BEYOND DEATH.
November 2, 2023.
The Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed (All Souls).
“For if we have grown into union with him through a death
like his, we shall also be united with him in the resurrection.” Romans 6:5
A Corsican proverb says: “The soul to God, and the body to
the Earth.” And a Swahili proverb adds: “If you don't know death look at the
grave.”
Love goes beyond death. And death has no power to separate
us from the people we love. Even though we may be physically split apart, away
from senses and sensuality, the bond of love unites us always with them and
gives us a motive to pray for them.
Today, the Church invites us to remember in a very singular
and special way our brothers and sisters who have gone ahead of us into the
journey toward eternity, but whom, we believe, are on a journey of purification
before entering God's glory. Our remembering or commemoration of the faithful
departed is not an actualization of their funerals. It is not with grief like
people who have no hope. It is rather filled with great hope and faith in the
Resurrection of the Dead, as we profess in our Credo, that we come to the
cemeteries and graveyards to light candles, put flowers, and offer prayers for
their souls. We show through this celebration our communion with them.
The Sanctoral gives this beautiful introduction: "The
Church, after celebrating the feast of All Saints, today prays for all who, in
the purifying suffering of Purgatory, await the day they will join in heavenly
glory. The celebration of the Mass, which re-presents the Sacrifice of Christ
on Calvary, has always been the principal means by which the Church fulfills
the great responsibility of charity toward the dead. Death cannot break the
bonds of the Body of Christ."
If in life, we are united and bonded into one by love and in
Christ, we also believe that death is not an end inse, but just a pathway to
heaven. As such, our beloved departed are not dead, but just on a journey,
crossing from this life, to the other one. However, while crossing, because of
the load of human imperfections and sin, they need our intercession for
purification. Thus, the need and the meaning of our prayers for the dead.
The word of God today is filled with hope and great
expression of faith. In the first reading, we hear the author of the Book of
Wisdom sing our hope: "The souls of the just are in the hand of God, and
no torment shall touch them..." Even though, for charnel beings, their
life is over, for us believers, that is not the case. Life is not over in
death. It just gets transformed. God, in his merciful love, opens the faithful
departed to a new horizon of life.
Paul, in the second reading, speaks of that new horizon as
the Resurrection, and he tells us that hope does not disappoint. We have this
firm hope of our future Resurrection and the Resurrection of our beloved
departed in Christ. That hope gives reason to our faith and also to our
prayers.
All those who are gathered in the cemeteries today are not
necromancers. We are not people who worship the dead. We rather gather to
express our faith in their Resurrection with Christ and pray that this should
be anticipated.
Did Jesus himself not assure us in the Gospel of John:
"Everyone who believes in the Son will have eternal life and I shall raise
him up on the last day..." That is why we commemorate this day, for
eternal life.
"The dead are not dead," said the Senegalese
famous writer. This, we believe it. So, let's tell them how much we love them.
Light a candle for them. Pray for them. Keep clean their graveyard... For forgetting
a dead one is denying our love for them and so, forsaking what they have been
for us when they were alive. One truth we must also keep in mind is, where we
are today, they were there yesterday. Where they are today, we will also be
tomorrow... So, communion and love are the reason for our prayers for them.
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