and by providing ourselves with the spiritual weapons of charity and faith. In addition, the Antichrist is destined to bring out, in its splendour, the fidelity and constancy of those whose names are written in the Book of Life, those whom all his violence and wiles will not succeed in daunting.

 

On the other hand, it is certain that the duration and bitterness of this persecution will make it the ultimate criterion for discerning the elect from the reprobate since it will also be the ruin of many whose perseverance will fail; thus, it will be a test “destined to be the downfall and the rise of many…so that the thoughts of many hearts may be laid bare.”²¹

 

Apostasies will be numerous, and courage will become rare. It is written that the powers of the heavens will be shaken, and the stars of the firmament will fall. In other words, the leaders of peoples will be seen to bend the knee before the reigning idol, and, what is still more lamentable, among the dispensers of science, the luminaries of theology, and the golden tongues of sacred eloquence, a large number will abandon the truth and let themselves be carried along with the current of depravity.

 

Again, St John speaks of a strange, mysterious character that all, “both small and great, rich and poor, slaves and freemen,”²² will be forced to have on the right hand or on their forehead; this mark will be a sign of apostasy, attesting that all those who bear it, whether to please the master, or escape his wrath, have renounced the true Christ and enlisted forever under the banner of His enemy.

 

Those who bear this degrading mark will enjoy the advantages of fortune in abundance; they will have the high salaries, the public offices, and the multiplicity of pleasures and of all desirable possessions: but those who refused to clothe themselves with this abominable seal will be outlawed. It is written that “no man might buy or sell anything unless he was first marked with the name of the beast or with the number that stood for its name.” All those who do not have this mark will be forbidden to draw water from the public fountains, and will even be unworthy to open their eyes to the light of day and breathe the pure air of the heavens.

 

“Those days will be more filled with anguish than any from the beginning of the world until now or in all ages to come.”²³ The just will be dishonoured and despised; they will be called fools and disturbers of the peace; they will be accused of trampling upon honour and patriotism, by refusing to acclaim the greatest man ever to have appeared in the world, the incomparable genius who has raised human civilisation to the zenith of perfection and progress.

 

If the just were not to be sustained by a special assistance from God, there would not be a single one who could withstand the violence of such temptation: Ita ut in errorem inducantur (si fiery potest) etiam electi.²⁴

 

In the dreadful days of the great French Revolution, there were still some havens, places of safety open to convicts and outlaws. The countryside was sane; there were impenetrable forests and hidden, isolated paths. However, in the period we are engaged in describing, science and human discoveries will have reached their zenith. Every mountain will have been bored. There will be no more rocks or caves, islands or deserts, where freedom can expect a refuge. The home itself will no longer be safe: for it said that “brother will hand over brother for execution and likewise the father his child. ^“25

 

It is not usual for the Sacred Books, when they reveal the future to us, to go into such precise, minute detail. The prophets speak to us only enigmatically, and in abbreviated form. In general, they limit themselves to marking out the main lines of future events. However, so far as the final combat waged against the saints is concerned, the inspired Apostles have followed the maxim mala proviso minus feriunt (“evils foreseen do less harm”); and they have neglected nothing that might strengthen the just during those days of trial and great calamity.

 

Thus, they teach us that, at that time, the East will once more become the focal point of politics and human affairs, and that the impostor, possessed with the blind, maniacal passion to desecrate the holiest places (those that have been the scene of the labours and suffering of the God-Man), will establish his royalty at Jerusalem. For our consolation, they tell us that God will shorten the duration of his power, limiting it to forty-two months, or three and a half years. ²⁶

 

The number given in the Sacred Books probably does not express the length of time the man of sin will need in order to conquer the earth and reach the zenith of his omnipotence. It is not reasonable to suppose that, even with the aid of the superhuman and satanic powers that will be at his disposal, he will be able to become master of the earth in a single day. It is to be supposed that he will attain the fullness of the sovereignty only gradually, and will require a long period to subdue the nations and envelop the whole world in the murky web of trickery and seduction. All we know from St John and Daniel is that his dominion over men “of every race, tribe, and language” will subsist “usque ad tempus, et tempora,et dimidium temporis” – that is, one year, two more years, and half a year. Daniel tells us, “From the time when the perpetual sacrifice shall be taken away and the abomination of desolation shall reign in the holy place, a thousand two hundred ninety days will have elapsed. ²⁷ Hence, it follows that the point when Christ will no longer be present on our altars, offering Himself as a victim to His Father’s justice in order to offset men’s crimes, is to be reckoned from the day when the Antichrist has obtained universal dominion: only then will the unbloody Sacrifice of the Altar cease to be celebrated; but, until that day, and during the time taken by the Antichrist to achieve his kingship, the Sacrifice of the Mass will continue to subsist.

 

St John indicates the name of the Antichrist; but he deems it proper to tell us only in the form of numerals. We know that in various languages, numbers can be translated into letters of the alphabet and, conversely, the letters of the alphabet into numbers. So, St John tells us that, in a language he does not make known to us, the name of the beast is expressed by the number 666.

