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             Revised and republished on:  November 1-2, 2013

 

Suffering is the Only Path to Triumph

by Thomas A. Droleskey

There is only one path to become a member of the Church Triumphant in Heaven: the Cross. There is no other way for any soul to enter Heaven than by bearing his share of suffering which the Gospel entails. That is, there is no way for any of us to rejoice in Heaven in an eternal All Saints Day unless we are willing to pray for crosses so that we can pay back here in this life the debt we owe as a result of our forgiven mortal sins, our unforgiven venial sins and our general attachment to our sins and to our own disordered, narcissistic self-love. Saint John the Evangelist reminded us in The Book of the Apocalypse that God will vomit the lukewarm out of His mouth. Strong words? Yes. Strong words, though, that are meant to remind us that the pursuit of sanctity must be followed assiduously with every single beat of our hearts, consecrated as they must be the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary and to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Which was formed out of that Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart.

Death is going to come to each one of us. Apart from some mystics over the course of the centuries (and death-row inmates whose executions have been fixed for a date and time certain), no one knows the exact moment of his death. Not even a person with a terminal illness knows exactly when he is going to die. Rather than being fixated on when the world is going to end we must realize that our worlds can end at any moment. An accident. A stroke. A heart attack. A violent assault upon our bodies. We do not know the day or the hour. Thus, we must be ever ready, ever vigilant, if you will, to make an accounting of our lives at the moment of our Particular Judgments. Do we aspire to go to Heaven with every beat of our hearts. Do we think of Heavenly things? Do we want to participate in the glory of an eternal All Saints Day?

Today's feast, All Saints Day, celebrates the triumph of the souls who are participating for all eternity in the unending Easter Sunday of glory that was won for them by the Paschal Lamb's immolation on the wood of the Holy Cross. The souls in the Church Triumphant in Heaven are rejoicing before the glory and the radiance of the Beatific Vision of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost because they were willing to pay the price of admission through the Gates that had been reopened when Our Lord had breathed His last breath atop the heights of Golgotha on Good Friday.

Whether they suffered so perfectly in this life that they were purified perfectly by the moment of their deaths or had died in a state of sanctifying grace and then repaid what they owed in the Church Suffering in Purgatory, the souls in Heaven suffered to get there. Nothing impure, that is, nothing defiled by the slightest stain of a seemingly minor Venial Sin, can enter into Heaven. Every soul in Heaven got there because they we were willing to accept the Cross of the Divine Redeemer in their own lives, embracing it as the instrument of the redemption of all men and the particular means by which they could climb to such a stage of personal sanctity that they might have as close a place in Heaven to that of the Blessed Mother as possible.

Sanctity is the universal vocation of all men. Every single person on the face of this earth is meant to be a Catholic. Every single person on the face of this earth is meant to follow Our Lord through His true Church and thus to be fed with His very Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity in the Most Blessed Sacrament. Every person on the face of this earth is meant to make frequent use of the hospital of Divine Mercy that is the confessional. Every person on the face of this earth is meant to rely upon the maternal love and Heavenly support provided by Our Lady, who made possible our salvation by her perfect fiat to the Father's Will at the Annunciation. Every person on the face of this earth is meant to be in constant conversation with the members of the Church Triumphant in Heaven and the Church Suffering in Purgatory.

One of the things that we are supposed to learn over the years is that nothing we endure in this passing vale of tears that is the Church Militant on earth is the equal of what one of our leas Venial Sins caused Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ to suffer in His Sacred Humanity during His Passion and Death. The more we complain about the crosses we are asked to bear you see, the less merit we earn. The more we refuse to give to Our Lady's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart our patient endurance of the crosses that God Himself has fashioned for each of us from all eternity, therefore, will be the more that we are likely to lose chances for eternal merit, if not seek to anesthetize it altogether. An embrace of the Cross of the Divine Redeemer is thus meant to fortify us, especially as the Sacrifice of the Cross is re-presented in an unbloody manner clearly and unambiguously in the Immemorial Mass of Tradition. An embrace of the Cross is meant to have us forget--and I mean absolutely forget--the travails of this life in order to focus on the crown of glory that awaits us if we persevere until our dying breaths in states of sanctifying grace.

