All Souls’ Day: No one Gets Left Behind or Forgotten

Dear Family in Christ,

Father Janusz, Father Don and I recently watched ‘Coco’, the 2017 Disney movie inspired and built around the Mexican cultural celebration Dia de los Muertos (a quasi-Catholic celebration of All Souls’ Day). Central to the theme of the movie (read: it does not accurately reflect Church teaching nor Mexican culture) is the practice of remembering the dead through pictures and celebrations. There is an urgency to this practice in the movie, as the souls of the departed would be annihilated even from the afterlife if they were forgotten by their family.

Despite the general superstition and diversion

from the Holy Tradition that inspired it, Coco displays

something undeniably beautiful and powerful. The love of

living family members for their dearly departed, and the

desire to help them in any way they could actually points to

the Catholic practice of praying for All Souls- particularly

on this day, November 2nd.

For more on Purgatory, see the Catechism

paragraphs 1030-32. For our immediate purpose, Purgatory

is the ultimate expression of Christian Hope for Heaven for

those who are not perfect when they die. The journey of

purification for a soul from this life to the next is arduous,

and wrought with suffering. In the great mystery of our

Faith, by our prayer and penance, we the living can obtain

grace and consolation for the faithful departed. Indeed, we

do this regularly for our loved ones, or those who have died

recently. On All Souls’ Day, however, the Family of God

takes special care that no soul is left behind, or forgotten.

(my fellow Millennials, please forgive me for mixing

Disney references)

I am grateful that one day, when by the grace

of God I am on my way to Heaven via the purifying fires of

Purgatory, the Church will assist me by her prayers. Even if

I am forgotten by family and friends, God’s family leaves

no soul behind.

God love you,

Father Corso