by Br. Alexis Bugnolo

God has not created us for this world, but has intended us to be capable of the world to come. He has graced us beyond all graces in raising us to the dignity of His adopted sons in Baptism and in saving us from the servitude of Satan by the power and grace merited by His Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, upon His Cross.

Thus, let us not fear more the death of the body, than the death of the soul.

The body is born once and it will die.

But the soul is created by God and will exist forever.

Ours is the choice of whether to have a soul which will be eternally dead and damned, burning in the inferno of Hell with Satan.

Or, to have a soul which will be eternally alive and blessed, beholding God face to face in the beatitude of Heaven, with the joyous company of Jesus, Mary, Joseph, and all the Angels and Saints.

If we, at the contemplation or consideration of our own mortality, can naturally incline to sadness at the only thing worthy of it in this world: losing the companionship of our loved ones in this world, we should tamp that down, with the consideration, that if we but die as God’s friends in the state of grace, we shall be taken into a much more perfect communion of the Saints, who are closer to our loved ones than we can ever be in this world.

For the faithful Catholic, physical death is not the end, nor is life in the world to come to be presumed.

We must confess all our mortal sins and repent of all our sins. We must do penance and good works and atone for our wrong doings.

But let us never fail in our hope in the God Who had descended from Heaven and died for us and called us into the wonderful Kingdom of His Love, apart from which there is no salvation: which Kingdom in this world is the Catholic Church.

After death comes only judgement, in life there is yet abundant mercy.

Let us live in such a way as to merit, not a demotion or end in death, but a promotion and ticket to the greatest party and feast in all the universe: the Empyrean Heaven.

I thank you all for praying for me, but pray more for the graces to continue or begin in such a life of hope. If God be knocking at my door, it is a knock I have been waiting for from my youth, and preparing. May God have mercy upon me, and may my Lady receive my sacrifice.