2 November 2025

2 November 2025 - All Souls' Day

Transcript

Reading:  

Romans 6:3

Write:  

… are you unaware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 

Reflect:   

Those of you who have been around funerals probably recognize that this verse and that most of the readings for All Saints and All Souls Days are from the options for funerals. Many of you have not had to deal with the pain of a funeral recently. But Midtown Catholic has endured over thirty funerals since this time last year. And there are a few already on my calendar for early November. 

It is a good tradition that we put these candles out during this month that remind us of those who have gone before us. If you have a family member who has died in this last year, again, you have our condolences from Midtown Catholic.

Apply:   

For me, personally, this year marked ten years since my dad died and five years since my mom died. Honestly, becoming an orphan changed some of the way I look at death. Another priest I know was the first one to use that line of “becoming an orphan.” When his mom died, he made that comment about himself and I thought it was… true and poignant. At the time he said that, my parents were still alive. But now… I am an orphan as well.

Moving on.

I do not think it is an accident that the church has placed these feast days for us here at the turn of the seasons. Granted, it is different between the northern and southern hemispheres. So, let me talk about us here in the northern hemisphere first. We see the leaves dying and colder weather reminds us of winter, so it is somewhat of a natural sense that we turn our thoughts to death and dying. St. Paul’s letter to the Romans reminds us of who we are in Christ. We have already died. Here is a great mystery: baptism is a dying and a rising in the same moment. Baptism is the only death a Christian needs to ever fear! Let me repeat that. Baptism is the only death a Christian needs to ever fear! It is the death of sin. Sin cannot keep control of us. (I know, it is unfortunate that we still yield to so much sin, but that is part of the human condition – flawed and wounded by sin. In the next chapter of Romans, St. Paul says, “Miserable one that I am! Who will deliver me from this mortal body?”) As long as we are taking a breath here on this earth we are facing the battle against temptation and sin. That is why the Church refers to those of us here on earth as being part of the Church Militant. She refers to those in purgatory as the Church Suffering. She refers to the saints in heaven as the Church Triumphant.

All Saints Day is intended to get us thinking about the Church Triumphant. All Souls Day is intended to get us thinking about the Church Suffering. Our everyday life should leave us thinking about ourselves being in the Church Militant.

Now let me speak for a moment about the southern hemisphere. There it is the beginning of spring. And that too brings a different look into the mystery of the call to heaven and these two feast days. Spring is a renewal and the resurrection which is the ultimate renewal.

Both perspectives are needed. And yet how often do we spend time thinking about them? I believe it is quite natural for us to mutiny against death, even though we cannot succeed on our own. The only successful mutiny against death is life in Christ. And this is what spring reminds us about.

This is what baptism gives us. As St. Paul says, “For if we have grown into union with him through a death like his, we shall also be united with him in the resurrection.”

In the Wisdom of Solomon, the King says, “God did not make death, nor does he rejoice in the destruction of the living.” And St. Paul says, “the wages of sin is death.” So, sin brought death. Death is a short circuit for what God intends. Think hard about that! I do not think God intended death the way we experience it. The Blessed Mother is proof of that. She was taken, body and soul, at the Assumption, into the presence of God.

I think the Assumption is what God intended had there never been any sin. So we have these two feast days to remind us that something has gotten in the way of God’s original plan. These feast days should get us thinking about sin and death and winter; and at the same time they should get us thinking of holiness and life and spring.

I have said as a joke over the last couple of weeks that “fall has fallen, I can’t wait for spring to spring.” So we can think about All Saints and All Souls, about those who have gone before us, about our own destiny.

There is another line from Lamentations, chapter three that says, “I will call this to mind as my reason to have hope: that the mercies of God are made new each day.”

Remember those who have gone before you. Call to mind His mercies. And declare your faith before the world.

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