Remember Them with Faith and Hope (All Souls’ Day, Nov. 2)

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Yesterday, we rejoiced with the Church triumphant, with our brothers and sisters who have gone through the great tribulation and emerged victorious into the joy of heaven. Today, with hope and faith, we remember the Church suffering, our brothers and sisters who may still be undergoing some form of purification before they join the great banquet of everlasting joy in heaven. We have not gathered to grief and mourn, but to reaffirm our belief in the resurrection of the dead, to pray for the eternal repose of departed souls and to remind ourselves of the need for us to prepare for death, which awaits everybody.

The souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch them (Wis. 3:1). That’s our belief! That’s our hope! Someone was asking, “If they are in the hand of God, if they are at peace, why do we still need to pray for them?” That’s a very serious question! Our gathering to pray for the dead does not nullify our statement of faith that the souls of the righteous are in God’s hand. But then, a state of no torment, a state of eternal peace is a state that souls can embrace after some form of purification either on earth or in purgatory. We live in a space where we may not be totally free of some stains of sin at the moment of death. Someone describes our earthly existence as the existence of fish in water: we are daily confronted with choices; we struggle with sin and sometimes wallow in unrighteousness. We don’t dispute the fact that a good number leave this world unstained by sin; but some others might have left the world with some stains of sin. And I think it stands to reason that some form of purification is needed; some form of discipline is needed; some form of furnace purification just as gold is purified in fire is needed. And this is why the first reading (from the Book of Wisdom) points out that “having been disciplined a little, departed souls will receive a great good; like gold in the furnace, God will try them” (Wis. 3:5-6). And that is why we talk about purgatory: a place of purification, a place of discipline.

As we offer our prayers for the dead in this month, may we be sustained by hope, the hope that is dependent on Christ’s expression in the gospel (cf. John 6:37-40) that He shall lose nothing of all that His Father has given Him, that all who see the Son and believe in Him will be raised at the last day, and they will have eternal life. That’s the hope that never disappoints as St Paul remarked in the second reading (cf. Rom. 5:5). May this hope also help us to persist in doing what is right so that we may not be found wanting at the moment of our own death.       




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