All Souls

In the month of November we remember our brothers and sisters who have gone before us marked with the sign of faith. We don’t know where they are. All we know is that they are already in eternity for ever. Some of them still have to undergo a kind of purification, because they are not completely cleaned to enjoy God’s presence. They are happy because they know they are on their way to heaven, but they earnestly desire to be transformed to be able to withstand God’s love. They don’t want to enter heaven yet. They need the right garment. It is like going to a formal party dressed in shorts and tee shirt, while all women are wearing long dresses and the men dinner suits. If you are going there, you would need to change your clothes.

We can help them to shorten their stay in purgatory. They cannot help themselves, but we can give them a hand. We have the keys to liberate them from their long imprisonment. Once two monks debated among themselves this question: What is more important, to pray for the living, or for the dead? One of them always prayed for the living and the other for the dead. The one praying for the living said: “the dead are already saved; the living can go either way.” The other monk answered: “you are right, but imagine you come across two beggars, one young and the other old. To whom would you give your money?” He answered: “To the old one because the young one can get a job.” “You are right. It is the same with souls. The living have the necessary graces to go to heaven. The dead cannot help themselves.” Therefore it is more pleasing to God that we pray for the souls in purgatory.

Let us be generous with our prayers and sacrifices. Not many people remember them. How often do we think about them? Out of sight, out of mind. Protestants don’t believe in purgatory. They don’t have the tradition of praying for the dead and therefore nobody is praying for them. Even though Purgatory is not a place but a state of being, it is getting full and we need to help God to empty it. If we pray now for the holy souls, when we die people will remember us. Then we will be very grateful to them, to be able to jump from one place to the other. Once talking with an old lady, she commented: “Father, when you are getting old, this is all that matters.”

Saint Josemaria used to call the holy souls in purgatory “my good friends”. Let us foster in our hearts a friendship with them, a relationship that will last forever and will help us to fix our eyes on the other life, the real life of the future. Let us finish the month of November with a renewed acquaintance with them.

They are very powerful in front of God. It is one of the best devotions. God listens to them, who are crying day and night. They cannot help themselves, but they can offer their sufferings for us. Any soul we help to reach heaven is going to intercede for us till we die. There will be a multitude of souls welcoming us when we reach the other life. We will ask our guardian angel who they are, and he will tell us that these are our friends the holy souls in purgatory.

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