All Souls' Day

All Saints Day in New Orleans

Decorating the Tombs

(Engraved by John Durkin

in Harper's Weekly 

November 1885)

     I know many parishioners, often the surviving spouse, who will visit their beloved’s grave with great regularity – even weekly, and always on important dates like birthday, anniversaries, and death days. The physical location gives them a way to spiritually relocate their loved ones in their grief while maintaining a connection with one who meant so much to them in life. Our bonds endure with those who have passed on before us. In many ways, the faithful departed of yesterday are more alive than we are today – for they are in the unmediated Presence of God – the Beatific Vision!

     Yet, I’m sometimes amazed how few people visit the grave sites of loved ones. There are many and varied reasons for not doing so. I realize, as we all do, that the ‘person’ is not there, just their earthly remains. And as for praying for, with, and ‘to’ our loved ones, we need not be at the graveside. Yet, we also need to remember that our bodies are not just ‘extras’ or ‘add-ons’. They are us. The temporary separation of the body & soul at earthly death will not be fully rectified until the full final Second Coming, when the Lord will have all risen in Glorified Bodies like His own. Yet, I also realize some don’t go to cemeteries, funerals, and even nursing homes because of a fear of death. It makes it too ‘real’. We ought not live from fear. And as Christians, we definitely ought not to fear death for we have already experienced death in our Baptism and now live in a confidence of Resurrected Truth. Our modern world likes to sanitize death – rose colored lights, make up, and perfectly curated displays of our beloved dead at the Funeral Home. For many, this is a comfort and gives them a reassuring last memory of them in their passing – especially as a corrective to the sometimes sickly & suffering view experienced in the weeks and months leading up to the passing. But it is also sometimes meant to ‘fool’ us or make it palatable, when the only thing that makes physical passing ‘acceptable’ is our Faith in the Resurrection.

     There is also a growing sentiment within the secular world that sees no point to remember or pay attention to the past or to our beloved departed beyond a sentimental familial or friendly connection. In a world view where this is all there is, once one has died, they are dead. Forever in the past, forever history, forever beyond influence or import. This is a logical conclusion for one who sees the human person as essentially a highly evolved and self-reflective animal, but no more. Apart from a deep understanding that humans are not merely animals – we indeed have an animal nature – but are in fact made in the Image & Likeness of God with eternal – not merely temporal – existence.

      Cemeteries, All Souls Day, and deep connections in prayer and action towards our beloved dead, keep us rooted in an authentic Christian understanding of the human person. And that deep rooting, allows us to be ever so more connected to the living here and now. I encourage you to really think, pray, and act out All Souls Day.

Nothing Less than saints for the Holy Family of God.

Holy Family, heirs to the House of David, Pray for us.

~ Fr Jeremy M. Gries