The Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed

All Souls' Day

Saint Victorinus, Bishop, Martyr (303); Saint Marcian (c. 387); Saint Winifred, Martyr (c. 650); Saint Malachy, Bishop (1094-1148); Bd Thomas of Walden (c. 1375-1430); Bd Margaret of Lorraine (1521); Bd John Bodey, Martyr (1549-83); Bd Pius Campidelli (1868-89)

Readings of the Day

RB: Ch 26 Unauthorized Association with the Excommunicated

Mass: Wisdom 3:1-9; Resp Ps 23; Rm 5:5-11 or Rm 6:3-9; Jn 6:37-40

The Lord is my shepherd; there is nothing I shall want.

HEART OF JESUS, HOPE OF THOSE WHO DIE IN THEE,

HAVE MERCY ON US.

I checked last year's lectio post for today and as I thought, last year, like today, I had a tune in my head of a little ditty "we" sang as children: Pray for the dead and the dead will pray for you. As we commemorate all the faithful departed, the simple song, as it did last year, makes more sense in light of today's "Prayer for the Morning" in Magnificat: "The commemoration of All Souls is rooted in the Church's strong conviction that we, the living, have a serious responsibility in charity to pray for those who have died but who must yet complete the purification every human being needs to be able to enjoy the vision of God." And from the Second Book of Maccabees: "For if he [Judas Maccabeus] were not expecting that those who had fallen would rise again, it would have been superfluous and foolish to pray for the dead. But if he was looking to the splendid reward that is laid up for those who fall asleep in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Therefore he made atonement for the dead, that they might be delivered from their sin" (2 Mc 12:44-45). We pray for the dead, then, and keep them in our heart and mind throughout this day and throughout the entire month, for "contemplation of the lives of those who have followed Christ encourages us to lead a good, upright Christian life so that we can prepare ourselves each day for eternal life" (Pope Saint John Paul (II). Pray for the dead and the dead will pray for you.

Not even the night of death shall prevail against this day of new life: instead it shines in the darkness, and the darkness does not swallow it up.

(Bernard of Clairvaux)

God is a God of the living. With confidence, we pray:

Raise them up, O Lord!

For all the dead whom we have loved in life.

For all the dead among those who have harmed us.

For all the dead whom no one remembers in prayer.

(Magnificat, Intercessions, November 2, 2020)

A culture that forgets death begins to die within. He who forgets death has already begun to die...Remember, if death is not to have the last word, it is because in life we have learned to die for one another.

(Pope Francis, Video Message, 4th World Meeting of Young People, Mexico City, October 31, 2019)

NB. During this month of November, you will see at the top of each post a list of saints for the day found in the November volume of Butler's Lives of the Saints. We pray to them and ask them to help us as we respond to the universal call to holiness. 

© Gertrude Feick 2020