The First Reading in today’s Mass of Our Lady’s Assumption shows John’s Apocalypse at its most vivid. Here’s an extract:

Now a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman, adorned with the sun, standing on the moon, and with the twelve stars on her head for a crown. She was pregnant, and in labour, crying aloud in the pangs of childbirth . . .

And on it goes. Veritable libraries have been written interpreting these “signs in heaven.” It’s very interesting, I think, that next year the stars happen to align and interact in such a way that at least some of these signs are retold.

Patrick Archbold, the brains behind Creative Minority Report, published an article on this last year, in The Remnant. It’s well worth reading his entire article. Here’s how it starts:

On September 23, 2017, we will see the constellation Virgo with the sun rise directly behind it (the woman clothed with the sun). These events transpire during the 100th anniversary of the apparitions of “the woman clothed in the sun,” Our Lady at Fatima in 1917. What does it mean?

[Editorial Note: In the following article, I intend to present a series of facts and observations from which I draw no definitive conclusion. Yet, these facts and observations are of such a nature, for no other reason than their observation and reporting, that lend themselves to misinterpretation. So let me be clear, in the following article, I predict nothing. I am offering my observations on some upcoming phenomena, both heavenly and man-made, potentially of great import, that people might find interesting and of which people should be aware.]

I included his editorial note in full, because that’s especially important. Many of my readers probably suspect that we are in the End Times. I suspect as much myself. That’s all well and good, insofar as it informs a truly supernatural outlook, by which we strive for sanctity, and pray like there’s no tomorrow, because maybe there won’t be a tomorrow. As Our Lord advises, “when that day and hour will come, no one knows.” (Mt 24:36)

On the other hand, “millennial fever” is no good at all if it distracts a person from the interior life. Stockpiling food and water, and poring over calendars and prophecies, can be very destructive to a person’s faith — and the faith of those around them. It can also leave a person looking a bit cray-cray, which is really not a good way to attract others to Christ.

Of course, it’s also worth considering that there are people in every generation who think theirs is the last generation. Just ask the apostles! Be that as it may, there’s little doubt in my mind that we live in extraordinary times. Ours is a time where evil abounds, but grace abounds even more.

Deo gratias.