It is hard to believe, but we are now entering the month of November! It is often a busy month, as we get ready for the great family event of Thanksgiving. Our thoughts also begin to turn to Christmas (and there are already plenty of Christmas things about, not least in the stores). This weekend, we begin the month by celebrating the great feast day of All Saints Day (normally a Holy Day of Obligation, followed by All Souls Day.
This year, the schedule of these two, great days, is a little unusual, because All Saints falls on a Saturday and All Souls on a Sunday. Whenever most holy days of obligation fall on a Saturday (or a Monday), they remain a holy day, but the obligation to go to Mass is abrogated for that year. However, many of us would still like to celebrate All Saints’ Day and so many parishes have added an extra Mass to their schedule. If not, why not drop in to your local church anyway and spend some time in prayer, to mark this special day. By the way, next weekend, the feast day of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica (the Pope’s Cathedral in Rome) will “bump” the 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time!
Despite the different schedule for this year, it is definitely worth spending a few moments reflecting upon our two feast days that we celebrate this weekend…
We give thanks and honor to all those special disciples who indeed heard the Lord’s call and then bravely followed him. The feast day of All Saints commemorates the many people who did this, but who are not necessarily and officially recognized as saints by the Church. We can also remember that, as Peter Kreeft puts it: “the saints are not freaks or exceptions. They are the standard operating model for human beings. In fact, in the biblical sense of the word, all believers are saints. All are holy…for they bear the image of God. Saints are not the opposite of sinners. There are no opposites of sinners in this world. There are only saved sinners and unsaved sinners. Thus “holy” does not mean “sinless” but rather “set-apart” and called out of the world to the destiny of eternal ecstasy with God.”
The feast day of All Saints is a powerful reminder of how we can also be inspired by the lives of the saints. We too have the same call and the same invitation, and the Lord offers us the same help so that we can follow him. Therefore, we are asked not just to admire the saints, but also to imitate them. November then is a great month to pick a saint each day and to read about their life, so that we can imitate their example and so that we too can use well the gift of discipleship that we have received from the Lord. We too can be brave!
November is also, of course, the month of “Holy Souls”; when we traditionally think of all our family, friends and benefactors who have gone before us. To mark this special season, many parishes have different ways of remembering all our departed brothers and sisters, especially those who have died in the last year and who have a particular connection with the parish. We can also do this at home, pausing each day to offer prayers for family and friends who have gone before us.
The tradition of praying for all our loved ones who have died is, of course, very ancient and it can be found in almost all cultures and places over millennia. The specific choice of November as the month for a particular remembering is also ancient: around a thousand years old or more. It can be a difficult time as we think of those who have had such an influence on our lives, but who are no longer physically present with us: we can sorely miss them. So, perhaps we can share a few thoughts on why we have this special season and how it can help us in our everyday life and to encourage us to growth in faith.
There are many layers, both emotional and spiritual, to our annual remembrance of those who have died. We certainly celebrate our faith in life and in the life to come; in Jesus who is “the resurrection and the life” (John 11: 25). We can celebrate Jesus’ victory over sin and death and the promise and hope of our life in heaven along with those who have gone before us. This is why St. Paul says “do not grieve as the others do” (1 Thess. 4: 13). He does not say that we should not grieve at all: that would just be ridiculous. Rather, we should not grieve as though we have no hope or faith in the life to come.
We also celebrate life: the lives of those who have gone before us and also our own life. This memorial season is a time when we realize both how wonderful and yet how fragile the gift of life is and how it is indeed a gift. God calls each one of us to use the gift of life that we have been given well: in love of God and of our neighbor, that is, to be His disciples. What happens to us in the life to come is determined by what happens in this life (as is so strongly put in Jesus’ words about judgment in Matthew 25: 31-46). As one spiritual writer puts it, “our future is now”. St. Ambrose writing all those centuries ago provided us with a great image when he wrote: “the Lord asks us to sacrifice present interests for the sake of eternal interests…in this way we purchase eternity with the coin of time.” Another image that can be helpful is that of our Christian life as a journey. This journey began in our birth and then our baptism and it will be completed when our life’s journey is ended. So, a fundamental question is: how well did we journey…?
This time of the year can be a real encouragement for us to discern what God is asking of us and so, with courage, to live our lives in His service to our families, our friends, our parish community and to those in need. It is, in other words, a wonderful time to refresh our sense of purpose and our mission as members of the Order. How good too, that we have the Investiture Weekend coming up: a case of perfect timing! Let us be inspired and guided by the saints and by all those special people we have known who have gone before us: family, friends, guides and mentors.
Very Rev. Msgr. Anthony M. Barratt STL, PhD, ChM
