Youth learn meaning of All Souls Day at Mass

Intermountain Catholic

+ Enlarge

The Blessed Sacrament School Choir cantors for the All Souls Day Mass, under the direction of Laura Thomas, Blessed Sacrament choir director and music teacher.IC photo by Christine Young

SANDY — "Today we remember the souls in Purgatory," said Msgr. Robert Servatius, pastor of Blessed Sacrament Parish, at an All Souls Day youth Mass Nov. 2.

"Today is All Souls Day, and one of the focuses of All Souls Day is the fact of death," said Msgr. Servatius.

He asked the youth what they felt about death. They said sadness, apprehension, and a feeling of hope that when one dies he or she will go to heaven. Msgr. Servatius asked them if they feared death. Some said they did and some said they did not.

"Death is a reality and something that will come to every single one of us at one time or another," said Msgr. Servatius. "There is a lot of ways to approach All Souls Day, and I presume that probably most of us have had someone, during our lifetime that was close to us or we loved very much, die. It might have been a grandparent, an aunt or uncle, or a close friend. The death might have been expected because of an illness, or the death may have come suddenly or unexpected.

"How do we deal with it as Christians?" asked Msgr. Servatius. "One thing that is closely associated with death is hope. The hope we deal with as we live our lives in the human sense is not the same thing as Christian hope. The hope we deal with day-in and day-out has an objective. When we say we hope for something, there is a desired thing out there. But we do not have any assurance those hopes will materialize because most of the things we hope for in this life depend on outer forces.

"If one hopes to win the lottery, it means someone will have to pick your numbers," said Msgr. Servatius. "We have no control over that. Christian hope is different from that. The virtue of hope, which God gives us is already about reality. There is no chance involved. When we say, ‘I hope that at the end of my life when I enter through the gateway of death I will be in God’s kingdom with him for all eternity,’ that kingdom is there already, as is the way to get there."

Msgr. Servatius said if we follow Jesus Christ and our faith with him, then our hope is realized. That is the difference between Christian hope and the hope that we deal with in our lives day-in and day-out.

"That should be a tremendous consolation knowing we can believe in God when he tells us our hope will be realized," said Msgr. Servatius. "Jesus said I do not want to lose anyone my father has created and that includes those who have gone before us and those who will come after us. If that is ingrained in us, there should be no fear of death.

Msgr. Servatius said to get a taste of our hope of eternal life, think of the happiest moment you have ever experienced and multiply it one trillion times, and that is just a taste of eternal bliss with God."