A Time To Remember Our Dead

By TOM DENNEHY

The month of November each year is dedicated to commemorating our dead. On November 1st, we celebrate All Saints Day. On this day which is a Holy Day of Obligation, we honour all the saints and we ask them to pray and intercede for us. On November 2nd, we celebrate All Souls Day as we remember all our faithful departed.

The month of November is a good time to reflect on our own mortality and the brevity of life. It is an absolute certainty that one day we will have to face our Creator and account for our lives. The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us (1030-1036) that immediately after death, the soul separates from our earthly bodies and we stand before God for judgement. Heaven, a state of eternal happiness, is the ultimate destination we long for. Those who are free from all sin enter Heaven immediately. Purgatory is a place of purification for those who die in friendship with God but are not purified of their sins. Hell is for those who have deliberately chosen to reject God and as St. Faustina has told us many go there because they refuse to believe in its existence.

God’s great mercy allows us to assist those souls on their way to Him. It is our great privilege to be able to shorten their time of separation from God. Then when the souls reach Heaven, they will intercede for us before the throne of God.

How can we help the holy souls? We can:

• Pray for them, especially at the Offertory of the Mass, as the priest pours the drop of water into the chalice we can make our intention for both our living and our dead.

• Pray the Holy Rosary and the Divine Mercy Chaplet for them every day.

• Offer Novena prayers and say the prayer of Saint Gertrude which promises to release 1000 souls from Purgatory each time it is prayed.

• Have Holy Mass offered for them as often as you can.

• Visit a graveyard and pray the chaplet for the holy souls whenever we can. Let us pray especially for those who have nobody to pray for them.

• During the month of November which is dedicated to the Holy Souls, we can merit plenary indulgences for our loved ones in Purgatory. That means we can offer prayers for our loved ones that will immediately release them from Purgatory and they will finally enter Heaven for eternity.

In order to gain a plenary indulgence for the Holy Souls –we must be in a state of grace and go to Confession in the week preceding or the week afterwards, receive Holy Communion, visit a graveyard and pray for the Pope’s intentions by praying The Our Father, The Hail Mary, The Glory Be and The Apostles Creed.

At the end of time, Our Lord Jesus will come again to judge the living and the dead. All souls will be rejoined with their bodies. Our Catholic faith gives us great hope and absolute assurance of a new life in the presence of Jesus in Heaven and those in Purgatory will join with those in Heaven. We tend to treat our spiritual lives with mediocrity compared with work, sport and other interests in our lives. But Eternal life is the most important. We must realize how important this is. We need to reflect on how we live our lives and make any changes needed. We have been given the necessary means of getting there through the Sacraments, the Rosary, Adoration, reading Sacred Scripture and doing good works. During this month we are particularly conscious of those who are grieving, all those who have lost loved ones. We mark this time with the blessing of graves and the celebration of remembrance services for all who have died. It is uplifting to visit a graveyard at night during November and see all the lights on the graves. There is a great peace and stillness in the air knowing that all our loves ones are remembered. We can only imagine the tremendous joy when a Holy Soul is released from Purgatory and enters the glory of Heaven.

Prayer of St. Gertrude -

Eternal Father, I offer you the Most Precious Blood of Your Divine Son, Jesus, in union with all the Masses said throughout the world today. For all the souls in Purgatory, for sinners everywhere, sinners in the universal Church, those in my own home and in my own family. Amen.