A SERMON ON ANTICHRIST.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIX, Issue 6, 7 November 1890, Page 5

A SERMON ON ANTICHRIST.

FATHBB Cboke-BobISSON, who is at present engaged in delivering a course of Sunday evimna; sermons in the church of Our Lady, Groveroad, Sl.S 1 . John's Wood, devoted lid discourse ou Suu.iay evening last, Bayß the Catholic Times of the 29th cf August, to considering thtnature of Antichrist, spoken of in bt. Paul's second Epistle to the Tbessalomans as " ibe man of sin, the son of perdition." M-iuy people had thought that Antichrist was not to be a man at all, but that the term was simply an expres-tioa for the spirit of opposition. the instinct of rebellion, the culminating disobtdieiice which the world was to witness before its end. All <he spiritual writers and Commentators of Holy Scripture were agreed that this was not so. Of course tbe principle of lawlessness was tue pnucip.e on which he would work bis basis, aa it were ; but there was some bing more than that. Ag<in, some men had said ihat An ichrist w >uid be - n incarta'ion of the devil Sometimes we he^rd people ta king of the devil incarnate, meaning an exceedingly wicked person, but we were forbidden to believe suck a thing possible as that the devil would ballowed to parody or to imitate tbe sacred incarnation of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. He could not think that God would allow the devil to take euch possession of a human being. There were limitations to the power of the Evil one. For instance, he could not read our thoughts ; he could not foretell tbe future. Bt. Theresa said she was more afraid of those people who were afraid of the devil than she was of the devil himself. There were people foolish enough to imagine that the Pope must be Antichrist. How was it, they asked, that the Scriptuial meaning of Antichrist looked so very much like something to do with _ ome, the scarlet woman of Babylon, the seven hills of Home, and so on. Cardinal Newman, with Lis usual acumen and ingenuity, answered these people by saying that as tbe very name of Antichrist signified a bad imitation of Christ, and as ibe lepresentative of < hiiit wi.b a Rome, An lcbr Bt would BUiely make lor Home, as the headquarters of the Ci ris ian w rid. A bad shilling was very like a good oae, aud no doubi Aiitichust would be » ver> m ce^iul p,.rod> ot Chn.t. They knew t a in the Guildhall of ibe Uiiy of London ih le were two coloscal figures— Gog and Magog, lhf idtal r< presented by those statu s went Lack about three thousand years to the- foundation of the City of Londor, bnt the dictionaries which told us that (Jog and Magog were medisav .1 heroes weie a little abroad. We must go back to Geneßiß io find that Gog was one cf the gra osons of JSloab. Fuitber on, in I Porahpomenori, »c found a menti n of Magog in chapter I In a chapter of Itsechiel devoted entirely to tbe subject of Antichrist, we found Antichrist repiesented b> Gog ana Magog and their descendants. Daniel took up the subject and represented them under the very same names c.6 ti e arch-enemtte of God's religion. Going on to the Apocalypse we found them again, and found also the culminating enmity against the Church of God. The Catholic interpretation of this was that b]l through the history of the world — some thought from tie time of Cain, but certainly from the time of this eon of Japhet, the son of Noah, after the Flood, up to the present time — the devil bad had hiß oiabolical parody of religion. Gog was Anuchiißt, and IVj agog was his army. What were we io learn fiom tbe Concurhus of these pur-sages of bcripture, and from the Fathers, and the commentators of bcnpiuie? First, that Antichrist would be a man, an ordiuary individual, iv his nature like to any other man born of woman. He would probably have the bltßsiLg uf God upon him in B ptism, and he would have a guardian ang 1. Ah Bt. Augustine Sbid, there was no need to dive down into fccnptuie for hidden meaningß when the literal interpretation was clear, and thertf.-re Antichrist would be a man. bt. Paul clkd him '• the man <)f am." All were agreed, too, that tlin mau would be a JV.w. and certainly this was mobt probable. We knew what an i xraoi-imary hatred the Jews bad fur Our Lord. The r« anon was btcaube ihey dehbe.atel}, wi<h their eyes wide open, cabt Him <_£E, and we knew that the veil waß npon their eyes as the judgment ot God. N. Xt, nil w. re agreed that this man would be borne of the people, in obscuiity, but that he would be gifted with the most extraordinary powers of intellect, and all the graces and qualifications that could secure followers he would po&se88 in the most consummate degree. He would win his way upwards by tbe force of his character and by virtue of his splendid endowments, and gradually work his way up to be a great king. He was spoken of as a king, and his empire was to be the woild. His seats of power would most lik> ly be first Babylon, then Jerusalem, and afterwards Borne. Next, he would be thu founder of a new religion, and by his extraordinary powers he would convince the whole woild that he was the Messias that whs louked lor, and that the person who came into the world as the true Messian was an imposter. He would succeed in persuading the greater part of the world that he was their saviour, and he would be worshipped as a Divine being. His powers of delusiin and misinterpretation would be so coi summate that he would be able to flood the world with vice undt r the appearnnceof virtue As regards the sixth commandment, tor instance, he would succeed by his extiaordinary mgenoi y in persuading the world that the laws of our Divine Lord on that point were oui of place, that they were too severe for human needs, and ought to be abolished. He would turn wrong into right in the most seductive way. Daniel made use of a very remarkable expression. He said this man of sin would above everything else in the world stop tbe daily sacrifice. The next question that occurred was — What would be tbe <S. ct of tbu retg of Antichrißt on the Church of God ? It would be most disastrous. Th greater part of Christendom would fall away Tbev wou.d leave thu Church ol God on all sides, deluded by th.- deceits of the imposter, and omy a small remnant would nmain with tbe Head (>f the Churcb. But even though none but the Pope himself should be l^ft, the gates of hell would not have prevailed. Übi Petrus, ibi ecclesia, and just as Noah himself when he built the ark, w«s tbe cole possessor of Uod's benediction, so will be tbe Pope. Our Lord Himself for told that multitudes should fall away from the Faith, and tben came tba remarkable passage ; Nevertheless, wh«n the Son of Man comet b,

shall Hp, think you, find fa'th on the earth ? There was a forecast of enormous, almost total d. fctivi from the tJhurch. Only a small remnant would be It f c with Peter. Tbe Hier-wchy oi the Church cou d never be abolished. The mints would be mirtyrnd, especially those two saints who had not yet seen denth, Enoch and Bliaa. Th j y wouM come on e.nh in tbe ex'remn triumph of Antic'iriwt, and by their preac mg w^uld convert th .ÜBinds of soule to tbe Faith once more, and would tben be martyred by a cruel death. Notwithstanding ,11 the r effort«, A itichrim would remain in almost perfect dotni ion over the world for thro • and a-half years, and then Our Lord would jouie in the glory of His Majesty, and would drive An ichrist away for ev< r. In the Apocalj pse we were told that Antichrist would be cast down alive into hell.