November 5, 2023
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My Dear Parishioners,
It's All Souls. It's November. It's the Month of the Faithful Departed. And it is natural that our memory goes today in particular to our deceased loved ones, whom we have entrusted to the love and eternity of the Lord. From our family members who are now gone – our parents and grandparents, from our siblings, from our uncles and aunts – we learn about the eternal love of God, which and which alone keeps alive those whom He loves, after having welcomed them with His forgiveness. Our deceased loved ones remind us that it is not worth it to waste time and effort on ambitions and ephemeral things because everything passes and only love remains. St. Benedict in his rules insists that his monks keep death before their eyes every day, for even they might forget that they will die someday. Our beloved dead remind us that someday we will follow them into the other world. There is nothing that strikes like the death of our parents, the ones who gave us life. All of us who know the syllogism, “All men die. John is a man.
Therefore John will die.” This is abstract thinking until we have lost a loved one – my mother or my father! Today, All Souls Day, we remember our beloved dead with the greatest affection for them, and I for one recognize that I have often neglected to think about them. We are simply too busy, too deeply immersed in the passing things of the world, too involved in things that do not last. On this one day of the year, we take time to think about where we are headed, where we have come from, and by whom and for whom we have been made.
But November 2 is not just a day which recalls to our attention the nature of transience and brevity of life. We don’t approach this day with dread or terror. This day is a day for the celebration of our greatest hope if we really believe in the faith of the Risen One and if we consider the omnipotence of God. This day is a day of reassurance for we know that the God we worship is the God who does not leave the dead in their graves, because He himself has destroyed death rising gloriously from His tomb.
