Feast of St. Michael and All Angels (Sept. 29) - Jesus tells more of what angels are sent to do

Angels were all the rage a little while ago, before vampires got their 15 minutes. People liked the idea of personal communication via spiritual beings, and that's fair enough since the Hebrew and Greek words for angel mean "messenger."

But again, we cherry pick the pleasant and deny the whole of what Jesus had to say:

Just as the weeds are gathered and burned with fire, so will it be at the close of the age. The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all law-breakers, and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear. Matthew 13:40-43

By the way, one presentation of angels in the New Testament provides an intriguing similarity to the L/Dakota understanding of spirits at the four cardinal directions:

After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth to prevent any wind from blowing on the land or on the sea or on any tree. Then I saw another angel coming up from the east, having the seal of the living God. He called out in a loud voice to the four angels who had been given power to harm the land and the sea: "Do not harm the land or the sea or the trees until we put a seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God." Revelation 7:1-3