 

The Fathers and Doctors have laboured to discover the key to this mysterious number and to ascertain the name hidden beneath it, but the investigations have come to nothing. It is possible to imagine a vast number of names whose letters, according to the way they are put together, express the number indicated by St John. We cannot go beyond the view of St Irenaeus,²⁸ who assures us that the Holy Spirit presented the name of the Antichrist in the form of this enigmatic number, because He wanted its true meaning to remain unknown until the fulfilment of His prophecy, the day when it would be in the interest of men for the Antichrist to be revealed to them. Then, says St John, “he that hath understanding, let him count the number of the beast.” ²⁹

 

St Paul tells us that God is faithful, for he has made a pact with temptation and does not permit man to be tested beyond his strength. (1 Corinthians 10:13). Here, the temptation will exceed the normal conditions and laws of mankind. It befits the mercy of God that the remedy should be proportionate to the extent of the evil. Now, the means of succour foretold is the most superhuman and extraordinary, the most alien to the rules of history and the ordinary workings of Providence, of all those that heaven has sent man since the Incarnation.

 

Just when the tempest is at its most violent, when the church is leaderless, when the unbloody Sacrifice has everywhere ceased and everything seems humanly lost, two witnesses, St John tells us, will be seen to arise.

 

These two witnesses will be two strange men, appearing suddenly amidst the world, without anyone being able to say of what birth or origin they are, nor from what place or family they have come. This is how St John speaks of them in the eleventh chapter of Revelation:

 

I will commission my two witnesses to prophesy for those twelve hundred and sixty days, dressed in sackcloth. These are the two olive trees and the two lamp stands that stand in the presence of the Lord of the earth.

 

No tongue can express the sheer amazement that will grip mankind at the sight of these two men, strangers to our passions and affairs, one of them having lived six thousand years, the other thirty centuries, in some ethereal region or other, beneath firmaments and upon spheres inaccessible to our senses and understanding. Yet, neither of these witnesses is alien to the human family. One of these candlesticks and olive trees is Enoch, the great–great–grandfather of Noah, the direct ancestor of the whole human race. The other is the prophet Elijah, who, as the Saviour has said, is destined to restore all things.³⁰ He will come a second time to stem the tide of wickedness, more reckless and unrestrained that it was in the days of Ahab. It will also be the hour of the redemption of Israel. The great prophet will convince the posterity of Abraham that the Messiah has come, and will remove the veil of ignorance and darkness that has lain heavy upon their eyes for nineteen centuries.

 

What sort of appearance and bearing will these strangers from another age present? What venerable majesty will shine forth from their persons? What inspired language will flow from their lips? Holy Scripture does not tell us. It teaches us that they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth, their garments and features bearing the marks of humility and penance. According to Daniel, the persecution under the Antichrist will last for 1,290 days; so the preaching of Enoch and Elijah will be thirty days shorter. Hence, it follows that they would appear in the period when the persecution is unleashed with the greatest violence.

How, within the space of time set for the mission, will they manage to give their testimony in all inhabited places, and cover the whole extent of the earth? We answer that it will not be necessary for them to visit every town; it will be enough for them to appear in the principal ones, and for their preaching to be heard in the capitals and main centres of population where the Antichrist has been present and has exercised his most powerful fascination. Furthermore it is unlikely that Enoch and Elijah will be constantly together; it is more probable that they will preach separately, until, by a command from God, all following a providential inspiration, they suddenly come together for the supreme battle.

 

At first, no doubt, incredulous men will refuse to admit their identity. They will seek to lay hold of them, and punish them as tricksters and sham visionaries; public opinion will shower them with satirical barbs and mockery, and the organs of publicity will persist in ignoring them, and pretend not to know them. The persecutor, foaming with rage, will try to have them put to death; but, as long as their mission lasts, they will be guarded by a superior force. Here is what St John says:

 

And if anyone tries to harm them, fire will come out of the mouths of these two witnesses to devour the enemies. Anyone attempting to harm them will surely be slain in this way. These witnesses have power to close up the sky so that no rain will fall during the time of their mission. They also have power to turn water into blood and to afflict the earth at will with any kind of plague.³¹

 

The Gospel is not so specific about the result and efficacy of the mission of these two great witnesses; but it may be taken as certain that they will undeceive a large mass of the deluded, and bring back most of those whom fear or ambition had enticed from worship of the true God. Indeed their preaching will need to have a power that no other words since those of the Gospel have ever had, since it will overcome the obstinacy of the Jews, who, bowing to the lustre of the marvels and the evidence of the facts, will return beneath the staff of the Shepherd of shepherds, to form with the Christians one flock and one fold.³²

 

However, God gives His graces with due proportion. When the light has been given, when men have had all the time they need to distinguish truth from error, God, in His wisdom, will then suspend the miracle. That is how Providence invariably acts. So it was of old with Samson when, once the Philistines had been humbled and defeated, God took away from him His spirit and the stupendous strength with which He had endowed him. Heaven proceeded again in the same way with Joan of Arc: once her mission had been fulfilled, when she had routed the English and placed the crown back upon the head of Charles VII, her genius and military talent seemed to pale; she was taken prisoner and reverted to the normal circumstances of human life.

