The Catholic Sense of Death

Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed

    While we, as Catholics, are used to the Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed, more commonly known as All Souls’ Day, it doesn’t often fall on a Sunday.  Sundays are little Easters, so it might seem odd to focus on those who are dead.  But Purgatory, the abode where the souls who are not ready for heaven, but have not rejected God, precisely stands as a possibility because of the Resurrection of Christ.  And Purgatory gives hope to all those who are not perfected at the time of their death, and therefore are not ready for heaven, where we see God, Holiness Himself, face to face.  
    We cannot deny the pain and sorrow of death.  When someone we love dies, we know that we won’t see that person on earth again.  And in the face of that harsh reality, tears naturally follow.  But as those who know that Jesus rose from the dead, our grief should be eased a bit by the fact that death is not the end.  That’s the power of the Resurrection of Christ: death is not the end.  That’s the power that the martyrs held as they didn’t fear to suffer for Christ, because they knew that the world threw all pain and suffering at Christ in His crucifixion, but Christ came out victorious in the end on Easter Sunday.  
    But it’s also the power that should help us who remain after someone dies, because our faith tells us that they simply have gone on a long journey to a place where we can’t stay connected through a meet-up, phone call, text, FaceTime, or Zoom, but where we can stay connected through prayer.  Just as we are somewhat sad, but still have hope when a family member or friend goes on a cruise and we can’t contact them with earthly technology, so we should have the same hope when someone we love dies, because death is not the end, but a transition to a new form of life.  
    But as Catholics we can often act like non-believers who treat death as the absolute end.  We forget our faith and the central teaching of our religion, the resurrection, and we do what St. Paul tells us not to do: weep as those who have no hope.  I’m not saying we need to celebrate every time someone dies, though some saints have reminded their family and friends that life will be better for them in heaven, since they followed Christ on earth.  Really, we should only mourn when someone was not prepared to die and did not follow Christ, though even then we commend those people to the mercy of God.  
    Purgatory also gives us hope because while we strive for perfection, if you’re anything like me, you sometimes fall short.  God is perfect holiness, and if you ever read through the Old Testament, you’ll notice that no one is really excited to see God.  It’s not because they disliked God, but because they knew, often better than we do, that the holiness of God destroys any sin, like light destroys darkness.  So to be in heaven, in the presence of God’s perfect holiness, means that we have nothing sinful left in us, otherwise we would be destroyed.  Or, if we think about God’s holiness like heat, it’s so hot that our sinfulness would immediately burst into flames.
    So if we die in a state of grace, that is, not aware of any mortal sins or any rejections of God, but we still have sin, we have the opportunity to still make it to heaven after we have been purified in Purgatory.  It’s not perfect holiness (and heaven) or hell.  We have the chance to still make it to heaven even if we have not fully configured our life to Christ.
    Having said that, Christ still calls us to put sin behind us and make His life our own while on earth.  Our goal should always be heaven.  If our goal is Purgatory, then we’re aiming too low, like a sports team that only hopes to make it to the playoffs, not win the National Championship.  Plus, we often don’t achieve the goals we set for ourselves.  If we set our goal as heaven and fall short, we do have Purgatory.  But if we set our goal as Purgatory and fall short, there’s no safety net, and our eternity could be the eternal suffering of hell.  
    What is also worth celebrating on a Sunday is that, because of the Resurrection and death is not the end, just like we can help each other while on earth to get closer to heaven, we can help those who have died and whom God purifies in Purgatory by His grace.  The souls in Purgatory are not just left to be purified until God has perfected them.  We can assist them in a variety of different ways and speed their way into heaven.  
    And this is something that we have also forgotten as Catholics.  Not only are we worse, after COVID, of even going to funerals (and I know that some employers are less willing to allow employees to attend funerals), but we especially drop the ball after the funeral.  We take on the mentality either that the person is dead and there’s nothing else we can do, or that the person has certainly made it to heaven and no longer needs our help.  Both of those approaches are antithetical to our Catholic faith.
    Because death is not the end, we can suffer for the benefit of souls in Purgatory.  Maybe it’s an illness, or pain, or just a frustrating situation, but we can offer it up, as the sisters used to say, and speed someone’s path to heaven.  During these first days of November we focus on special opportunities to gain indulgences for the souls in Purgatory, but there are numerous opportunities throughout the year to gain an indulgence, not only for our own salvation, but to help a soul in Purgatory get to heaven a bit faster.  For example, under the usual conditions, spending 30+ minutes in Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is a plenary or full indulgence; saying the Canticle of Mary (the Magnificat) is partial indulgence; using an object of religious devotion that has been blessed by a priest is a partial indulgence; the vocal  recitation of the Rosary in a church or as a family, or a partial indulgence anywhere else; reading Sacred Scripture to grow in holiness is a partial indulgence, unless it’s 30 minutes or more, in which case it’s a plenary indulgence.  None of those require going to Rome or a Jubilee Year (though there are also indulgences attached to the Jubilee Year).  
    Lastly, Masses can be said for the soul of a person who died.  When a Mass is said for a deceased person, the merits of Jesus’ salvific work is applied to purify the soul of that person.  The practice of saying Mass for a person enjoyed popularity with older Catholics, but is important for every person.  And the cost to schedule Mass for the intention of a person is only $10.  So it’s not outside the range for even a young family with kids.  But what a powerful way to help a person in Purgatory!
    As we celebrate All Souls’ Day today, it’s good to have reminders about our faith in the Resurrection, and the effect it has upon how we mourn those who have gone before us marked with the sign of faith.  May our faith in the Resurrection of Christ not only remain in our minds and hearts, but truly affect how we live our lives as Catholics and the choices we make to assist the souls in Purgatory. 

