The Coming and the Cruelty of Antichrist
by Fr. Francis Hunolt
“And immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light.” St Matthew 24: 24.
I. Who is antichrist and what has he to do in the world?
II. What should be our thoughts regarding this?
Who is Antichrist? Of what nature shall he be? In the Scripture the Holy Ghost never gives him a proper name, be*cause he did not wish to mention the name of such a wicked man; therefore he calls him only Antichrist, that is, one who is opposed to Christ in everything. Daniel names him a “beast, terrible and wonderful, and exceeding strong” (Dan. 7: 7). St. Paul calls him a man of sin, made up, as it were, of vice and wickedness; “The man of sin, the son of perdition” (2 Thess. 2: 3). In any case he will be a man of the same nature as we, created by God for the same end, and he shall also have sufficient graces and means given to him to save his soul, if he only chooses to make use of them. This wicked man is to be the offspring of adulterous intercourse, to be born in the Jewish tribe of Dan at Babylon and to be secretly brought up by people of the lowest kind: sorcerers and witches. It is easy to imagine the kind of training he is likely to get from such teachers.
When he comes to man’s estate he will at first conceal his wickedness and craft under a mask of hypocrisy and apparent sanctity; he will be very zealous for the law of Moses, and pretend to despise all earthly things; to be an enemy of idolatry and a lover of the Sacred Scriptures. Although he will privately wallow in all kinds of impurity, he will outwardly condemn adultery and decry it as most criminal; he will be very charitable to the poor; in a word, he will put on such an appearance of virtue that many nations shall desire to have him as their king. He will draw the Jews to his side in crowds, and they will soon look on him and adore him as their long-expected Messiah, when they see that he is a sworn enemy of Christ and the Christian law and an upholder of the Jewish law and its ceremonies, and moreover that they can hope to profit by having him in power.
When he shall thus have raised himself to a high position in the world and secured a great number of followers, then this wicked serpent shall commence to spit out his poison and to spread his authority over the world by craft, promises, and force of arms. Besides Turks, heathens, and Jews, he will attract to his standard and subject to his authority countless numbers of Christians. That he will effect first by the riches, honors, dignities and sensual delights that he will place in the power of all his followers, as Daniel says of him: “He shall increase glory and shall give them power over many, and shall divide the land for nothing” (Dan. II: 39). For besides the immense revenues he shall have from conquered countries, the devil with the divine permission shall discover to him mines of gold and silver, and treasures hidden in the sea: “And he shall have power over the treasures of gold, and of silver, and all the precious things” (Dan. 11: 43). Alas! What an attractive bait that will be to ensnare the vain, ambitious, and greedy children of the world, who are already only too willing to grasp such things! How will they be able to withstand this seductive and powerful temptation?
But when Antichrist finds virtuous souls who will not allow themselves to be turned aside from the love of God by promises, flattery, caresses, money, honors, or pleasures, then he will use against them another terrible weapon, namely, tortures such as the most cruel tyrant has never yet even thought of. “For there shall be then great tribulation,” says our Lord of him in the Gospel, “such as hath not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be” (St. Matthew 24: 21). So that even many just and pious servants of God shall yield under the pres*sure of tortures and deny their God. “And it was given unto him to make war with the Saints, and to overcome them. And power was given him over every tribe, and people, and tongue, and nation” (Apoc. 13: 7). So that he will overcome even the Saints, some according to the body by martyrdom and torturing and putting them to death; and others, which is far more deplorable, according to the soul, by forcing them with cruel torments to deny Jesus Christ and his faith. There will be no choice left between enduring intolerable torture and falling away from the true religion, or else perishing with hunger and want in caverns and deserts.
All that should encourage a pious Christian and console him in such tribulations shall then be removed; for this cruel beast in his daring pride shall set himself up as the true God and claim to be adored and to have churches built in his honor. “And the king shall do according to his will, and he shall be lifted up, and shall magnify himself against every god” (Dan. 11: 36). All the temples consecrated to our Lord shall be pulled down and desecrated, the sacred images destroyed, spiritual books burned, all priests made away with, and the use of the holy Sacraments and the celebration of Mass utterly abolished. Thus for about four years, the duration of the reign of Antichrist, the public celebration of the Holy Sacrifice shall be nowhere tolerated in the whole world; not a single crucifix shall there be that one might comfort himself in his sorrows by looking at it. He will give his followers another sign, which they are to wear on their foreheads or on their right hands and a man who has not that sign may not buy or sell the least thing, or do any business whatever; and the sign shall be the blasphemous words:
Nego Jesum (“I deny Jesus”).
Continued here. . .