 

So shall it be in the case of Enoch and Elijah. Besides, the miracle, if prolonged, would have no other effect than to confirm in their obduracy those stubborn men who had refused to receive their words with a submissive ear and heart. In short, the two witnesses are not dead, although one of them is six thousand and the other three thousand years old, and it is necessary that they should seal their testimony by the shedding of their blood, and be subject to the law of human nature from which Christ Himself did not desire to be spared.

 

Here, then, is what will take place, says St John, in the chapter already quoted:

 

And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascends out of the abyss shall make war against them and shall overcome them and kill them. And their bodies shall lie in the streets of the great city which is called spiritually Sodom; where their Lord was crucified. And men, tribes, and people shall see their bodies for three days and a half; and they shall not suffer the bodies to be laid in sepulchres. And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them and make merry; and shall send gifts one to another, because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt upon the earth. And after three days and a half, the spirit of life from God entered into them; and they stood upon their feet; and great fear fell upon them that saw them… And at that hour there was made a great earthquake; and the tenth part of the city fell. And there were slain in the earthquake, names of men, seven thousand; and the rest were cast into a fear and gave glory to the God of heaven.³³

 

St John does not tell us what the fate of the Antichrist will be, but St Paul teaches that “the Lord Jesus will destroy him with the breath of His mouth and annihilate him by manifesting His own presence.” ³⁴

 

Some have concluded from this passage that Christ is to come down in person to strike His great adversary, and that this will be the day when He will appear in His glory and majesty. This interpretation is incorrect. St Thomas and St John Chrysostom explain the words quem Dominus Jesus destruet illustratione adventus sui (“whom the Lord Jesus will destroy with the brightness of His coming”) in the sense that Christ will strike the Antichrist by dazzling him with a brightness that will be like an omen and sign of His Second Coming. St Paul does not at all say that Christ will kill him with His own hands, but by His breath, spiritu oris suri (“with the spirit of his mouth”) – that is, as St Thomas explains, by virtue of His power, as a result of His command; whether, as some believe, executing it through the cooperation of St Michael the Archangel, or having some other agent, visible or invisible, spiritual or inanimate, intervene. What is certain is that Satan will be hurled back into the darkness of the abyss, the reign of the man of evil will be utterly destroyed, and his power, which aspired to extend up to the heavens, will vanish like a cloud of smoke.

 

Will the resurrection of the body and the Last Judgement follow close upon that great vent? Holy Scripture is silent on this point, and the Church has not wished to define anything. Among the interpreters of Holy Writ, some affirm it and others deny it. Suarez expresses the view that after the death of the Antichrist, the world will not subsist more than forty-five days. He bases his opinion on the prophecy of Daniel, who after announcing that the persecution by the man of sin will last for 1,290 days, adds these words: “Happy he who has hope and holds firm until the 1,335^th day.”³⁵

 

This opinion, however, does not seem to be the most certain. The most authoritative view, and the one that appears to be most in harmony with Holy Scripture, is that, after the fall of the Antichrist, the Catholic Church will once again enter upon a period of prosperity and triumph. In fact, does not St Paul, the inspired Apostle – of all the sons of Israel, the one who saw most clearly into the future and destiny of his people – seem explicitly to affirm this doctrine? Does he not affirm it when – recalling the effects of the grace and blessing obtained by the conversion of the Jews, who, in accordance with the prophecy of Malachi,³⁶ will not be brought back to the truth until they are enlightened by the preaching of Enoch and Elijah – he exclaims, moved by a holy transport: “If the fall of the Jews, which brought about the conversion of the Gentiles, was the strength of the Church and the richness of the world, how much more will their resurrection enrich the world; and if their loss has become the salvation of men, what will their return be if not a resurrection of the world from death to life?” ³⁷

 

These words are formal, and appear to leave no room for doubt. They are in harmony with those of St John: “I then saw… those who had won the victory over the beast and its image and also the number that signified its name… They sang the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb.” ³⁸

 

In other words, the Christians and the remnant of the Jews henceforth have only one spirit and one faith, they address the same praises and blessings to the Son of God and, together, proclaim His glory, saying, “Mighty and wonderful are Your works, Lord God Almighty! Righteous and true are Your ways, O King of the nations! ³⁹

 

It is really credible that the day when all people will be united in this long-sought harmony will be the one when the heavens shall pass away with great violence – that the period when the Church Militant enters her fullness will coincide with that of the final catastrophe? Would Christ cause the Church to be born again, in all her glory and all the splendour of her beauty, only to dry up forthwith the springs of her youth and her inexhaustible fecundity?

 

However, if it may be granted that, after the Antichrist, the end of the world will not come for some centuries still, the same cannot be said of the supreme crisis that shall bring about the great unity; for, if we study but a moment the signs of the present time, the menacing symptoms of our political situation and revolutions, as well as the progress of civilisation and the increasing advance of evil, corresponding to the progress of civilisation and the discoveries in the material order, we cannot fail to foresee the proximity of the coming of the man of sin, and of the days of desolation foretold by Christ.⁴⁰

 

Holy Scripture gives us three main features that will mark the dominance of the Antichrist. First, he will be emperor and absolute master of the universe. Secondly, he will have Jerusalem as his capital. Thirdly, he will be as clever as he is violent, and the war he will wage against the saints will be, primarily, one of deceit and seduction.

 

First, the Antichrist will be lord of the world. It is abundantly clear that the effect of all the events of the present time is to prepare the social setting in which the dominance of the man of sin will be exercised.

