To read the texts click on the texts: Isa 25:6-9; 1 Thess 4:13-18; Mt 11:25-30
The
Commemoration of the faithful departed reminds us that we are still one with
those who have gone before us into eternal life, and that death is not and can
never be the end. Since they are alive we still owe them love and support in
Christ’s name, even beyond the grave.
While
the readings may be chosen from a great
variety found in the Masses for the dead, I have taken the ones mentioned
above. This gives us an opportunity to look at the mystery of death and the new
life that Christ has won and promised for all of us who believe.
The
question of where we go when we die is a question that has puzzled and continues
to puzzle the minds of many. It is a question that brings out the fact that we
realize that this life has to end and all of us no matter how strong we are, no
matter how rich or poor have to die some day. Death has been and will continue
to be a mystery. While we know that we have to die and today with the
advancement of science and technology can delay death by a few days, months or
even years in some cases and can tell how a person may have died, what we will
never know, what will always remain a mystery is why a person must die at a
particular moment in time. The feast of the Commemoration of the faithful
departed does not provide the answer to this question, but informs us that for
us as believers, death is not and can never be the end.
If
in the past the focus of the feast was on praying for the deliverance of the
“souls” in purgatory who were regarded as the “Church suffering” and needed our
prayers so that they could join in heaven the saints and add to the number of
the “Church triumphant”, today the focus is different. This focus is brought
out through the readings suggested for this day.
It
is quite amazing to find a text like
the first reading of today in the Old Testament in which we do not find any
clear theology of the resurrection of dead. During most of the time before
Christ, only a vague idea of afterlife is found: and "abode of the
dead" called Sheol, whose inhabitants had only a shadowy existence. God’s
favour or disfavour was understood in terms of the present life only. However, as
hard times and tragedies befell the Jewish people, ideas of life beyond this
life began to emerge. Isaiah saw this as eternal restoration of the nation
where death would be destroyed and the whole people would live forever. The
text comes from within the block of material known as 'The Isaiah Apocalypse'
(Isa 24-27). The view of the future within these chapters is universal in
outlook and speaks of God's power in the cosmic as well as the earthly realm.
An invitation to a feast is also issued in the first reading from Isaiah. Those who will heed the call are invited to
the mountain of the Lord, Zion. Here is the choicest of food and drink which is
served in abundance. It is an invitation to feast and rejoice and an assurance
that all tears will be wiped away and the people who come will be accepted. All
reproach will be removed and God will reveal himself as a God who saves. This
salvation will be shown in the most tangible of ways in that death itself will
be destroyed.
The
Gospel text is addressed to all those who accept the message of Jesus unlike
those in Chorazin and Bethsaida. To understand it fully, two points must be
kept in mind. The first is that it is placed by Matthew after three “negative”
passages which begin at 11:2. These are the response of Jesus to the disciples
of John the Baptist to their question whether Jesus was the Messiah, the
exasperation with the crowd who do not recognize John nor Jesus, and the
denunciation of the cities of Chorazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum. Indeed, this
entire section of Matthew’s Gospel seems to lean on a sense of apparent
“failure” on the part of Jesus to measure up to the expectations that all
around him had in terms of what a “Messiah” would look like or act like. The
second point is that this text is clearly a Matthean composition and is made of
three elements. The first two parts are found in Luke but in different contexts
and the third is exclusive to Matthew.
In
Matthew the audience is clearly the crowds and so the words of Jesus here are
meant for all. The passage appearing as it does in this context seeks to state
that despite so much of doubt and negativity, that despite so much of blindness
and closed attitudes, this is not the last word. Despite the fact that Jesus’
message has been questioned by John the Baptist, rejected by many and
especially the wise and understanding and not paid heed to by the cities, yet
the invitation and message will find acceptance among the open and receptive of
which there are still some left. There is no arbitrariness in this. Rather, it
is simply true that for the most part the wise tend to become proud and
self-sufficient in their wisdom and particularly unreceptive regarding the new
and the unexpected. On the other hand the childlike are most often
unself-conscious, open, dependent, and receptive. They are willing to let God
work in their lives. They have not decided in advance how God must act and are
willing to let God be God. They are willing to believe that in Jesus, God has
indeed brought salvation from sin, failure and even death itself. Jesus himself
is an example of such openness, which allowed him to receive everything
directly from God. It is his intimacy with the Father and not his religious
genius, which is responsible for this grace.
Even
as we commemorate the faithful departed we must remember that the readings of
today do not focus on death at all rather they focus on life and life in
abundance. In writing to the Thessalonians Paul makes clear that we cannot
behave as a people who have no hope. Our grief has to be a controlled grief. It
has to be a grief that has its basis in the hope that all who have died in
Christ are sure to rise with him. After God has spoken in Jesus, death is seen
only as transition from one kind of life to another. In the words of the
sixteenth century poet John Donne: “Death, thou shalt die”.
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