Thought for the Week, November 9, 2025

 

“For us, our homeland is in heaven” (Phil 3:30)

These words of St. Paul remind us that this world is not our permanent abode.  We are to live here not as settlers but as pilgrims, as people on the move to their heavenly homeland.  These words remind us that while we seek the goods of this earth, we must seek heaven alone.  The words of a Catholic hymn attributed to I. Williams come to mind, words that clearly point to the thought of St Augustine of Hippo in his Confessions:

One thought only have we

As we journey on

‘Tis our soul’s salvation,

That and that alone.

Seeking heaven alone brings true happiness.

       

On All Saints’ Day, we who are pilgrims on earth, we who journey on through this world, venerate the memory and ask for the prayers of those men and women of faith who once lived with us here, who like us journeyed through this world, and who are now in the heavenly homeland, in the Father’s house. 

On All Souls’ Day, we who are pilgrims on earth pray for those who once lived here with us, who have gone before us, but whose souls still need to undergo purification before they can be admitted into the heavenly homeland.  They have gone before us.  But they are not yet in the heavenly abode.

        During this earthly life of ours, after we have been washed clean by the waters of baptism, and by the cleansing blood of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, we still find ourselves swimming in the muddy waters of sin, covered in the dirt of sin.  Our heavenly homeland, our destination, is the abode of holiness, home of our God who alone is holy, and who has put in us the desire to see his face.  But, because we are made impure by our sins, by our failure to love rightly, we need to be purified before we can enter the heavenly presence and see the face of our God.

        When we pray for the dead, we invoke God in his mercy to liberate souls from the impurities of sin that make them unworthy to be allowed into the heavenly homeland.  We pray for the dead because our God is merciful, and his mercy is limitless.  Not even death, cessation of our breath, can limit God’s mercy.  God hears our prayers when we pray for the dead because God’s mercy is limitless.  Praying for the dead is an evocation of God’s endless mercy.

        Praying for the dead is a sign of our belief in the resurrection of the dead.  We learn this from the Second Book of Maccabees, in the story of Judas, who, from the land of captivity, took a collection, sent it to Jerusalem, to have a sacrifice offered for the dead because of his belief in the resurrection.  We read that if Judas the Maccabean had not believed in the resurrection of those who have fallen in death, “it would have been superfluous and foolish to pray for the dead.”  He had an atonement sacrifice offered for the dead, “so that they might be released from their sin.”

St Monica, mother of St. Augustine, said to her son at the point of her death: “One thing only do I ask of you, that you remember me at the altar of the Lord wherever you may be” (Confessions, Bk XI).

        When we pray for the dead, we are doing what St. Monica asked of St. Augustine.  We remember them “at the altar of the Lord”, as we do at every Mass.   Like Judas the Maccabean, when we pray for the dead, we unite ourselves with the atonement sacrifice offered by Christ Jesus on the cross.  We do this at every Mass when we offer the sacrifice of Christ Jesus the head and of his body the Church.  We offer the holy sacrifice of the Mass praying for the dead because we believe that “just as Jesus died and has risen again, so through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.”

Praying for the dead expresses our faith and our hope in the resurrection. If we did not believe and hope in the resurrection, we would not be praying for the dead.  We believe that Jesus, the immortal Son of God, embraced our humanity when he took mortal flesh in the womb of Mary.  Our Christian faith teaches us that he became flesh “for ourselves and for our salvation”.  We believe that he became flesh to die for us, that he died to destroy sin and death, and he rose so that we who have died to sin can rise with him. 

The resurrection of Jesus assures us that we too will rise again.  After his resurrection, Christ our head ascended into heaven where he continues to intercede for us sinners.  When we pray for the dead, we the Church, his body, are united to Christ our head who continues to intercede for us at the right hand of the Father.  We pray for the purification of souls so that the fruit of Christ’s victory over death will be theirs.  We pray so that, purified by water and blood which flowed from the side of Jesus on the cross, they can return to the everlasting joy of our heavenly homeland.

Even as we celebrate the liturgy on All Souls’ Day with great solemnity, let us know that it is not a day of mourning but a day of prayer.  Whoever prays hopes, and whoever hopes prays.  All Souls’ Day is a day of joyful hope in the resurrection, a day of joyful hope that when we die death will be swallowed up in victory.

We pray for all souls, for all our departed ones, so that, in the words of Odilo, Abbot of the monastery of Cluny, “In return for their faith and good works they will receive the kingdom of heaven from their Saviour who is God Almighty, and who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit through endless ages. Amen.”

Father Anthony Akinwale, OP