An irony of fallen human nature is that it is sometimes easier to endure larger crosses than smaller ones. It is sometimes easier to deal with a terminal disease or a chronic, debilitating illness than it is to suffer the barbs of calumny and misunderstanding directed at us by friends or associates, no less than by absolute strangers who have never met us but think that they are qualified to speak about our own lives. It is, though, in the patient endurance of these lesser, although certainly painful, crosses, that we can find a special union with Our Blessed Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Who was calumniated and misunderstood throughout His life, yes, even in His home town of Nazareth itself. Climbing the ladder of sanctity, which involves a lot of backsliding for those of us still stuck in the Purgative Stage of the spiritual life, involves coming to this important realization: the intentions of all hearts and the circumstances of all lives will be made manifest only on the Last Day at the General Judgment of the Living and the Dead. We must be content to wait until then for an "understanding" of our lives. It will be at that time and that time alone that all of the souls of the just will be reconciled one unto the other. The disputes and contentions and envies of the past will be wiped away. Growing in the spiritual life requires us to want to be misunderstood and calumniated, to be patient in the face of false accusations and humiliations, to pray fervently for those who misunderstand us and to forgive right readily just as we are forgiven by Our Lord in the Sacrament of Penance through the words and actions of an alter Christus, acting in persona Christi.

There is, of course, a much simpler way to put all of this: Our Lord loved us so much that He was willing to endure the scandal of the Holy Cross, heedless of Its shame, as Saint Paul teaches us, in order to pay back in His Sacred Humanity the debt of our own sins that was owed to Him in His Infinity as God. We must show our love for God by enduring the just suffering that He sends to us as a means to purify us and as a means of uniting us more fully with His own Holy Cross, giving more and more and more by means of His ineffable graces to His Blessed Mother's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart. If we say we love God, you see, we must prove it by our willingness to accept with absolute serenity and equanimity each and every cross, whether great or small, we encounter in our daily lives.

The path to sanctity that a soul travels as a member of the Church Militant on the face of this earth is fraught with perils. The devil prowls around the world like a roaring lion seeking the ruin of souls. He attempts to lay countless traps to ensnare us into the pit of lukewarmness and sloth. We must rely upon the intercession of the Queen of All Saints, Our Lady, and all of the angels and saints to help us to resist the wiles of the ancient adversary and his minions, especially by fleeing from all occasions of sin, withdrawing as far as is possible from a culture that is diabolically disoriented, and by remaining steadfast in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament and to the Mother of God as the twin pillars of our interior lives. We need to study the lives of the saints and to imitate their virtues. We need to rely upon their assistance from Heaven in the Church Triumphant so that we might join with them one day in an unceasing chorus of praise before the Throne of God Himself.

Unlike the sin of Presumption upon which Protestantism is founded, the true Faith, that is, the Catholic Faith, teaches us that none of us is assured of his salvation. It is possible for a person on the path to high sanctity to lose his soul. We must, therefore, work out our salvation in fear and in trembling, never taking anything for granted, understanding that to die in a state of Sanctifying Grace is itself a grace from God that we must pray to receive and then to cooperate with to the point of shedding blood. We must for this every single day of our lives without fail. No soul is saved until he perseveres to the end in a state of sanctifying grace. We must pray for grace of perseverance until the end.

Conversely, a person caught up in a lifetime of sin has no reason to commit the sin of Despair. It is possible for a great sinner to be converted and to scale the heights of sanctity, to become a great lover of God as He has revealed Himself to us exclusively through His true Church. The graces won for us by Our Lord and that come to us through Our Lady, the Mediatrix of all graces, are so powerful as to make the Sauls of our own day into new Saint Pauls, the Magdalenes of our own day into new Saint Mary Magadelenes, the hedonists and Manicheans of our own day into the new Saint Augustines, the cavalier seekers of adventure and luxury into the new Saint Francis of Assisis. No soul is lost until he or she dies in a state of final impenitence. We must for the conversion of sinners every day.

