Anger And Mercy

Deus, repulisti nos, et destruxisti nos: iratus es nobis et misertus es nobis. Commoristi terram, et conturbasti eam, sana contritiones ejus, quia commota est. Ostendisti populo tuo dura, potasti nos vino compunctionis. Secundum communem saeculi sensum irae miserationique non convenit: neque ipsius in eosdem uterque hic conveniet affectus, ut ultionis voluntati voluntas miserationis admixa sit. Solis autem hoc patribus pie irascentibus congruit, ut misericors eorum ira in peccatis sit filiorum, secundum etiam illud beati Pauli , cum ita Satanae in interitum carnis tradit, ut spiritus salvus sit in die Domini, vinclictae praesentis severitatem ad salutem spiritus proficere demonstrans. Aeternus ergo ille coelestis omnibus pater, qui et dixit: Ego occidam et ego sanabo, sic repellit et destruit suos, ut misereatur iratus. Destruxit enim Jerusalem templum, sed coelestem santis reddidit civitatem: repulit ab operationibus legis, sed justificationem fidei justificans ex fide impium tribuit: dissolvit terrestre regnum, sed reges constituit coelorum. Ita iram misericordia consecuta est, dum damno terrenorum praesentium, ingens aeternorum bonorum retributio repensatur. Sanctus Hilarius Pictaviensis,Tractatus super Psalmos, Tractatus in Psalmum LIX Migne PL 9 384-5

'God, you scattered us and you destroyed us, you were angry with us and you were merciful to us. You have shaken the earth and you have troubled it, and you have healed its wounds because it was shaken. You have shown to your people hard things, you have given us the wine of compunction to drink.' 1 According to the common sense of the world anger and mercy are not found together, nor may they fit together in the same affection, that the will of anger and of mercy be mixed. Yet with angry fathers alone in piety it does seem meet that there is mercy in their anger against the sins of their sons, as happened with the blessed Paul, when he handed over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit be saved on the day of the Lord, 2 which thus showed that the severity of present punishment may profit for spiritual salvation. Therefore that eternal heavenly Father of all, who said, 'I kill and I heal' 3 so scatters and destroys His own, that angered He be merciful. He destroyed the temple of Jerusalem but He gave a heavenly city for the holy; He suppressed the works of the law, but gave justification by faith, justifying by faith the impious, He lay waste terrestrial kingdoms but established kings in heaven. Thus mercy follows anger, and the ruin of the present things of the world He greatly repays with eternal goods. Saint Hilary of Poitiers, Homilies on the Psalms, from Psalm 59 1 Ps 59.3-5 2 1 Cor 5.5 3 Deut 32.39