"I'm sorry for your loss" and praying for the dead

From a very young age the greatest human fear is being lost. For this reason we teach our children to know their phone number, their address and hold our hands tightly when we walk through a crowd. Being lost is such a national phobia that Australian sales of GPS units is outstripping sales of TVs. Losing something is also a frustrating experience. Where are those keys? What panic sets in when we can’t find our credit card! Losing something is very frightening. And it is appropriate that the way we describe the death of someone close to us is as a loss.

“I am sorry for your loss” is a statement I have repeated many times over as a priest. Nothing I can say will ever replace that feeling of emptiness that a person encounters when their wife, husband, parent or child dies. Death robs us of optimism and hope. But it need not always have that effect. For those with faith, death is not the end. With death, life is changed, not ended.

Today I am especially sensitive to Josefina. Her mother passed away when Josefina was only 19 and although that was ten years ago, she still mourns her loss every day but especially on the feast of All Souls. To the Filipino people this is a public holiday as everyone has this special day to remember their beloved dead and they will do this practically by feasting in the cemeteries and on the graves of their dead. We Catholics will attend Mass today and pray for the souls of people we have known in life and hope that they will receive the forgiveness they need to raise them to eternal happiness.

The Books of Maccabees present a firm belief in the eternal life of those who have lived for the Lord and a belief in praying for those who have died. We continue this in our Church. We use the term purgatory, or place of cleansing, as the state of those waiting full entrance into the love of the Lord. Our prayers for the dead are prayers that they be united soon to God in his love.

A priest of our diocese was once asked, "Do you believe in purgatory?" He answered, "Not only do I believe in purgatory, I'm counting on it." Our lives are fragile. A typhoon comes and ten thousand of us die without any warning. Even when we have an idea that our lives are coming to an end due to a devastating illness like cancer, we always die sooner than we expect and sooner than we would like.

We are all imperfect. We need healing from the results of our sins, even if these sins are forgiven. The results of sin do not just go away because the sin is forgiven. For example, a man might leave his wife and family and move in with another woman. His wife might be near a nervous breakdown. His children in turmoil. If ten years later he seeks forgiveness for his actions, he can be forgiven not just by God but also by his wife. But, the results of his sins remain. The children grew up devastated. Their father was not there when they needed him. His wife is still suffering the results of the end of their marriage. The sin is forgiven, but the effects of the sin remains.

During our lives we approach the Lord seeking the healing for the results of our sins. When our lives on earth have ended we depend on the prayers of those still living here to continue to ask God to heal the results of sin in our lives. The priest who said, "I don't just believe in purgatory, I am counting on it," is seeking healing from the community for the effects of his own sins.

This is the month of All Souls. We have done a disservice to our dead by canonizing them all, by deciding that no matter what their lives may have been like, they must they must be in heaven right now. It is a disservice because the faithful departed need our prayers. They need us to offer the sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross for them--to have Masses said for them. They need us to pray the rosary asking Mary to speak to her son for our loved ones. They need us to keep the memory of their goodness alive and before the Lord.

The Books of Maccabees tell us that it is a good thing to pray for the dead. During the Month of November, we pray for our loved ones that they might be healed of the effects of sin in their lives and be admitted into the eternal love of the Lord.

And so we pray in beautifully poetic language: Eternal Rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May their souls and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace.

Is your hope in this present life only? What about the life to come after our death? God puts in the heart of every living person the desire for unending life and happiness. While death claims each of us at the appointed time, God gives us something which death cannot touch - His own divine life and sustaining power.

In the Old Testament, one of the greatest testimonies of faith and hope in the midst of great suffering and pain is that of Job: "For I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last He will stand upon the earth; and after my skin has been thus destroyed, then in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see on my side, and my eyes shall behold, and not another" (Job 19:25-27).
Jesus made an incredible promise to His disciples and a claim which only God can make and deliver: Whoever sees and believes in Jesus, the Son of God, shall have everlasting life and be resurrected!
How can we see Jesus? He is present in His word, in the breaking of the bread, and in the church, the body of Christ. Jesus reveals Himself in many countless ways to those who seek Him with eyes of faith.
When we read the word of God in the bible Jesus speaks to us and reveals to us the mind and heart of the Father. When we approach the table of the Lord, Jesus offers himself as spiritual food which produces the very life of God within us (I am the bread of life, John 6:35). He promises freedom from the fear of being forsaken or cut off from everlasting life with God. And He offers us the hope of sharing in His resurrection. Is your hope and desire to see God face to face?
What is faith and how do we grow in it? Faith is an entirely free gift which God makes to us. It is the Holy Spirit who reveals who Jesus is.
Faith is a personal adherence to God and the free assent to the whole truth which God has revealed. Faith is active submission to the One who created us in love and who sustains us by his grace and power.
To obey in faith is to submit freely to the word that has been heard, because its truth has been guaranteed by God, who is Truth itself. We can entrust ourselves wholly to God and believe absolutely what he says. To live, grow, and persevere in faith to the end we must nourish it with the word of God.
Augustine of Hippo (354-430 AD) said: I believe, in order to understand; and I understand, the better to believe. Jesus promises that those who accept Him as their Lord and Saviour and submit to his word will be raised up to immortal life with him in the Day of Judgment. Do you know the inexpressible joy of belief and hope in the resurrection (see 1 Peter 1:3-9)?
"Lord Jesus Christ, your death brought life and hope where there was once only despair and defeat. Give me the unshakeable hope of everlasting life, the inexpressible joy of knowing your unfailing love, and the unquestioning faith and zeal in doing the will of the Father in heaven."