Feast November 2
The “Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed” is
founded upon the Catholic Church’s doctrine that those faithful who have
not been cleansed from the temporal punishment due to sin and from
their attachment to sin cannot enjoy the Beatific Vision in heaven
immediately upon their death and that they may be assisted by the
prayers, almsgiving, and sacrifices of the living.
This duty of charity observed by the people of God in the Old Testament was continued by the Church in the New Testament.
Over time, it found expression not only in the public and private
prayers of the faithful and in their cultural and religious traditions,
but particularly in the singing of the Office for the Dead and in the
offering of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass for the “Poor Souls in Purgatory”.
In the eleventh century, the tradition established by St. Odilo of
Cluny for the monasteries of his order, spread to other religious
congregations and thence to the universal Church.
Thus, the many different regional dates for commemorating the dead
that had arisen throughout the Church gave way to the universal
observance of “All Souls’ Day” on November the 2nd.
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