The prayer taught  in 1916 by the Angel of Fatima during his third apparition to Lucia dos Santos and her cousins, Francisco and Jacinto Marto, should be one that we memorize and recite frequently during the day, both for ourselves and for everyone in the world:

My God, I adore, I hope, I trust and I love Thee. I ask forgiveness for all those who do not adore, do not hope, do not trust, and do not love Thee.

Oh Most Holy Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, I adore Thee profoundly.


I offer Thee the most precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, present in all the tabernacles of the world, in reparation for the outrages, sacrileges and indifferences by which He is offended.


By the infinite merits of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I beg the conversion of poor sinners.

Amen.

God has given us an entire company of His friends in the Church Triumphant to intercede for us. They are waiting for us to ask them to help us. Most of the members of the Church Triumphant are not known to us. Their names have been inscribed in the Book of Life by God Himself and will not be revealed to all until the Last Day. These anonymous saints, whose participation in Our Lord's Easter victory over sin and eternal death we commemorate today, All Saints Day, are content to wait until that Last Day for us to see how much they aided us in moments of temptation or suffering, how much they consoled us in moments of sorrow, how much they encouraged us to persevere in the Faith and to grow in love of God and in appreciation of  and thanksgiving for the Communion of Saints that comprises the true Church. Ah, yes, and what inexpressible joy awaits us in the glory of the Beatific Vision when the souls of the just are united together in one hymn of praise, basking in the warmth of the love of God and in the knowledge that that bright, burning love can never be lost!

We must aspire to Heaven with every beat of our hearts, consecrated as they must be to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and to Heart formed therefrom, the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. We must meditate on First and Last Things every day, concentrating on the Four Last Things (Death, Judgment, Heaven, Hell) after we make our nightly examination of conscience every night. We must lift up our minds and our hearts to God through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, keeping in mind this simple reality: how do my words and actions this day look in light of eternity? To this end, of course, we must read about the lives of the saints, who provide us an inexhaustible treasury to inspire us to climb the heights of personal sanctity so as to enjoy the glory of the Beatific Vision for all eternity.

Our Communion with the Church Suffering

The possession of the Beatific Vision for all eternity is indeed what God wills for each human being. As the Beatitudes contained in the Gospel reading for today's Mass reminds us, only the pure of heart can enter Heaven. As noted at the beginning of this reflection, though, Our Lord has compassion on us erring sinners. He permits souls who have not been purified of the debt they owe to Him as a result of their sins to make satisfaction for them in the Church Suffering, Purgatory. Tomorrow's Commemoration of All Souls, therefore, reminds us to pray every day for the Poor, Suffering Souls in Purgatory so that their participation in the joys of Heaven, which is assured, can be expedited and their suffering expiated.

The souls in Purgatory have died in a state of sanctifying grace. They are saved. They will enter Heaven. As death ends their ability to pay back what they owe for their sins, the souls in Purgatory must experience the intense hell fires and other excruciating pains of the Church Suffering to be purified. We, however, can help them to pay back what they owe by having Masses said for them, by remembering them in our prayers, especially in our Rosaries, by visiting Catholic cemeteries frequently (and by praying for the Poor Souls every time we pass by a cemetery and are unable to visit), and by commending them to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

The Poor Souls in Purgatory are particularly grateful for the assistance we can provide them by means of our Masses and prayers. Those whose stay in Purgatory is cut short by means of our prayers and sacrifices will help us to persevere to the point of our dying breaths in states of sanctifying grace. They will help to shorten our own stay in Purgatory if we die a good death and are in need or purification following the pronouncement of the Particular Judgment upon our souls.

Devotion to the Poor Souls must be part and parcel of the daily prayer life of every Catholic. We pray for the Poor Souls in general, yes. However, filial piety requires us to pray specifically, that is, by name, for our parents and grandmothers and brothers and sisters and other close relatives. It is an act of great charity to remember other souls by name, including people we may have never met in this life. Don't have a good memory? Write down these names on a piece of paper. Take out the piece of paper when praying before Our Lord in His Real Presence in the Most Blessed Sacrament every day or when praying in the quiet of the "room" of your own hearts. Saint Francis de Sales taught that those who pray for the Poor Souls discharge all of their obligations to perform works of Charity for others, and I, for one, am counting on that truth to help me at the moment of my own Particular Judgment!

