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From: Wisdom 3:1-9

The death of the righteous

[1] But the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God,
and no torment will ever touch them.
[2] In the eyes of the foolish they seemed to have died,
and their departure was thought to be an affliction.
[3] and their going from us to be their destruction;
but they are at peace.
[4] For though in the sight of men they were punished,
their hope is full of immortality.
[5] Having been disciplined a little, they will receive great good,
because God tested them and found them worthy of himself;
[6] like gold in the furnace he tried them,
and like a sacrificial burnt offering he accepted them.
[7] In the time of their visitation they will shine forth,
and will run like sparks through the stubble.
[8] They will govern nations and rule over peoples,
and the Lord will reign over them for ever.
[9] Those who trust in him will understand truth,
and the faithful will abide with him in love,
because grace and mercy are upon his elect,
and he watches over his holy ones.

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Commentary:

3:1-4:20. This passage describes at some length the contrasting situations of
the righteous and the ungodly in this life, in death, and beyond the grave. The
author has consoling things to say to the righteous as regards afflictions; they
have every reason to hope. But evildoers he describes as foolish; theirs is a fun-
damental error which will cause them grief now; any suffering they experience
will do them no good; their death is grievous and so is what lies beyond it: “Two
possibilities are laid open to us at the same time: life and death – and each per-
son will come to the end that befits him. Life and death are like type types of
coin, one belongs to God and the other to this world, each with its own hallmark:
unbelievers deal in the currency of this world, and those who have remained faith-
ful through love carry the coin of God the Father, which is marked with Jesus
Christ. If we are not ready to die for him or to imitate his passion, we will not
have his life within us” (St Ignatius of Antioch, Ad Magnesios, 5, 2).

3:1-9. These very poetic lines convey very well the notion of the reward that
awaits the just in the after-life, but they are not very specific about it. The author
uses expressions that correspond to the time in history and Revelation in which
he lives, but they do enable us to get an idea of the state of the blessed: “The
souls of the righteous are in the hands of God, and no torment will ever touch
them” (v. 1); the righteous dead are “at peace” (v. 3), that is, in the sphere proper
to God; they can be sure of immortality, athanasia (v. 4). They will abide in the
Kingdom of God forever and share in God’s power to judge and rule (v. 8; cf. Mt
19:28) – a pointer to their power of intercession. One could say that the most en-
couraging line of all is, “the faithful will abide with him in love” (v. 9). Still to come
is the explicit New Testament revelation which tells us that the blessed “shall
see God as he is” (1 Jn 3:2), not as in a (dull) mirror but “face to face”; they will
know him as he knows them (cf. 1 Cor 13:12) and they will be with Christ forever
in heaven (cf. 1 Thess 4:17).

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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.

From: Romans 5:5-11

Reconciliation Through Christ’s Sacrifice, the Basis of our Hope

[5] And (this) hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured
into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

[6] While we were yet helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. [7]
Why, one will hardly die for a righteous man—though perhaps for a good man one
will dare even to die. [8] But God shows His love for us in that while we were yet
sinners Christ died for us. [9] Since, therefore, we are now justified by His blood,
much more shall we be saved by Him from the wrath of God. [10] For, if while we
were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more,
now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by His life. [11] Not only so, but
we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have
now received our reconciliation.

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Commentary:

1-5. In this very moving passage God helps us see “the divine interlacing of the
three theological virtues which form the backing upon which the true life of every
Christian man or woman has to be woven” (St. J. Escriva, “Friends of God”, 205).
Faith, hope and charity act in us in turn, causing us to grow in the life of grace.
Thus, faith leads us to know and be sure of things we hope for (cf. Hebrews 11:
1); hope ensures that we shall attain them, and enlivens our love of God; charity,
for its part, gives us energy to practise the other two theological virtues. The de-
finitive outcome of this growth in love, faith and hope is the everlasting peace that
is of the essence of eternal life.

As long as we are in this present life we do have peace to some degree—but with
tribulation. Therefore, the peace attainable in this life does not consist in the con-
tentment of someone who wants to have no problems, but rather in the resolute-
ness full of hope (”character”) of someone who manages to rise above suffering
and stays faithful through endurance. Suffering is necessary for us, because it
is the normal way to grow in virtue (cf. James 1:2-4; 1 Peter 1:5-7); that is why it
is providential (cf. Philippians 1:19; Colossians 1:24) and leads to joy and happi-
ness (1 Thessalonians 1:6).

“A person who hopes for something and strives eagerly to attain it is ready to
endure all kinds of difficulty and distress. Thus, for example, a sick person if he
is eager to be healthy, is happy to take the bitter medicine which will cure him.
Therefore, one sign of the ardent hope that is ours thanks to Christ is that we
glory not only in the hope of future glory, but also in the afflictions which we suf-
fer in order to attain it” (St. Thomas Aquinas, “Commentary on Romans, ad.
loc.”).

A person who lives by faith, hope and charity realizes that suffering is not some-
thing meaningless but rather is designed by God for our perfecting. Perfection
consists “in the bringing of our wills so closely into conformity with the will of
God that, as soon as we realize He wills anything, we desire it ourselves with
all our might, and take the bitter with the sweet, knowing that to be His Majesty’s
will [...]. If our love is perfect, it has this quality of leading us to forget our own
pleasure in order to please Him whom we love. And that is indeed what happens”
(St. Teresa of Avila, “Book of Foundations”, Chapter 5).

5. The love which St. Paul speaks of here is, at one and the same time, God’s
love for us—manifested in His sending the Holy Spirit—and the love which God pla-
ces in our soul to enable us to love Him. The Second Council of Orange, quoting
St. Augustine, explains this as follows: “To love God is entirely a gift of God. He,
without being loved, loves us and enabled us to love Him. We were loved when
we were still displeasing to Him, so that we might be given something whereby
we might please Him. So it is that the Spirit of the Father and the Son, whom we
love with the Father and the son, pours charity into our hearts” (Second Council
of Orange, “De Gratia”, Canon 25; cf. St. Augustine, “In Ioann. Evang.”, 102, 5).

6-11. The friendship which reigned in Paradise between God and man was fol-
lowed by the enmity created by Adam’s sin. By promising a future redeemer,
God once more offered mankind His friendship. The scale of God’s love for us
can be seen in the “reconciliation” which the Apostle speaks about, which took
place on the Cross, when Christ did away with this enmity, making our peace
with God and reconciling us to Him (cf. Ephesians 2:15-16).

The petition in the Our Father, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those
that trespass against us”, is an invitation to imitate the way God treats us, be-
cause by loving our enemies “there shines forth in us some likeness to God our
Father, who, by the death of His Son, ransomed from everlasting perdition and
reconciled to Himself the human race, which before was most unfriendly and
hostile to Him” (”St. Pius V Catechism”, IV, 14, 19).

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.