This is a continuation of my post on October 21st, "Concerning Those Who Do Penance." The name of the book that I referred to in that post is My Visit to Hell by Paul Thigpen. I ordered it after reading an interview of Thigpen on Zenith, a Catholic site. The interview is here. "Thigpen is editor of The Catholic Answer, director of the Stella Maris Center for Faith and Culture, and an award-winning journalist and best-selling author of 34 books."
This novel is a modern-day adaptation of Dante's Inferno, the 14th century poem about a visit to hell. My Visit to Hell provides a frightening, thought-provoking guided tour of hell through the eyes of the main character, Thomas Travis. This book will encourage all to run to confession and to flee to God for healing and forgiveness. It is not difficult to read and understand and holds one's attention to the end.
As one reads, it becomes more and more apparent how true are the words of Paul in Romans that "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." What is the hope for us? The same as it was for Thomas Travis in My Visit to Hell.
What is the relationship between this book and Saint Francis? Read the second chapter of the Volterra text (http://www.ourladyofthepearl.com/rule.htm), written by Saint Francis. Here Saint Francis, writing in the 1200's, echoes Thigpen's book, and it is just as frightening. For example, one paragraph from the second chapter by Saint Francis is quoted below.
"The devil snatches the soul from his body with such anguish and tribulation that no one can know it except he who endures it, and all the talents and power and knowledge and wisdom which they thought they had will be taken away from them, and they leave their goods to relatives and friends who take and divide them and say afterwards, 'Cursed be his soul because he could have given us more, he could have acquired more than he did.' The worms eat up the body and so they have lost body and soul during this short earthly life and will go into the inferno where they will suffer torture without end."
All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all." Isaiah 53.6.
Our hope - our redemption - lies only in the cross - in Jesus Christ. Saint Francis knew this. He knew that God loved him - that he loves all of us. In joy and gratitude, Francis embraced the cross. Through prayer, the Spirit of God breathed within him, drawing him into the circle of love between the Father and the Son. He danced with the Trinity.
So can you.
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