The past ten months of 2013 also brought us news, from both direct and indirect sources, of the deaths in 2011of a true priest with whom I once taught, Father Jesse Creel, Mrs. Riccardina Porres de Torres, Mr. John W. Blewett (see With A Heart Of Pure Catholic Gold), Mr. Mark Polaschek, Mr. Edward Stabinski, Mr. Victor Joseph Meyer, Mr. Robert Duff, Miss Roberta Duff, Mrs. Melissa Kunkel, Miss Maria Duff (see In Honor of +Maria Cecilia Rose Duff, R.I.P.), Mr. William Kevin Ahern, Mr. David Dolan, Mrs. Kathleen Sanborn, Mr. Joseph Guerrero, Mr. John Horvat, Mr. Donald Delassus, Mrs. Christine Brung, Mrs. Ronnie Zadroga, and a woman named Ella, who was the mother-in-law of a friend of ours. I had only met four of these people during their lives (John Blewett, Father Creel, Maria Duff and John Horvat). The rest were relatives or friends of people who have been in our acquaintance at one point or another. No matter we are now united with them by our prayers for the repose of their immortal souls by means of the Communion of Saints.

Each of these souls have been added permanently to our prayer list for the Poor Souls. We trust that they will help us after our deaths if, please God and by the prayers of His Most Blessed Mother, we die in states of Sanctifying Grace as members of the Catholic Church.

And no matter how long it may have been since a particular person has died, keep praying for that person's soul until you die. We never know for sure, unless the Church canonizes someone whose soul we are praying for, if a particular soul has gone to Heaven even if we think we have satisfied all of the requirements for a Plenary Indulgence to be applied to that soul. We don't know for sure if we have indeed satisfied all of the requirements (especially that of being totally detached from one's sins). Thus, we keep praying and praying and praying. No prayer is ever wasted. If the deceased soul of a particular person has no need of our prayers, either because they are in Heaven or, God forbid, in Hell, then Our Lady will direct the fruit of those prayers to some other deserving soul.

Keep praying for your relatives and friends until you die. Keep praying for the soul who is most abandoned, for the soul who has no one to pray for him, for the soul who is closest to leaving the Church Suffering and entering the Church Triumphant in Heaven, for the soul who was most devoted to the Blessed Sacrament and to the Mother of God, especially through her Most Holy Rosary, for the souls for whom we have promised to pray but whose names may have escaped us over the course of time. Keep praying for the Poor Souls every single day without fail.

Although the Poor Souls cannot help themselves, they can help us. Pray to them for so that we might live so prayerfully and penitentially here in the Church Militant on earth that we might be able to escape Purgatory altogether. Pray to them for our temporal needs (they are particularly helpful in getting waking us up on time without an alarm clock, believe it or not). We have friends in the Church Suffering. We must rely on these friends to help us to save our own souls and to fulfill the duties of our own particular states in life.

Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., wrote the following in The Liturgical Year about this glorious feast day:

 

Truly this day is grand and beautiful. Earth, midway between heaven and purgatory, has united them together. The wonderful mystery of the communion of saints is revealed in all its fullness. The immense family of the sons of God is shown to be one in love, while distinct in its there states of beatitude trial, and purifying expiation: the trail and expiation being but temporary, the beatitude eternal. It is the fitting completion of the teaching given us through the entire year; and every day within the octave we shall see the light increase.

 

Meanwhile, every soul is recollected, pondering pondering over the dearest and noblest memories. On leaving the house of God, let our thoughts linger lovingly upon those who have the best claim to them. It is the feast of our beloved dead. Let us hear their suppliant voices in the plaintive tones that, from belfry to belfry throughout the Christian world, are ushering in this dark November night. This evening or to-morrow they will expect us to visit them at the tombs where their mortal remains rest in peace. Let us pray for them; and let us also pray to them: we need never be afraid to speak to them of the interests that were dear to them before God. For God loves them; and, as His justice keeps them in an utter inability to help themselves, He makes amends to His goodness by hearing them all the more willingly on behalf of others. (Dom Prosper Gueranger, The Liturgical Year: Time After Pentecost, Book VI, p. 92.)

