DIES IRAE CHANT

[Day of Wrath]

ALL SOULS DAY COMMENTARIES

THE COMMEMORATION OF ALL THE FAITHFUL DEPARTED (ALL SOULS)

JOHN 6:37-40

Friends, in today’s Gospel, Jesus talks about raising us on the last day. Our faith is that God will clothe the soul in a new and higher body, what Paul calls a "spiritual body." Here we might rely on the musings of John Polkinghorne, the Christian physicist, who appreciates the soul as the "form" or pattern of the person. God remembers this "form" and then reconstitutes it at a higher level during the resurrection, much as the pattern of an article or a photograph could be preserved in a computer’s memory and then reproduced in a new way.

Listen again to the words of Jesus in our Gospel today: "Everything that the Father gives me will come to me, and I will not reject anyone who comes to me." As you pray for the souls of your beloved dead, take comfort in those words. They will be raised again.

Purgatory Inspires the Pursuit of Holiness

Purgatory Provides Consolation for Believers

Union with God is our ultimate life’s goal. As such, it’s our ultimate joy. So whatever truth helps us attain our ultimate goal of union with God necessarily is a joyful truth.

The doctrine of purgatory is one of those truths that help us achieve ultimate union with God. Therefore, purgatory is a joyful truth.

So how does purgatory help us achieve our life’s final goal? It inspires the pursuit of holiness.

Loving Concern for the Suffering Souls

Looking out for the good of others is necessarily wrapped up with the pursuit of holiness

The doctrine of Purgatory elicits loving concern for the suffering souls that manifests itself in acts of charity, which in turn contributes to our pursuit of holiness. Just as knowledge of fellow Christians suffering in other countries elicits a movement of love within our hearts that manifests itself in acts of intercessory prayer, so too knowledge that fellow members of the Mystical Body of Christ are suffering across the boundary of death can elicit a movement of charity within the heart and manifest itself through acts of charity on their behalf (e.g., offering the Mass, almsgiving, indulgences, prayers).

Looking out for the good of others is necessarily wrapped up with the pursuit of holiness because it’s the essence of love. Christ instructs us that the second greatest commandment, obedience to which constitutes our holiness, is to love our neighbor as we love ourselves (Matt. 22:39). He also stipulates that our holiness involves loving others as he loved us (John 15:12). So love for neighbor is essential to our pursuit of holiness.

The doctrine of purgatory reminds us that love of neighbor extends beyond the boundaries of death to the suffering souls in purgatory. So whatever acts of love we perform on their behalf, whether it be offering the Mass, almsgiving, indulgence, or prayers, such acts contribute to our growth in holiness. We become more conformed to Christ, who “always lives to make intercession” (Heb. 7:25). As Pope St. Paul VI stated in reference to offering indulgences for the dead, “if the faithful offer indulgences in suffrage for the dead, they cultivate charity in an excellent way.” And for Pope Paul VI, such charity “bring[s] a wider order into the things of this world.