Homily for November 2, 2008

Father Tom’s Homily
All Souls Day
November 2, 2008

In recent years archeologists discovered something remarkable when they were working in an ancient and long-ago abandoned Roman sewer. They found a very large head, a colossal stone head.
The head had been removed from some public statue. They recognized the head to represent the Emperor Constantine.
There were statues of other dead emperors. This one commemorated the first Christian emperor.

This prompted speculation that Constantine had been the victim of damnatio memoriae (damnation or destruction of memory).
In this case of a severed head in a sewer, it was the practice of obliterating the memory of someone they wanted to forget, an ancient emperor who was despised by some Romans.

It is reasonable to assume that Constantine had many enemies because he had embraced the long forbidden religion of Christianity.
In doing so he had repudiated the gods who were the sacred guardians and protectors of Rome and its mighty empire.
Constantine had wiped out the memory of the Roman gods. Now he must also be forgotten.
In this regard, one can note that a large statue of the Emperor Constantine is now one of the only statues of an ancient Roman emperor on public display in Rome. It is a grand image at the entrance to St. Peter’s Basilica.

At the beginning of November each year, Christians throughout the world engage in a ritual of remembering the dead. We do not want them to be forgotten.
On November 1 & 2, All Saints and All Souls Days, we call to mind all those who have gone before us, the well-known saints and the lesser-known saints.

Today, All Souls Day, we pray that God embrace with his mercy our own beloved family and friends who have died. But there are further reasons for our prayers for our beloved dead today and throughout November.
Do we pray for the dead to remind God to be merciful to them? God does not need our reminders. God loves them more than we do. And is already as merciful as love allows.

We bring the concerns of our hearts to God because Jesus has asked us to do so. He has instructed us to pray always.
Prayer is not meant to change God’s heart, but our hearts.
We pray for our beloved dead because prayer helps us who are left behind. We pray that we might be consoled.
How do people cope with the pain and loss of a loved one? Throughout history, people have rituals when death breaks our living communion with others.
Catholics have the celebration of the Eucharist and rituals of departure at funerals. Wakes are meant to awaken in us something to heal the loss.
There is the gathering of family and friends to hug one another and perhaps to cry together. To share stories and perhaps to laugh. And to remember. Remembering is important.

We pray and remember the dead because we believe in the communion/community of the saints. This is the Christian belief that death does not separate us from one another.
We remain in communion with them through our prayers and memories of them. Just as we may have held someone’s hand when they were dying, now we can hold a person’s hand beyond death through prayer and remembering.
After a time, we sense that we no longer need to pray for our beloved dead. Now we just talk with them. They are still with us.

In ancient Rome the dead were buried with a coin in their mouths. This was to pay the ferryman the cost of crossing the river of death to the next life. The river was called the River Styx. The name of the ferryman was Charon.
In Christian belief, the payment to the cross the river into the next life has been paid by Jesus.

On this day of remembering and praying for those who have crossed the river before us, we also acknowledge our own life journey.
The Christian version of this journey can be summarized in this way.

In life we are accompanied by the Spirit Companion (the Holy Spirit). At the river’s edge we are met by our Brother Jesus, who pays our passage and escorts us to the Father’s House.
At the door, the Father greets us with an embrace. And as the Father of all us prodigal sons and daughters, he clothes us with the robe of welcome and places on our finger the ring of the beloved. And then there is music and dancing at the Feast, our Wedding Feast.

The image of a wedding is appropriate because in eternity we shall enter the intimate circle of the Blessed Three (Companion Spirit, Loving Brother and Welcoming Father). For such glory and eternal love we have been created.
We are born from the heart of God and we are meant to return to the heart of God.