Remember, of course, that from noon today on All Saints' Day through midnight of the Commemoration of All Souls tomorrow the Catholic faithful, as often as they visit a church or Catholic cemetery to pray for the dead, reciting six times during each visit the Our Father, Hail Mary and Glory Be for the intentions of Holy Mother Church may gain a plenary indulgence applicable only to the souls in Purgatory, under the usual conditions of making a good Confession within a week before or after, worthily receiving Holy Communion within the week and having the right intention of heart. This is called the Toties Quoties Indulgence.

The day of ire awaits us all as the Dies Irae reminds us. May we show our love for the Poor Souls in Purgatory so that the day of ire will be for each one of us a participation in the application of the Divine Mercy upon our immortals souls, making it possible for us to rest for all eternity from our labors in this vale of tears with all of the saints, basking in the company of the Queen of All Saints, Our Lady, and all of those who have gone before us marked with the sign of Faith. May our Rosaries this month of November be offered in a particular way for the needs of the Poor Souls.

Réquiem æternam dona eis, Dómine: et lux perpétua lúceat eis.

The Prayer of Saint Gertrude the Great for the Poor Souls

Eternal Father, I offer Thee the Most Precious Blood of Thy Divine Son, Jesus, in union with the masses said throughout the world today, for all the holy souls in Purgatory, for sinners everywhere, for sinners in the universal church, those in my own home and within my family. Amen."

Litany of the Poor Souls in Purgatory

(for Private Devotion)

The just shall be in everlasting remembrance; He shall not fear the evil hearing.

Absolve, O Lord, the souls of the faithful departed from every bond of sin, And by the help of Thy grace may they be enabled to escape the avenging judgment, and to enjoy the happiness of eternal life.

Because in Thy mercy are deposited the souls that departed in an inferior degree of grace, Lord have mercy.

Because their present suffering is greatest in the knowledge of the pain that their separation from Thee is causing Thee, Lord have mercy.

Because of their present inability to add to Thy accidental glory, Lord have mercy.

Not for our consolation, O Lord; not for their release from purgative pain, O God; but for Thy joy and the greater accidental honor of Thy throne, O Christ the King, Lord have mercy.

For the souls of our departed friends, relations and benefactors, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For those of our family who have fallen asleep in Thy bosom, O Jesus, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For those who have gone to prepare our place, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For priests who were our spiritual directors, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For men or women who were our teachers in school, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For those who were our employers or employees, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For those who were our associates in daily toil, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For any soul whom we ever offended, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For our enemies now departed, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For those souls who have none to pray for them, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For those forgotten by their friends and kin, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For those now suffering the most, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For those who have acquired the most merit, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For the souls next to be released from Purgatory, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For those who, while on earth, were most devoted to God the Holy Ghost, to Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament, to the holy Mother of God, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For all deceased popes and prelates, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For all deceased priests, seminarians and religious, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For all our brethren in the Faith everywhere, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For all our separated brethren who deeply loved Thee, and would have come into Thy household had they known the truth, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For those souls who need, or in life asked, our prayers, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

For those, closer to Thee than we are, whose prayers we need, Grant them light and peace, O Lord.

That those may be happy with Thee forever, who on earth were true exemplars of the Catholic Faith, Grant them eternal rest, O Lord.

That those may be admitted to Thine unveiled Presence, who as far as we know never committed mortal sin, Grant them eternal rest, O Lord.

That those may be housed in glory, who lived always in recollection and prayer, Grant them eternal rest, O Lord.

That those may be given the celestial joy of beholding Thee, who lived lives of mortification, self-denial, and penance, Grant them eternal rest, O Lord.

That those may be flooded with Thy love, who denied themselves even Thy favors of indulgence and who made the heroic act for the souls who had gone before them, Grant them eternal rest, O Lord.

That those may be drawn up to the Beatific Vision, who never put obstacles in the way of sanctifying grace and who ever drew closer in mystical union with Thee, Grant them eternal rest, O Lord.

