Thought for the Day – 17 April – During this Season of Alleluias and Joy, we will consider Fr von Cochem’s Reflections upon our Heavenly Homeland.
Excerpts from THE FOUR LAST THINGS —- DEATH, JUDGMENT, HELL and HEAVEN
FR MARTIN VON COCHEM (1625-1712) OSFC
Nihil Obstat: Thomas L Kinkead, Censor Liborium
Imprimatur: Michael Augustine — Archbishop of New York (New York 5 Oct 1899)
PART IV
ON HEAVEN
III. On the Spiritual Joys of Heaven
WITH regard to the spiritual joys of the Redeemed in Heaven, they are in such great abundance that in speaking of them, one does not know where to begin or where to end!
Think of the spiritual consolations granted to eminent servants of God in this world.
We know concerning some Saints that their life on earth was more akin to the Angels than of men, so frequently were they favoured with ecstasies, visions, interior lights and Divine consolations of all kinds.
And yet, all these favours were but as a drop out of the boundless ocean of Celestial Sweetness.
What rapture it will be for holy souls in Heaven to drink from the fountainhead and draw freely from the inexhaustible Source of all felicity!
All the powers of the mind, the understanding, the memory, the will, the imagination, every thought, every desire, the whole intellectual being, elevated and perfected by God Himself, will be fully satisfied and will add to and heighten the joys of the soul.
With the understanding the blessed will behold all created things in the Light of God and thoroughly penetrate the secrets of nature.
It is recorded of King Solomon that “God gave to Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, as the sand that is on the seashore. And the wisdom of Solomon surpassed the wisdom of all the Orientals and of the Egyptians and he was wiser than all men.
He also spoke three thousand parables and his poems were a thousand and five. And he treated about trees from the cedar that is in Lebanon unto the hyssop which cometh out of the wall and he discoursed of beasts and of fowls and of creeping things and of fishes. And they came from all nations to hear the wisdom of Solomon and from all the Kings of the earth, who heard of his wisdom“ (3 Kings iv. 29-34).
We have never heard of wisdom equal to this, nor can we cease to wonder at the wide range and astuteness of this great King’s understanding.
Yet compared with the wisdom of the least of the Saints in Heaven, it ranks no higher than does the knowledge possessed by a child of 3 years old, beside the erudition and wisdom of the most learned of men.
For all the operations of nature, all the powers of the universe are open and revealed to the least of the Saints in Heaven.
Nothing is hidden or mysterious in his eyes. He knows all that the Holy Trinity has accomplished from all eternity, in how marvellous a manner the Heavens and the earth were created out of nothing, how wisely all has been ordered and maintained from the beginning to the end of time. He knows how the Son of God was begotten of the Father before all ages; he knows how the Holy Ghost proceeds eternally from the Father and the Son.
He knows how Christ was born of an earthly Mother without violation of her virginity; he knows all Our Lord accomplished and suffered throughout His whole Life and how each Saint and Servant of God lived for God and laboured in His service.
All which is mysterious and incomprehensible to us in the Holy Scriptures, the Mysteries of our Religion and of nature, he understands without a moment’s reflection.
Hadst thou been on earth but a simple, illiterate peasant, on thy entrance into Heaven thy eyes would be opened and thou wouldst see clearly and understand all things perfectly.
What joy, what happiness this knowledge and clear insight will be to thee.
What grateful thankfulness thou wilt render to God forever and ever!
AnaStpaul 