 

On the one hand, the railway has reduced barriers and triumphed over distance. The telegraph allows an oppressive ruler to transmit his orders from one point of the universe to the other with the instantaneousness of thought. Moreover, the peoples of the diverse races are mingling: Russian and American, Japanese and Chinese meet on the same ships, rub shoulders, and cross one another’s paths, in our great cities, and in the commercial centres of Europe, California, and Equatorial Africa.

 

Already, the distant peoples are adopting our inventions, casting rifled guns, and beginning to build armoured ships and arsenals. China – that vast empire swarming with people, where, each day, the seas and rivers engulf a huge excess of human beings whom the rich, fertile soil can no longer feed – she has her mechanics, her engineers, and is learning our strategy and industrial progress. Now, have our latest wars not shown that, at the present time, the issue of battles lies above all in numbers, and that, in armies, as in the realm of politics, what determines success and wins the victory is the brutal, inexorable law of superior numbers?

 

Thus, the hour bids to be not far off when these millions… who populate the east and north of Asia will have at their disposal more soldiers, more ammunition, and more military leaders than all other peoples; and the day can be foreseen when, having become fully conscious of their number and strength, they will hurl themselves in countless hordes upon our Europe, enfeebled and forsaken by God. There will then be invasions more terrible than those of the Vandals and Huns… Provinces will be pillaged, rights are violated, and small nations destroyed and ground down like dust. Then, a vast agglomeration of all the inhabitants of the earth will be observed, under the sceptre of a single leader, who will be either the Antichrist, or one of his immediate predecessors. That day will see the death of human freedom.

 

The unity of all the peoples will be rebuilt, for the last time, upon the ruins of all the suppressed nationalities. The empire of evil will be accomplished. Divine Providence will scourge the world, by subjecting it, body and soul, to one master… Who will be moved solely by hatred of men and contempt of God.

 

Accordingly, any careful observer of the events of the present time cannot escape the conviction that everything is being done to bring about a social environment where the man of sin, by combining in his person all the depravity and every false doctrine of his age, will be produced spontaneously and effortlessly, like the parasitical tapeworm that breeds naturally in gangrenous flesh and organs.

 

Yet the apparently incomprehensible thing that, at first sight, no sign seems to presage, is that the seat of his empire will be Jerusalem.

 

Well, it is easy to see that, if the materialistic, atheistic civilisation, whose impending coming the freethinkers and the irreligious press are always predicting, ever dawns on the world, its centre of action and seat of public power will be Jerusalem.

 

In fact, when the Christian Faith has finally died out in the hearts of men – when pleasure and well-being have become the gods of the day-human activity will then have a single goal: the power of the state; one single lever and stimulus: public opinion; one inspiration and driving force: and this stimulus, this sinew, this driving force, will be gold. Gold will take precedence over religion and morality, becoming the basis of politics and the keystone of all institutions. The pontiffs and kings will be the financiers; and the people who possesses the most gold will be the ones who will soon exercise the greatest control over us.

 

Now, after fifty centuries of existence, nineteen of them in misfortune, a certain people is found everywhere, scattered in every quarter of the globe, meeting on the most distant shores, mingling with the whole human family, still enduring, still in search of their Messiah, dreaming of rebuilding their temple and, despite all changes and upheavals, unshakeable in their homogeneity and in the pursuit of their goal.

 

It must be said, in justice to them, that they are an active, temperate, and hard-working race. If we speak of them, we do so in the abstract and solely from the point of view of their destiny and of their providential and historical mission… this people of illustrious ancestry, which has given to the world Christ, the Apostles, and the Immaculate Virgin.

 

We, Christians and the children of Israel, are closer to one another than we think. As one well-known speaker has said: Christianity is Judaism with its apex; Judaism is Christianity without its apex.

 

Nevertheless, the facts are there, and it is impossible for the Christian philosopher to ignore or disguise them… Judaism is really a confessional faith and doctrine grafted onto one nationality and race. All other peoples – Frenchmen, Italians, Germans, Spaniards – if they live for a certain time subject to the same government and form of administration, if they are ruled by the same laws and institutions – do not take long to merge, unite their interests, mix their blood, and acquire the same aspirations and patriotic spirit. The Jew is not able to be integrated: he is planted among the other peoples in the position of a tenant, as a famous writer has said; or, rather, he considers himself an exile and captive amidst the other nations. Instead of a real motherland, he has only an ideal  motherland, Palestine. Jerusalem is the only permanent city for which he yearns. In his speeches and writings, on every page of his newspapers and reviews, he manifests the hope he has never ceased to cherish of rebuilding a new, Jewish Kingdom, either at Jerusalem or in the surrounding area…

 

…Now, if we take Israel as a whole, leaving aside the men of that nation who have fallen into rationalism and unbelief, the nucleus of the Jewish race have not ceased to nourish the same illusions we have just indicated: still expecting a Messiah, whom they continue to see as a powerful conqueror who will subdue the earth. Not long ago, one of the most authoritative exponents of the Talmud dared to say, “A new messianism must be born; a Jerusalem of a new order, set reverently between East and West, must replace the twofold city of Caesars and Popes.”⁴¹ Furthermore, it is an established fact that the majority of orthodox believers have retained, as their slogan and watchword, the remark once uttered by a famous rabbi: “Jerusalem is still the pivot of our hopes and of our faith.”

