[Pearls Episode 144: Bringing Sunday into the workweek.]
We’re coming to the end of the liturgical year and yesterday’s readings (and next Sunday as well) are reflective of the End Times (the period leading up to Christ’s Second Coming).
On Friday we looked at three particular events that some associate with the End Times – the tribulation, the chastisement and the warning.
- Tribulation: An extended period (perhaps 7 years) of trials and suffering. There will be great persecution of the Church and overall societal collapse.
- Chastisement / Great Purification: A period of 3 days of darkness, patterned on the Passover. The wicked will be pruned and it will be dangerous for believers to leave their home or even look out of windows.
- Warning / Illumination of Conscience / Mini Judgement: A brief period (perhaps 15 minutes) when even time will stand still and everyone on earth will see their life as God sees it – particularly their sins. This will lead to mass conversion, but many whose hearts are truly hardened toward God won’t survive the experience. It may be accompanied or followed by a great sign or miracle.
Today we look at a fourth event – the Era of Peace (aka Triumph of the Immaculate Heart, Eucharistic Reign, Era of Divine Will and other names besides).
Scripturally, this concept is often associated with Revelation Chapter 20, which states that after Jesus defeats satan the souls of the just “came to life and they reigned with Christ for a thousand years.”
The Catholic interpretation of Revelation 20 is that it is symbolic, and the “thousand years” simply represents a long period of time between Christ’s victory over satan on the Cross and Christ’s final coming. Thus, the traditional view is that we are currently living in the “thousand-year reign.”
Other interpretations are conceivable, but it must be emphasized that the Church strictly condemns “milleniarism” – the idea that following some manner of tribulation, Christ will institute something of a utopia on earth, separate and apart from His second coming.
The Era of Peace (or Triumph of the Immaculate Heart) is particularly associated with Marian apparitions such as this prophesy from Fatima, “The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me, and she shall be converted, and an era of peace will be granted to the world.” This prophetic statement isn’t necessarily in conflict with the Church’s condemnation of millenarism. It could simply be that Mary was informing us a period of general peace and stability in the world if we respond to her requests to consecrate and convert Russia.
Other claims about the “thousand-year reign” become more problematic. Perhaps most so is the so-called “Era of Divine Will” based on the private revelations to Luisa Piccarreta and Fr. Iannuzzi. The revelations to Luisa are still under review. But the “Divine Will” movement that has sprouted up seems to be a form of milleniarism, anticipating not only an era of peace, but a time when we will relate to and reign with God in a new way, while still on this earth. And now we’re veering off into New Ageism.
So, what to make of all this?
First, there may well be a period of peace in our future that will follow our present tribulations. That may be what Mary was speaking of at Fatima. This is also reminiscent of the prediction of Pope Benedict (then Cardinal Ratzinger) that the Church will go through great persecution (internal and external) and come out much smaller, but also purified.
Second, the whole point of an Era of Peace is that the peace is forged by people being converted to Christ. Christ is always our unifying principle; always the source of peace. For that reason we need not wait to for the uncertain arrival of some prophetic era. We can get a taste of that now by recommitting ourselves to our conversion and finding solid Christian community.
In fact, every Sacrifice of the Mass should be a small experience of the Era of Peace. Whatever else is going on in the world, in the sacred space of the Mass we enter into a guaranteed source of peace.
When we commit ourselves to a community of brothers and sisters in Christ – what do we experience when we’re together? An Era of Peace.
When we live our life according to God’s will for us, what do we experience? An Era of Peace.
When we follow the Church’s seasonal rhythms of days of penitence and feasts and ordinary time, what do we experience? An Era of Peace.
The Era of Peace is first and foremost an interior reality. Don’t take our word for it, here is St. Bernard of Clairvaux:
“We know that there are three comings of the Lord. The third lies between the other two. It is invisible, while the other two are visible. In the first coming, He was seen on earth, dwelling among men…In the final coming, “all flesh will see the salvation of our God, and they will look upon Him whom they have pierced.” The intermediate coming is a hidden one; in it only the elect will see the Lord within their own selves, and they are saved. In His first coming, our Lord came in the flesh and in our weakness; in this middle coming, He is our rest and consolation. In case someone should think that this middle coming is sheer invention, listen to what our Lord himself says: “If anyone loves me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him.”
St. Bernard speaks of “the elect” – which is to say all men and women of good will who give their lives to Christ. And when the good Saint mentions Christ coming to us and being “our rest and consolation” – what is that if not an interior Era of Peace – which is available to all of us, in the here and now.
Blessings on your journey with Christ –
Steve and Karen Smith
Interior Life