In this last week of the Church's liturgical year, the first readings each day deals with visions of the end of the world. We do not live in a world where we have any experience of the visions which the writer of the Revelation has described for us. Not knowing the historical details of the writer's times and background, means that much of what he says passes us by. Yet if we have the patience to read and to look for meaning we can discover quite many consoling insights in his work. The last paragraph of today's passage, speaks of new heavens and a new earth and then of a new Jerusalem. In spite of the terror of the previous paragraphs, the author obviously experienced some great consoling truth which gave him hope.

Heaven, of course, is totally different from our earthly experiences, but the author's linking together of a new heaven and a new earth is a reminder that there is some continuity between heaven and earth. Our bodies die, but we live in a new relationship with God which gives us eternal life and everlasting happiness.

This hope and certainty which our faith reveals to us means that we can go from strength to strength as the Psalmist says.