O Day of Wrath

The Prophets, the Apostles, and the Lord himself warn us of the wrath of God.  But what does this wrath mean?  Can God become angry?   In his commentary on Psalm 6, St. Gregory the Great says:

“ ‘Lord, do not rebuke me in your anger, nor chastise me in our wrath.’  See how good a beginning it is, how full of affection, how full of grace!  In it, he calls him ‘Lord’, showing him that he ought to have mercy for the sake of his own law.  It is proper for lords to maintain their slaves, not to despise them; to correct those who fail, not to kill them; to seek for those who run away, not to reject them.  ‘Lord, do not rebuke me in your anger.’  When someone incurs the anger of his lord and he wishes to be reconciled to him, it is customary for him to seek out patrons, to employ intermediaries, to hire advocates.  But this soul, stricken with terror at his terrible judgment, and inflamed with the love of God, suffers no delays, refuses any deferrals.  The soul cannot escape condemnation if it puts off coming together with God at the assigned hour.  But he does not restrain his desire; he does not keep his patience.  Trusting in the mercy of his Creator, he gathers witnesses and presumes to speak, as though seeing him already present: Indeed, I know that I am shut off from your sight because of my deeds; still, I am smaller than all your mercies.  ‘Lord, do not rebuke me in your anger,’ for I have not denied that I am your servant; I desire to obey your commands; I never refuse to bear your sweet yoke.  Rather, convict me here.  Correct me while there is still time for mercy.  Train me while it is the day of salvation. It is kindly correction for a man to be worn away by lashes in this life, for he is repaired with these rebukes.  In this terrible trial, every wicked man is rebuked in anger: no mercy at all is joined to his endless punishment.  Far be it from us to believe that anger is present in God.  He would not be changeless if the necessity of some passion were able to move him.  It is otherwise with God, but in the human manner of speaking, we call the sentence of infinite damnation his ‘anger’.  Not that God may be moved in the severity of justice by any disturbance, but that those who are to be crushed, in two senses, by contrition, are irremediably punished.  ‘Do not rebuke me in your anger.’  His anger is neither human nor passing.  Human anger passes quickly in such a way that it extends the force of its power against bodies.  On the other hand, not only does the force of divine wrath multiply punishments for body and soul, but it continues ceaselessly against the damned.  ‘Nor chastise me in your wrath.’  Just as wrath is greater than anger, so to chastise is greater than to merely rebuke.  We rebuke those whom we love in order to correct them.  And because after the death of the flesh some are assigned to eternal punishments, and others pass through the fire of purgation, the faithful soul should fear not only his anger, but shudder at his wrath.  As the blessed Augustine says, ‘All those who do not set Christ as a foundation for themselves are chastised in wrath and suffer eternal fire.’  But those who build over this foundation with wood, straw, or hay, are rebuked in his anger.  These are purged by fire and led into the rest of beatitude (cf. 1 Corinthians 3, 12-15).”