After my recent experience of two family members dying and by being blessed by God to witness their journey to heaven, I was reminded of a piece of scripture that has somewhat confused me over the years every now and then it pops up and leaves me head scratching.. “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.” Whilst I was attending my father in law in hospital and I watched and prayed with him the line popped in to my head, he was agitated and having a difficult time in his last journey and repeatedly told me that he did not like the person at the foot of his bed he was afraid of him and couldn’t get passed him, I spent some time reassuring him that all was good and to ignore it and trust in Jesus At the same time my brother in law was dying and I had the gracious gift to spend a night in prayer with him, his journey was quite peaceful and I was touched deeply by the way he prayed his words flowed to heaven beautifully and I was in awe how peaceful and ready he was to meet his God, As he was in his last hour he did become agitated but not in the same way, he sat up at one point and looked to the door of his room quite angry and powerfully he said “what do you want now” there was no one at the door “ go away he said” a few hours later he passed away. I was comparing their two deaths some time later and the line popped into my head again but this time it was immediately followed by the line ..Jesus stood up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more. I don’t know how to explain it but it just kind of fitted, I instantly knew that on both their death beds they had experienced the pathetic weasel taunting them, calling out their sins and failings in life it showed me just what this coward will do to put doubt into a believing soul,, what powerful words in that scripture when Jesus said “Neither do I condemn you” . We have great hope that at the time of our death if we manage to go through life with love and we stand before Jesus he will say “Child where are your accusers” we will reply “I don’t see any Lord” .. We must grasp every opportunity in this life to fix our wrong doings and make peace with our accusers View attachment 4935
Quis, When my grandmother passed she saw the bad smoking people...she would tell me to get them out of her room. I guess when your time is close, you are in between this world and the next. Thats why its so important to pray for those that passed. Maybe we can help them get over the hump Brother al
Yes John , people do seem to go through the works towards the end, hence the prayer; Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, I give you my heart and my soul. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, assist me in my last agony. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, may I breathe forth my soul in peace with you It seems to me that the devil can put forward to people a distroted summation of their lives. A kind of twisted version composed of a web of half truths . The aim of this is to make the person despair. If the person despairs the devil has won the End Game. This is the last throw of the dice for Satan and he throws all he can into it. Even through life the devil does this. A kind of song of negativity he sings in our ears. ..you are usless, all you do is usless, it is all pointless and so on. Even if he does not cause us to despair he can make things very misrable and he is happy with this. I think this is one of the many reasons why we need to be people of prayer, to counteract this negativity.
I think the old image of the devil whispering in one ear and the good angel whispering in the other is not so far out.
I have come to believe that the Ghost & Spirit Stories we have heard about are, in many, cases confused souls that are having difficulty reaching back to Jesus. I have only come to that conclusion as I've heard/read that in The Divine Mercy Message The Lord continues to reach out to recalcitrant souls for some undetermined length of time ... Oh!!! By the By! The Divine Mercy Message is one THAT IS APPROVED by The Catholic Church GOD SAVE ALL HERE!!
My dad spent about 6 weeks in the hospital dying. He said he did not like night time because the gobblins always came.
I think at he death bed is the devil's last chance so he is given special permission at this point to try people. St AMrgaret Mary Alocoque was given a very ,very hard time indeed by some of the nuns in her convent. To such an extent that a group of them dragged her out of her cell one night and beat her up screaming like demons. I cannot imagine what it must have been like of the saint in an enclosed convent with these women so full of hate and spite for her. Hell on Earth. They did not appear to like Margaret Mary because , basically she was of working class origins and did not come with w a dowry. Also , I suspect because Margaret was holy and kept the rules, living the religious life as it is supposed to be lived. So she was a constant rebuke to them. Anyway the death bed scene of one of these women, who as far as I recall was Mother Saumais was truly horrible with her seeing the devil around her bed viivdly for days and the poor woman screaming. The Sacred Heart told her she saved , thanks to Margaret Mary's prayers but would be in the deepest part of purgtory to the end of the World. Quite a thought.