Eternal rest give unto them, O Lord, And let perpetual light shine upon them.

Let us pray:

Be mindful, O Lord, of all Thy servants and handmaids who are gone before us with the sign of faith and repose in the sleep of grace. To these, O Lord, and to all who rest in Christ, grant, we beseech Thee, a place of refreshment, light and peace, through the same Christ Our Lord. Amen.

The Dies Irae

 

Dies iræ, dies illa, Solvet sæclum in favílla: Teste David cum Sybyla.

Quantus tremor est futúrus, Quando Judex est ventúrus, Cuncta stricte discussúrus!

Day of wrath and doom impending, David's word with Sibyl's blending, Heaven and earth in ashes ending.
O what fear man's bosom rendeth, when from heaven the Judge descendeth, on whose sentence all dependeth

Tuba, mirum spargens sonum, Per sepúlcra regiónum, Coget omnes ante thronum.

Wondrous sound the trumpet flingeth, through earth's sepulchres it ringeth

Mors stupébit et natúra, Cum resúrget creatúra, Judicánti responsúra.

Death is struck, and nature quaking, all creation is awaking, to its Judge an answer making.

Liber scriptus proferétur, In quo totum continéntur, Unde mundus judicétur.

Lo, the book exactly worded, wherein all hath been recorded, thence shall judgment be awarded.

Judex ergo cum sedébit, Quidquid latet, apparébit: Nil inúltum remanébit.

When the Judge His seat attaineth, and each hidden deed arraigneth, nothing unavenged remaineth.

Quid sum miser tunc dictúrus? Quem patrónum rogatúrus, Cum vix justus sit secúrus?

What shall I, frail man, be pleading? Who for me be interceding When the just are mercy needing?

Rex treméndæ majestátis Qui salvándos salvas gratis, Salva me, fons pietátis.

King of majesty tremendous, Who dost free salvation send us, fount of pity, then befriend us.

Recordáre, Jesu pie, Quod sum causa tuæ viæ: Ne me perdas illa die.

Think, kind Jesus, my salvation caused Thy wondrous Incarnation, leave me not to reprobation.

Quærens me, sedísti lassus: Redemísti Crucem passus: Tantus labor non sit cassus.

Faint and weary Thou hast sought me, on the Cross of suffering bought me, shall such grace be vainly brought me?

Juste judex ultiónis, Donum fac remissiónis Ante diem ratiónis.

Righteous Judge, for sin's pollution grant Thy gift of absolution, ere that day of retribution.

Ingemísco, tamquam reus: Culpa rubet vultus meus: Supplicánti parce, Deus.

Guilty now I pour my moaning, aAll my shame with anguish owning. Spare, O God, Thy suppliant groaning.  

Qui Maríam absolvísti, et Latrónem exaudísti, Mihi quoque spem dedísti.

Through the sinful woman shriven, through the dying thief forgiven, Thou to me a hope hast given.

Preces meæ non sunt dignæ: Sed tu bonus fac benígne, ne perénni cremer igne.

Worthless are my prayers and sighing, yet, good Lord, in grace complying, rescue me from fires undying.

Inter oves locum præsta, et ab hædis me seqústra, státuens in parte dextra.

With Thy sheep a place provide me, from the goats afar divide me. To Thy right hand do Thou guide me.  

Confutátis maledíctis, flammis ácribus addíctis: Voca me cum benedíctis.

When the wicked are confounded, doomed to flames of woe unbounded, call me with Thy Saints surrounded.

Oro supplex et acclínis, cor contrítum quasi cinis: Gere curam mei finis.

Low I kneel with heart's submission, see, like ashes, my contrition, help me in my last condition.  

Lacrimósa dies illa, qua resúrget ex favílli Judicándus homo reus.

Ah! that day of tears and mourning, from the dust of earth returning, Man for judgment must prepare him.

Huic ergo parce, Deus: Pie Jesu Dómine, Dona eis réquiem. Amen.

Spare, O God, in mercy spare him. Lord, all-pitying, Jesus blest, Grant them Thine eternal rest. Amen.

 
 




© Copyright 2013, Thomas A. Droleskey. All rights reserved.