"Father, Mass is boring..."

Twenty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time

            There are few things more disappointing to a priest than the words, “Father, I think Mass is boring.  I prefer going to my friend’s church because it’s more exciting and they have better music.”  These words generally come out of the mouths of teens, because they generally speak their mind, whether you like it or not.  But, if I had to guess, I would say that many adults feel this way too, they just have become familiar enough with the rules of decorum not to say it, at least, not to the priest’s face.

            Saying that Mass is boring betrays that one does not know what’s really going on at Mass.  Many of us come because we have always come.  Many come because we don’t want to commit a mortal sin of missing Mass on a Sunday or Holyday.  If you’re a minor, you may come simply because it’s one of the expectations for those who are provided with free room and board by mom and dad.  But do we know what we are doing when we come here?  Do we know the privilege we have?

            In our second reading from the Letter to the Hebrews, the author tells us that we

have approached Mount Zion and the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and countless angels in festal gathering, and the assembly of the firstborn enrolled in heaven, and God the judge of all, and the spirits of the just made perfect, and Jesus, the mediator of the new covenant, and the sprinkled blood which speaks more eloquently than that of Abel.

He is talking about the worship of the Church, and contrasting it with the ways the Israelites worshipped at Mount Sinai, when God revealed Himself, and it was so terrible (causing terror)—with a mountain that could not be touched, blazing fire, gloomy darkness, storm, trumpet blast, and a voice speaking from the clouds—that they begged the Lord not to reveal Himself to them in such a way, but to speak through Moses from that point on.

            As we gather here, in this Church, to celebrate Mass, we are being drawn up to heaven.  The stained glass, the high ceilings, the occasional incense, the candles, the bells, the gold, the special vestments, the occasional sprinkling rite—all of this is meant to tell our senses that we have left earth and have entered into a new reality.  We, at this Mass, have entered into the halfway point between   With angels bowing down in worship, with the saints, our Catholic brothers and sisters who have shown us in countless ways what it means to be a faithful disciple of Jesus, we hear God’s Word proclaimed to us, the Word that brings life, the Word that saves us from sin, the Word that tells us how to live so as to not stay in the halfway point, but to truly enter in to what was promised to us in Baptism: the Kingdom of Heaven.  We are able to see the miraculous, as Bread and Wine become, not as a corporate game of imagination, but in reality, the Body and Blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ.  What the angels do not even dare to gaze upon, we hold in our hands or receive on our tongues and Christ becomes one with us.  Our God so loves us that He will not remain separate but pierces the veil between heaven and earth and draws us up to Himself so that we can have communion—union with—Him.  And because of that, our music is different, our words are different.  This is no common place, this is not just another building.  This is sacred space, dedicated to God, and where we are drawn up in anticipation of what heaven will be like, when we are all worshipping God in love before the throne and the Lamb, as the Book of Revelation tells us.

earth and heaven.

            And how do I know that at least some do not understand?  I can tell because, if this Sunday is like other Sundays, or weddings, or funerals, some here are probably chewing gum as I speak.  Some here probably brought in coffee to the Church, or have not observed the fast for one hour before the reception of Holy Communion.  Some here were probably reading the bulletin during the proclamation of the Word of God.  And because some here in coming weeks will just drop the kids off for religious ed and your children will only rejoin you more than halfway through Mass, and they will never fulfill their Sunday obligation.  And that’s just those who are here.  There are so many, including even parents who sacrifice to send their children to our parish school, who won’t even come on Sundays.  This betrays the fact that there is ignorance about what’s going on.  “Father, you don’t know me.  You don’t know my circumstances.  You can’t judge me!”  I certainly cannot judge your soul; that is only for God to do.  I cannot judge your culpability: perhaps you’ve never heard this before; perhaps you have forgotten; perhaps we priests have not done all we can to form you in understanding what the Mass is.  But I can call all of us together, as the Body of Christ, to feel shame for the fact that we have the most precious gift here, and at times we treat it like going to a movie theater, or a play, or a concert.  We treat it just like another weekly event on our calendar that we need to attend for whatever reason.

            Right now in Egypt there are families who are risking their lives, in no exaggeration of that phrase, to go to Mass, because it is likely that radicals could blow up or try to set fire to their church.  Right now in China there are groups of Catholics that gather in secret locations for Mass because if the government finds out that they are more faithful to the Pope than to the Communist government they could go to jail, be tortured, or just “disappear.”  Right now there are many places in the US that see a priest once every month, or even once every few months, and that is the only time they are able to receive Holy Communion.

Our first reading and our Gospel both remind us to be humble.  Let us be humble enough to recognize that we somtimes don’t understand what we are doing, or don’t show the proper appreciation for the great gift that we have in being able to gather each Sunday as the People of God and join in the worship of the angels and saints in heaven as we hear the Word of God and receive that same Word of God, Jesus, in the Eucharist.  And then let us work at being formed to be receptive to the Mass through the many great books that are out there on the Mass, through adult formation sessions, and more, rather than asking the Mass to be formed according to our desires.  Because, brothers and sisters, right now, at this moment, we are participating in the halfway point between heaven and earth.  We are worshipping God and the Lamb, as angels bow down in adoration around this altar as Christ is made present.  We are surrounded by the saints who are filling this room to capacity, joining with us in our worship of God.  We are preparing to receive “Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and the sprinkled blood that speaks more eloquently than that of Abel.”