There was another case in Serbia a few years back. A psychiatirst and prominent politican died. This gentleman had used his professional training in order to stoke up hate prior to and during the wars out there. Apparently people were afraid to go near his bedroom whilst he was dying the screaming was so bad as the devil stood by his bedside through it all. Orthodox clergymen in attendance witnessed to this. \ I think for myself the greatest consolation of all is devotion to Our Lady. As I think St Louis Grignion De Motnford testifies no one with a Devotion to the Blessed Virgin will ever be lost. http://www.ncregister.com/blog/jose...21-things-louis-de-montfort-said-about-the-r1 “If you say the Rosary faithfully until death, I do assure you that, in spite of the gravity of your sins you shall receive a never-fading crown of glory. Even if you are on the brink of damnation, even if you have one foot in hell, even if you have sold your soul to the devil as sorcerers do who practice black magic, and even if you are a heretic as obstinate as a devil, sooner or later you will be converted and will amend your life and will save your soul, if — and mark well what I say — if you say the Holy Rosary devoutly every day until death for the purpose of knowing the truth and obtaining contrition and pardon for your sins.”
My mother prayed a prayer daily consecration the last 2 hours of her life to Our Lady and her last 2 hours were very blessed. I didn't think she was dying but she had developed pneumonia that morning. She had suffered from Alzheimer's for the previous few years but was very with it and recollected. At 1pm I suggested we pray the rosary then we said the chaplet of DM. The priest showed up at 2.30pm and anointed her and at 3p.m. she breathed her last. She was completely at peace and lucid through it all. The particular prayer is on the back page of the Poets prayer book. I must start saying it myself.
Catholics did used to be taught to medidate on the Four Last Things; Death, The Last Judgement and Heaven of Hell. Which is why in paintings of the old saints you used to see beside pictues of them sitting a rather grizzly skull. In fact it was not uncommon for them to have a skull in their cell...ugh. We can't relate to this. But personally I do think about death. If you remeber in some part of you being that death is inevitable it puts al lthat we do in life into context. Life is rather like a supermaket , we can load up our trolleys as fullas we like but whn it comes to exit door we can't take any of the goodies with us. We can't take things with us , we can't take the what we are away we can only take the who we are. In other words the only thing we cna take out of the supermarket of life is our love. St Pauls say we should work out our salvation, 'In fear and trembling'. Philippians 2:12 Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed--not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence--continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, Why so? Well the whole world knows are sins , the only person who remains ignorant of them is we ourselves. We are the very last to know. We think we are wonderful and fine, great, but no one esle is fooled they can tell us our sins to the very last inch. Such is the nature of sin, its inner treachery. But on our death beds (if we are blessed enough) we will be given the final restauraunt bill and a chance to repent. if not so blessed we wil lgo to the dread Judgement Seat of God and pay the dues in Purgatory or Hell. So , personally I would be very,very uneasy about being smug and complacent. Better, far better to enter by the NArrow Gate. I ahve met souls in my life who were generally consider to be saints and who were in actual fact little balls of smug, self cnetred pride. So I think thoughts of this final restaruant bill should be always, to some extent, as St Paul says somewhere inmind. For we are, all of us, such liars to ourselves. The Cure of Ars, Patron Saint of Parish Priests and one of the most innocent, holy men who ever lived tells this story. One time in prayer he asked God to show him his full sinfullness. Within seconds he had to scream to God to stop. He said that if God had not stopped he would ahve died of fright and horror. Well if a great saint could react like this... Everybody knows but us; everybody knows but us, everybody knows but us.....
I didn;t realise you mother was dead, Mary? I belive I met her and said the roasry with her. I remember thinking how holy she was. What a good Catholic.
People who listned to St John wound him in tears, apparently you could hear a oin drop. But it was not so much his words but the way he said it, from the heart. It was what he was rather than his ideas, his essential holiness. An Anglican clergyman who visited Ars to meet St John out of curiosity said of him, 'I have met God in a man!' There is a wonderful, wonderful satue of St John in prayer at Ars which captures this holiness:
It is the same of couse with all the saints, it is not essentially what they said of what they did that touches and converts, it is what they were. That they were Holy. This is what made Padre Pio's masses so very,very special.
