In a couple of days, once again, we will be celebrating All Saints and All Souls’ Days. All Saints’ Day is a solemn holy day of the Catholic Church celebrated annually on November 1. The day is dedicated to all the saints of the Church, that is, all those who have already attained the glory of heaven. It should not be confused with All Souls’ Day, which is observed on November 2 and is dedicated to those who have died and not yet reached heaven. Although millions of people may already be saints, All Saints’ Day observances tend to focus on known saints –that is those recognized in the canon of the saints by the Catholic Church.
There are many ways to observe this solemnity. The most obvious is by going to Mass! There is no better way to commemorate the saintly lives of those who have gone before us than the Eucharistic Sacrifice. It is also good to do other prayerful things to mark the day, like - to read the lives of the saints; watch a movie about a saint; pray the litany of saints; think about your baptismal and confirmation saint and study and imitate their lives. Similarly, if you or any of your children share the name of a saint, learn about that saint together, read about the saint and pray together, asking for the saint’s intercession.
All Saints’ Day is the perfect time to pray to God through all these holy men and women, asking for their intercession for the conversion of sinners, so that we might all become saints.
Within the Catholic Church there are many great traditions which help us reinforce our basic Christian beliefs. One such centuries-old celebration takes place each year on November 2nd - the Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed/All Souls’ Day. It is a day on which we express our fundamental Catholic belief in the resurrection of the body and life everlasting. We pray for the deceased of all times (souls in purgatory) and for our own deceased loved ones, renewing our affection for them, and we keep their memory alive until, with God’s mercy, we see them again in the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, on All Souls’ Day, and indeed throughout the entire month of November, the Church honors Her dead and reaffirm our belief in eternal life. The Catholic Church from the earliest centuries has believed in and taught the existence of a temporary experience after death, of purification from the consequences of personal sins. This experience is called purgatory - a state of spiritual preparation for the full vision of God and eternal life with Him.
Both all the Saints in heaven and the living on earth can offer intercessory prayer for those in purgatory, asking God to grant them merciful release. The Church, then, encourages us, the living to pray for the dead. The greatest prayer that can be offered for them is to commend them to God in Christ’s Eucharistic sacrifice. We do it by offering mass intentions for them. Prayer for the deceased benefits not only the dead, but also us, the living. Our intercessory prayers show our ongoing concern and love for them, and of keeping in touch with God and the reality of our own mortality.
“Eternal Rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May their souls and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.”