 

Now, it is improbable that, in social conditions like ours, in which the most dreadful and unforeseen events loom up with the rapidity of steam and lightning, there may live a man who will take advantage of the chaos into which our revolutions will have cast us, and succeed in beguiling the masses and gaining mastery over minds and hearts; then, pledging himself to regenerate mankind, will send out a rallying cry to which all his co-religionists will respond, thus achieving the conquest of universal power, a stupendous dominion over minds and bodies, a dominion accepted enthusiastically by the universality of misled, seduced peoples?

 

Lastly, may we not believe that this powerful and wicked man, who will imprison the world in the jaws of an indescribable, unrestrained despotism and unify the human race through the enslavement of consciences and humbling of spirits, will be the personage portrayed and predicted by St John as the Antichrist, and that he will be the man whom Divine Providence has desired to use in order to undeceive Israel, who will at first have claimed him as her Messiah and King?

 

Finally, what will be the characteristic marks of the persecution under the Antichrist? Its main features have been described by Cornelius à Lapide and Suarez, in accordance with Scripture and the Fathers.

 

At the outset, what is certain and should be taken in faith is that, of all the persecutions the Church has had to suffer, that of the Antichrist will be the most terrible and the most violent.

 

First, because this persecution will be general, and will extend over the whole earth. It is written: “They spread over the whole country and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city. “⁴²

 

St Augustine, in book 20 of the City of God, explains this text from St John by saying that all the infidels, heretics, sectarians, and the  depraved men, scattered over the surface of the earth, will unite with the Antichrist to make war on the saints and to persecute those who are faithful to God.

 

Secondly, this persecution will be the most severe and violent of all because it will be inspired not by superstition or fanaticism, nor by a blind attachment to the worship of idols, as were the persecutions unleashed by the pagan emperors. Its purpose will not be to assuage pride, or to satisfy an unbridled lust for power, like the persecution of Mohammed. Nor will it be roused by the unrestrained lusts of the flesh and by the lure of plunder, like the one to which the German princes subjected the Church under Protestantism and in the lifetime of Luther. It will be a persecution inspired solely by hatred of God, in which God and His Christ will be directly challenged, and its sole objective will be the extermination of the divine kingdom, the complete annihilation of Christianity and of all positive religion. Thus, the Tiberiuses, Neros, and the most frightful tyrants of paganism at least acknowledged an apprehension and, as it were, a distant reflection of the divinity in the idols, which they sought to compel the Christians to adore; but, in the times of which we are speaking, it will no longer be permissible to accord even a modified and corrupted adoration to any divinity. All men without exception will be forced to honour and render occult worship to Satan himself, personified in the Antichrist – that is, in the most evil and abominable man that humanity has ever produced.

 

Thirdly, this persecution, which will mark the last ages, will be waged with an irresistible seductiveness, “insomuch as to deceive (if possible) even the elect.” ⁴³ Cornelius à Lapide says, “He will excel at all the crafts, forms of guile, and practices of politicians.” At first, the Antichrist will convince the Jews that he is the Messiah. In order to deceive them the more successfully, he will hide behind a mask of moderation and feigned holiness. When St Paul tells us that he will have himself worshipped in the temple of God, he seems to imply that he will rebuild the temple of Jerusalem, utterly destroyed by Titus; consequently, he will prescribe circumcision and, for a time, restore the bloody sacrifices and the other rights of the Judaic religion.

 

As for those who are foreign to the Jewish religion, he will draw them to himself, first, by persuasion and eloquence. He will be skilled in artifice and will be taught by the Devil himself all knowledge useful for the ends for which the evil spirit destines him. St Anselm tells us that he will be acquainted with all the natural sciences and will know all the sacred texts by heart. ⁴⁴ In the second place, he will win men over by lavishing gold and riches. He will be the wealthiest person on earth. Satan will deliver to him all the treasures concealed in the bowels of the sea and in the hidden depths of the earth. ⁴⁵

 

Fourthly, he will fill all men with admiration by his genius, and by the amazing rapidity of his elevation to the heights of fortune and omnipotence. As for the ignorant and the multitude, he will fascinate them by marvels, cujus est adventus secundum operationem Satanae,in omni virtute et prodigis mendacibu – “whose coming is according to the working of Satan, in all power, and signs, and lying wonders.”⁴⁶ St Thomas says that, just as Christ worked miracles in confirmation of His doctrine, so also the man of sin will work false miracles in confirmation of his errors; and just as the true Christ worked wonders by the power of God, the author of all truth, so, too, His adversary will work as we have indicated above, by the power of Satan, the father of fraud and lies.

 

Thus, the man of sin will not perform true miracles, like Jesus Christ, but will perform false and apparent ones. All his wonderful works will be, in reality, mere illusions and works of fantasy; so that, as St Athanasius⁴⁷ says, when he appears to resurrect a dead man, either the man whom he resurrects will not really have been dead, or else, if he had been dead, he will not really be restored to life.

