The spiritual and corporal works of mercy, the pontiff said, “remind us that faith finds expression in concrete everyday actions meant to help our neighbors in body and spirit: by feeding, visiting, comforting and instructing them. On such things will we be judged, —(Pope Francis)
People are afraid of the concept of judgment. One reason is that we get stuck on human judgment, which at its best is iffy. What does it mean that we will be judged by how we live out the showing mercy through corporal acts? I believe that when we die, we are simply what we are. We show it by the fruits of our lives. There can be so subterfuge, no hiding, no making of excuses. In fact that would be impossible. We can make excuses while alive because we are often in conflict and pulled this way and that. Yet in our depth, we either have hearts of mercy open to grace and others, or we over time grow into the opposite. If we have not love, we are left too ourselves. There will be no desire for communication with none but our-selves.
Our lives are important. God is love, so eternal life is to be filled with the love of God, of others and of our selves. The unconscious, what is hidden becomes manifest and because of that we will embrace that and freely go to where we belong. The grace and love of God will only fill us if we want it. In death we will see the depth of our being. While alive, only God sees that. Judgment is self judgment and by that I mean that which pours contempt on another human being. This is a difficult reality to ponder, but to deny it I think short circuits our need to seek to understand what we in fact may never comprehend fully.
Br. Mark Dohle, OCSO
Holy Spirit Monastery
