Father Mike Schmitz

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen.

Okay, so.

Revelation getting intense, obviously, getting really intense.

Chapters 18, 19, and 20 here.

One of the things that comes up is the fall of Babylon, chapter 18.

And the term Babylon is used, obviously, a bunch of times.

And so I'm just going to offer, you know, these books are so rich.

They're so deep that 10 minutes of commentary is not enough, obviously.

um there's some incredible incredible commentary books that are around in fact there's there's one book of commentary called the ignatius catholic study bible new testament it's the second catholic edition you know so that's good but it's really good because it has all the all the details all the little notes can be so incredibly important and helpful but they have a longer note about babylon and what babylon is in fact one of the interesting notes they have when it comes to chapter 18 in the fall of babylon

is they know that several images and expressions in this chapter, chapter 18 here, are taken from the judgmental oracles of the prophets, especially Jeremiah's condemnation of ancient Babylon from Jeremiah 15 and 51.

So if you remember, and you do, the history of Babylon and the history of the Babylonian exile and evil Babylon, there's all these connections with what happens here in chapter 18 and what Jeremiah had prophesied back in the book of the prophet Jeremiah, which is remarkable.

Now, another guy, St.

Caesarius of Arles,

He once said this, he said, Babylon in the harlot, whose smoke goes up forever, are none other than the lustful, the adulterous, and the arrogant.

So he was saying, he was making a point like in a sermon, right, in a homily, that he was saying that it doesn't have to be a place, right?

It doesn't have to be a city I'm talking about.

Now, John in Revelation is likely talking about a specific city, which we'll talk about in just a second.

But here is St.

Caesarius of Arles, who was saying that, listen, this can be in our own hearts.

Babylon and the harlot, he says, whose smoke goes up forever are none other than the lustful, the adulterous and the arrogant.