 

Lastly, the same saint continues, the works performed by the Antichrist that appear to transcend the laws of nature will not be miracles in the true sense, but effects and phenomena of the physical order, performed through the intermediary of certain secret, hidden, and natural causes.  In order to better captivate men, the Antichrist will permit lasciviousnessand the licentiousness  of the flesh, and will stimulate the most intoxicating pleasures, totus erit in libidinbus et concupisceentiis feminarum – “he shall follow the passions and lust of women.” ⁴⁸

 

Fifthly, the persecution under the Antichrist will be the bloodiest and most barbarous of all those which Christianity has ever suffered. Jesus Christ so assures us, when He says, “For those days will be more filled with anguish than any from the beginning of the world until now or in all ages to come.”⁴⁹ This can be surmised if we refer back to two causes. The first is the vast power and the stupendous instruments of force and destruction that the Antichrist will have at his disposal and, with these, the evil and fury of the men appointed to execute his commands. The second will be the terrifying wickedness of the Devil, because in those days, says St John, God will allow him to leave the fiery prison where he is chained, and will give him full permission to seduce and satisfy his hatred of the human race.⁵⁰ Whence it follows, says St Cyril, that there will then be multitudes of martyrs, more glorious and admirable than those who formally fought with lions, in the amphitheatres of Rome and Gaul.

 

These had to struggle against mere agents of the Devil, but the confessors of the last ages will have to struggle against him who is a murderer from the beginning. To torment them, the old enemy will practice monstrous tortures with unheard-of refinements, unparalleled in past centuries, which the human mind could never have contrived to invent by itself.

 

Finally – the last feature of the persecution under the Antichrist – it will be so violent that it will succeed in making almost the entirety of Christians apostatise. “And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them.” ⁵¹ For, as I watched, that horn made war against the holy ones and was victorious…” ⁵² St Paul informs us that Christ will not return until the great apostasy has come.⁵³ Interpreting these words of the apostle, St Augustine tells us that if, in every age, we have seen believers renounce Christ on account on the wiles of heretics and the fear of persecutors and tyrants, nevertheless the defection that will take place under the Antichrist is called the apostasy, properly speaking, because, in number and extension, this apostasy would exceed all that has been in previous times.

 

However, it would not be correct to conclude from this testimony that there will be none of the elect left on earth, and that the Son of God will fail to keep the promise made to His Church, when He said, Propter electos, dies breviabuntur (“because of the elect, the days will be shortened”). Moreover, St John, in his revelation adds, “And he [the beast] will be worshipped by those who dwell upon the earth whose names are not written in the book of life.” ⁵⁴

 

St Augustine tells us that, in the reign of the Antichrist, there will be multitudes of martyrs who will display a heroic constancy, and also a number, more or less large, of confessors who will manage to escape into caves and high or sheer mountains, and God will see to it that these sanctuaries shall elude the vigilance and investigations of the persecutors, and will not permit the Devil to point them out to them. Daniel tells us that, at the time when this terrible persecution breaks out, the abomination of desolation will openly sit enthroned in the holy place. “The King shall do as he pleases,” says Daniel. “He shall exalt himself and make himself greater than any god; he shall utter dreadful blasphemies against the God of gods… He shall have no regard for the gods of his ancestors… for no god shall he have regard.” ⁵⁵

 

In other words, once the man of sin has crowned the human race by his threats and entangled it in the meshes of his lies and wiles, he will observe no restraint, and show his hand, and act openly. He will not permit anyone to worship or invoke any other god than himself, and will proclaim himself sole lord of heaven and earth. Wherever he is not present in person, men will be obliged to pay homage to his image or statue: Et elevabitur, magnificabitur adversus omnem Deum. ⁵⁶ He will tolerate neither the Mosaic religion, nor natural religion itself. He will persecute with equal thoroughness Jews, schismatics, heretics, deists, and every sect that recognises the existence of a supreme being and the immortality of the life to come. Yet God, in His wisdom, will draw good from evil. The horrible tempest that His justice has allowed to be unleashed upon the earth will result in the disappearance of false religions. Along with Judaism, it will abolish the remains of Mohammedanism, idolatrous superstitions, and every religion hostile to the Church.

 

It will deal the finishing blow to the sects of darkness. Freemasonry, Carbonarism, Illuminism, and all subversive societies will vanish in the vortex of wickedness which will be their work, and which they had prepared for centuries in the belief that it would be their  definitive, supreme triumph. They will have assisted unintentionally in the establishment of the reign of unity foretold by our Lord: “There shall be one flock then, and one shepherd. ⁵⁷

 

The triumph of the wicked one will be of short duration, but the consolations that follow will be universal, abundant, proportionate to the extent of the tribulations the Church will have suffered.

 

However, the final consummation will not come yet as it is written:

 

And then the seventh angel blew his trumpet, and loud voices in heaven cried out; the voices of angels and of virgins, together with the voices of confessors and holy martyrs, will hail Christ with praise and acclamations, giving thanks for His victory over the Antichrist, and for the extermination of the wicked. All men, now become worshippers of one and the same God, all professing the same faith, united in the same adoration, sharing the same table, will exclaim in chorus, “The kingdom of this world now belongs to our Lord and to his Anointed One… We praise you, O Lord God Almighty, who is and who was and who are to come; because You have assumed Your great power, and You have begun Your reign.” ⁵⁸

 

 

Notes

 

¹             Tertullian (c. 160-225), ecclesiastical writer.

