Eternal Rest...

Zaduszki (Photo credit: Klearchos Kapoutsis)

Yesterday we celebrated All Saints’ and today we remember All Souls. There is something about the opening days of November that tends to bring these two celebration neatly together. Even the weather (cool and rainy) somehow have conspired towards bringing about this awareness of the mystical and haunting feeling associated with All Saints and today, All Souls.

To celebrate All Souls is not something we do lightly. Neither is it to be taken in a superstitious manner which would negate totally the understanding of our Christian faith. Instead, the celebration of All Souls’ is an affirmation of our capacity to a relationship with God – One whom we can know and love. It is also about our acknowledgement that in us we have something that links us to a power that transcends this world. That something is our soul.

Life is Changed Not Ended

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On the occasion of All Souls, let me offer my homily for the day. I hope you may find some consolation and peace, especially for those who have lost their dearest and best.

The past two days we have been placed before the great question that always haunts us, we who are mortals. It is this practical question of the end of life, we call death. Today, we are reminded that as mortals, we don’t live forever, no matter how much we try to add on those extra years to keep living. Then, again, there are those who would want to die now due to extreme pressures of life and just want to end it all. We are complicated creatures and just don’t know how to handle death and its implications well – in general.

The celebration like today is one way the Church offers us hope that even though we may not in this life be perfect as our heavenly father is perfect, we can still hold on that there are mansions for us in the kingdom of heaven through that very profound and loving act of God who completes our salvation, purifying us for glory. It is also on this note that we pray for the dead in a special way today, keeping clearest in mind that for the Lord’s faithful life is changed not ended.

In her eulogy to her brother, Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple who passed away recently, Monica Simpson said that Steve valued highly beauty and has his life philosophy that hinges on the aesthetics and one that drove him to always aspired to make things that are ‘beautiful’ which people would want to use. Alongside that, she mentioned that her brother’s supreme virtue, his god of gods, was Love. In his final moments as he lay on his bed with his closest family and kin with him, Monica mentioned that he looked at his other sister Patty, then for a long time at his children, then his wife Laurene, and then over their shoulders past them. His last words as he looked past them was, “Oh Wow. Oh Wow. Oh Wow.”

I’d like to think that Steve Jobs at his final moments on this earth finally saw the Beauty and Love that he so aspired for all his life and realised in that instance what for us to mean in saying that life is changed and not ended. So, as we continue out celebration that commemorate the dead, in all humility and awe, we praise God and his goodness and love with the simplest words as only a child may utter: Oh Wow. Oh Wow. Oh Wow.

Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May their souls and the souls of all the faithful departed, through Your mercy, rest in peace. Amen.


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Rest In Peace

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Is this a glimpse of what our final destiny with God is all about?....

On this day of All Soul's, I was brought to the realisation that life can certainly be fragile and that we must cherish every moment of it, especially with and among our love ones, friends and acquaintances. We do not know when we would no longer be among the living, for at any moment we can be called away from this realm of existence.

I was suddenly brought to mind concerning an old school mate of mind whom I had never seen in so many years, and was told one day by my other classmate whom I had bumped into, back in Melaka, many years back, that this person had died. He died because he had committed suicide in a fit of depression. I felt utterly at a loss when I first heard that news and felt the force of the tragedy that came with it because of the waste involved and that none of us, as his schoolfriends, were able to be there to help him. Today I remember him in my prayers, along my other love ones who had gone before us.

I remember him so that through this, he could be forgiven and be made available to the vast mercy of God who calls no one away from Him and I remember this friend with hope that together with all the saints and our love ones in heaven, I may one day greet him there as a fellow child of God, that he truly is...

"Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May their souls and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen"

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Mortality

Image via Wikipedia

Okay, so we have passed through Halloween's, All Saints' and now we have All Soul's.

All speak of the reality of a supernatural  order that points to something greater than our being. It also shows up our own mortality and how we constantly struggle with the issue of death. It is in this mood that it is difficult not to feel a little melancholic or sober with a dash of fear that one really can go anytime.

It is really laughable when you consider the fact that we may come from all walks of life, with different status and level of intelligence and 'greatness'. However, at the end of it all, we all return to dust that we are...

But to stop here and say nothing else would be totally selling ourselves short - as we always like to do.

The Christian response (and of which I am happy to be part of this great calling) is one of hope, wonder and peace to this question of death. It is because, this response is open to the greater transcendence that continues to pervade our dimension even if we choose to ignore it. We are 'hardwired' for the transcendent and and there is something within our being that 'pushes' us to seek the beyond. When we suppress or deny this 'inner wiring' that is there, it shows up in retaliation through different strains of reaction.

One interesting manner which this comes about, is the current fascination of many young people with vampirism, zombies, and all dark natured related items. The industry that services this fascination thrives in bringing about all sorts of activities, books, movies and related collectibles, thereby creating an industry of sorts which is very profitable and, yes, self-indulging.

Image via Wikipedia

As Christians, we know that our hardwiring is towards a God whom we call Father and Jesus Christ points us the way to Him, as did many countless other saints and holy men and women. It is because of this beacon that constantly blazes the path towards our eternal heritage of sons and daughters of God that we are, we can be reassured and walk in this life a better and enlightened person who knows what it means to have faith, hope and charity.

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