ALL SOULS’ DAY

PENITENTIAL RITE:

Today’s commemoration is an extension of yesterday’s feast, since the faithful departed also belong to the Communion of Saints. The only difference is that our dear departed are shadowed over by our human sense of temporary separation and loss.

So as we prayerfully remember our parents, brothers and sisters, teachers and friends, we pray the Lord to spare us the torture of the memory of our sins at the hour of our death.

All Souls' Day

It is All Souls’ Day. Let us listen to the dear departed’s entreaties for our prayers and Masses on their behalf. Here is one such entreaty:

“It is All Souls’ Day

Have you forgotten me, dear earthly friends?

Have you a prayer to spare for one you once loved well?

Do you still remember the happy hours we spent together in the past?

Have you forgotten the scalding tears you wept when I was dead?

The promises you breathed over my still form?

The Masses you had intended to have offered up for me?

Across the eternal silence I lean forward now to remind you!

Think of me, help me, and when your last hour comes,

you will find your goodness to me has not been in vain.

For the dead forget not; the dead are never untrue;

 they live forever in the changeless love of God,

which permeates all, sanctifies all, immortalises all.

The flowers of his heaven are your fervent prayers!

For your loved and seeming lost, then,

make a wreath of them for me to lay at his holy feet.”

(From “Prayers of an Irish mother”)

            When we who are now on earth have died, we will in our turn need to make that entreaty. During our brief sojourn here we remember the departed. This age-old tradition of praying for the dead is rooted in the early Church’s trust in the mercy of God and faith in a personal resurrection with Jesus Christ. We pray for the faithful who are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; though after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven. We don’t quite know the nature of this purification, but it certainly has to do with the advent of God’s purifying love.

Today’s commemoration is, in fact, an extension of yesterday’s Feast of All Saints’, since the faithful departed also belong to the Communion of Saints, which is animated and electrified by divine love. It is a truth that is based on the teaching of Scripture, namely, that the Church is Christ’s body. Christ has only one body, not one on earth and another in heaven. Christians are not separated from one another by a death that makes no difference to their love and service of one another. The moment they closed their eyes to this world and opened them to the light of eternity, all was suffused in the love of God and the saints, and in a flash they were rejuvenated forever. Such is the advent of the purifying love of God.

            One day, during a catechism class on All Saint’s Day, the teacher asked, “Who or what are the saints?”  One youngster stood up and happened to look at the stained glass window that had a saint portrayed, with the sunlight streaming through. The little fellow got a bright idea and answered, “The saints are those who let in the sunlight.” Splendid answer, the teacher thought. The saints let the light of Christ into our life by their prayer and example. But what happens when there is no sunlight, when the outside is dark and we are seated in a well lit church? That is when we send our light and prayer to our friends in the semi-darkness as they walk towards the pearly gates. They are grateful for our prayers and sacrifices that serve as so many points of light on their way to the perpetual light of the Heavenly Jerusalem. And as they march in they hear the words of the prophet Jeremiah, Chapter 31: “I have loved you. I will guard you as a shepherd guards his flock. They will come and sing for joy on Mt. Sion. I will turn their mourning into joy.” And from the book of Revelation, Chapter One: I turned round to see who was speaking to me, and when I turned, I saw.....one like a Son of Man, dressed in a long white robe tied at the waist with a belt of gold. His head and hair were white with the whiteness of wool like snow, his eyes like a burning flame, his feet like burnished bronze when it has been refined in a furnace. His face was like the sun shining in full strength. When I saw him I fell at his feet as though dead, but he laid his hand on me and said, “Do not be afraid...I was, and look...I am alive for ever and ever. Look at my hands and feet; it’s me. Touch me and feel secure.”

PRAYER

Lord God, we thank you for your ineffable gift of eternal life in you. We thank you for inviting us to pray for our loved ones who wait to enter there. Grant them a speedy entrance into your joy forever. We beg to intercede also for those who have no one to pray for them. Grant them eternal rest.  Amen.

ALL SOULS’ DAY 2017

Lord, grant that the greater harvest

Which we came on earth to save,

May be golden and ripe for the reaping

‘Ere we go the lonely grave;

That our souls in the last dread autumn

May be clean as the hill and lea,

When we bring life’s grain to the haggard

and offer it all to thee.

O great and merciful God,

We praise and thank you

that you have brought our dearest parents,

 brothers, sisters, and friends,

at their last awakening,

into your house and gate of heaven,

to enter into that gate

and dwell in that house

where shall be no darkness nor dazzling,

but one equal light,

no noise nor silence, but one equal music,

no fears nor hopes, but one equal possession,

no ends nor beginnings, but one equal eternity

in the habitations of your glory and dominion,

where there is continuous happiness

and profounder joy in your presence

wherein they see you as you are,

for ever and ever. Amen.