²        St John Chrysostom (c. 347-407) Archbishop of Constantinople and Doctor; named Chrysostom, or “Golden Mouth” for his eloquent preaching.

³             2 Thessalonians 2:1-4.

⁴             St Augustine (354-430), Bishop of Hippo and Doctor; St Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225-1274), Dominican philosopher, theologian, and Doctor.

⁵             St Robert Bellarmine (1542-1621; Jesuit Cardinal, teacher, writer, and Doctor), De Pontiface

⁶        Cf. Daniel 11:37: “He shall have no regard for the gods of his ancestors.”

⁷        Cf. Genesis 49:17.

⁸        Cf. Jeremiah 8:16.

⁹        John 5:43.

¹⁰           2 Thessalonians 2:10-11.

¹¹       St John Damascene, De fide orthodoxa.

¹³       Cf. 2 Thessalonians 2:4.

¹⁴       St Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, III, Q.8.

¹⁵       Cf. Acts 8:9-24.

¹⁶       2 Thessalonians 2:10, 11, 12.

¹⁷       Revelation 13:5, 8.

¹⁹       1 Timothy 4:1.

²⁰       Cf. Daniel 7:25.

²¹       Luke 2:34–35.

²²       Cf. Revelation 13:16

²³       Matthew 24:21.

²⁴       Cf. Matthew 24:24: “False messiahs and false prophets will appear, performing signs and wonders so great as to mislead even the chosen if that were possible.”

²⁵       Mark 13:12.

²⁶       Cf. Revelation 13:5.

²⁷       Cf. Daniel 12:11.

²⁸       St Irenaeus (c. 125-c. 203), student of St Polycarp, missionary, Bishop of Lyons, and Church Father.

²⁹       Cf. Revelation 13:18.

³⁰       It is clear from the context that, by the two candlesticks and two olive trees, St John does not mean any two saints or preachers, but two definite personages, endowed with an extraordinary power and holiness. Now-pondering all the facts and circumstances foretold to us about the life and death of these personages, and recalling all that we are told about them by Scripture, especially in Sirach, chapter 48 and by the prophet Malachi, concerning the mission they will one day be called upon to fulfil-Bede, St Anselm, St Augustine, and a large number of the Fathers assure us that that the two witnesses of whom Revelation speaks are none other than Enoch and Elijah, and that they were miraculously preserved from death for no other purpose than to fight against the Antichrist and bear testimony to Jesus Christ, at the end of the world.

³¹       Revelation 11:5-6.

³²       Sirach 48:9-10.

³³       Cf. Revelation 11:7-13.

³⁴       Cf. 2 Thessalonians 2:8.

³⁵       Cf. Daniel 12:12

³⁶       Cf. Malachi 3:23-24: “Lo, I will send you Elijah, the profit before the day of the Lord comes, the great and terrible day, to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers…”

³⁷       Romans 11:11-12: “I further ask, does their stumbling mean that they are forever fallen? Not at all! Rather, by their transgression salvation has come to the Gentiles to stir Israel to envy. But if their transgression and their diminishing have meant riches for the Gentile world, how much more their full number!”

³⁸       Revelation 15:2-3.

³⁹       Revelation 15:3.

⁴⁰       It is undeniable that all governments at the present time are at work accomplishing this abdominal operation of apostasy, and that they are striving to banish Jesus Christ from the school, the army, and from every abode of justice! Are not His Cross and His adorable name blasphemed and held up as a symbol of ignorance and fanaticism? Has not the Church been outlawed and excluded from the councils of governments and deliberative assembly? Are not all the laws that are formulated marked with the seal of odious intolerance towards her, and have they any other purpose than to diminish her authority and influence? Blasphemy is raised to the level of a privilege and a right. Parallel with the destruction of Christianity, we see the reappearance of paganism, in the form of base materialism, marked by the exhortation of all that flatters the senses, and the glorification of the basest and most brutish instincts; a paganism that pervades industry, the arts, and literature, and predominates in all public institutions. Christianity is declared to be the enemy, and at the same time materialism is presented to the aspirations of peoples as the moving force of progress, and the god of the future. Now, if the extremes of evil do not meet with a prompt and vigorous response, if the defection continues on its course, it may be predicted that this war on God must inevitably end in total, consummated apostasy. It is but a small step from the cult of the state-that is, the utilitarian and the worship of the god-state which is the religion of our time, to the worship of the individual man. We have almost reached that point… and, proceeding from these facts and observations, we must conclude that the hypothesis of the proximity of the Antichrist’s coming is more probable than the hypothesis that considers his coming as remote.

⁴¹       Archives Israelites.

⁴²       Cf. Revelation 20:8-9.

⁴³       Cf. Matthew 24:24.

⁴⁴       St Anselm (c. 1033-1109), Archbishop of Canterbury and Doctor.

⁴⁵       Daniel 11:43.

⁴⁶           Cf. 2 Thessalonians 2:9.

⁴⁷       St Athanasius (c. 297-373), Bishop of Alexandria and Doctor.

⁴⁸       Cf. Daniel 11:37.

