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 for the day 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 someday. 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. This first two of these 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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