⁴⁹       Matthew 24:21.

₅₀       Revelation 20:7-8.

⁵¹       Revelation 13:7.

⁵²       Daniel 7:21.

⁵³       2 Thessalonians 2:3.

⁵⁴       Revelation 13:8.

⁵⁵       Daniel 11:36-37. It is true that the prophet also intends, by these words, to depict the persecution by Antiochus and the fury against the Lord’s people which will fill this prince. Nevertheless as Suarez observes, Antiochus was only the image of the Antichrist, and the evils to which he subjected the faithful Jews are meant to be a brief outline of those which the Christians of the last days will endure.

⁵⁶       Cf. Daniel 11:36.

⁵⁷       John 10:16.

⁵⁸       Revelation 11:15-17.

 

The following appendices are not from Fr Arminjon’s book.

 

Appendix 1:

 

St John Chrysostom born 344 A.D. wrote in his homily on chapter 11 of

Romans: “Seeing the Gentiles abusing little by little their grace, God will recall a second time the Jews”.

 

“The Gentiles would be the believers whose faith has grown cold, or even that the totality deceived by the Antichrist, fall and are restored to their pristine favour by the admission of the Jews” (St Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans 11:15).

The “admission of the Jews” does not refer to the country of Israel as the majority of Jews do not live in that secular state but to Jews all over the world.

 

The Christian community is the “Israel of God” (Gal. 6:16). Admission to this community is through baptism not circumcision. St Paul calls baptism “circumcision according to Christ” (Col. 2:11-12).

Mount Zion is not the earthly Jerusalem but the “heavenly Jerusalem” (Heb. 12:22), the Jerusalem “above” (Gal. 4:26) and the “holy city” from Heaven (Rev. 21:2,10). St Peter using the words of Moses to the Jews at Mount Sinai (Exodus 19:6) refers to the Christian community as “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a consecrated nation, a people set apart” (1 Peter 2:9). Because “God does not have any favourites but anyone of any nationality who fears God and does what is right is acceptable to Him” (Acts 10:34-35).

 

 

Appendix 2:

 

Saints and Fear:

 

In recent times more Christians were martyred than in all the previous centuries put together. Perhaps we may be called to give our lives for the love of God like the many martyrs extolled in the Letter to the Hebrews, Chapter 11. For “they loved not their lives even unto death”. (Revelation 12:11)

 

All through 2000 years of Christianity we see the Holy Spirit coming to the help of Christian martyrs in their weakness. For example, one of the glories of the early Christian centuries, a young pregnant woman by the name of St Felicity (died in 203 A. D.), was in prison with St Perpetua awaiting martyrdom, and she cried out in labour pains on giving birth to a daughter. One of the soldiers taunted her thus: ‘If you feel so much pain now, what will it be like when you are thrown to the lions?’ She replied: ‘Now the suffering is mine. But when that happens, there will be someone else inside me suffering in my place, because I will be suffering for Him’ — the Spirit of Jesus.

 

Then there was the saintly Jesuit, Father Alfred Delp, who was executed by the Nazis in 1945, who wrote as follows: “Very often during the suffering and disturbance of these last few months, and bent down under the weight of violence, I have been conscious of a peace and joy invading my soul with the victorious power of the rising sun”. Joy and peace, of course, are fruits of the Holy Spirit.

 

St Peter, the first Pope, who died a martyr like every single Pope up to the fourth century. Wrote to his fellow suffering Christians in Rome during the persecutions: “My dear people, if you can have some share in the sufferings of Christ, be glad because you will enjoy a much greater gladness when His glory is revealed. It is a blessing for you when they insult you for bearing the name of Christ, because it means that you will have the Spirit of glory the Spirit of God resting in you”. (1 Peter 4:13)

 

The saintly Jewish-Christian pastor, Richard Wurmbrand, author of the best-selling book Tortured for Christ, would concur with St Peter’s sentiments when he wrote of his barbaric treatment at the hands of the Communists, and of the consolation of the Holy Spirit:

 

“One great lesson arose from all the beatings, torturing and butchery of the Communists: that the Spirit is master of the body. Often when tortured, we felt the torturing, but it seemed as something distant and far removed from the spirit which was lost in the glory of Christ and His presence with us… alone in my cell, cold, hungry and in rags, I danced for joy every night. Sometimes I was so filled with the joy (of the Spirit) that I felt I would burst if I did not give it expression”.

 

Sister Gilberte Bussiere, (76), kidnapped by the Islamic Boko Haram in 2014. “Our material deprivation was harsh. We had nothing besides our clothes”, she said. “But I found out that when you are deprived of everything, God looks after you and fills you with everything you may need. I never felt God’s presence as I did during my captivity. I never enjoyed more deeply the soothing power of God’s words, as well as the joy of prayer”. (Southern Cross, 10. 2.16)

 

We read in Holy Scripture:

(1) You will have in you the strength, based on His own glorious power never to give in… (Colossians 1:11)

(2) There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love”. (1 John 4:18)

 

“Neither prison nor chains nor sentence of death can rob a man of the faith and his own free will. God gives so much strength that it is possible to bear any suffering, a strength far stronger than all the might of the world. The power of God cannot be overcome”. Blessed Franz Jägerstätter (Franciscan layman)