Today we celebrate the Faithfully Departed - all those who have died and who believed that God loved them and actually desired them. This is the oldest feast celebrated in the Catholic Church to pray for the dead - at Mass and in our private prayers - is considered a Spiritual Work of Mercy that we all are obligated to do.

Our Catholic faith teaches us that at death we actually do not "end" but are transformed into a new Being. In fact we believe that at the very moment of death we are judged (the particular judgment) and receive our eternal reward. Our bodies and our souls separate and as theologians put it, we become like a mind alone, communicating with God in a completely different way (at the final judgment our mortal bodies and our immortal souls will be reunited and glorified). Our Catholic faith also teaches us that it is the obligation of those of us on earth to pray for the departed, especially for the souls in Purgatory (who are there due to any hindrance that keeps them from the face of God until they are purified) so that they may be welcomed home.

This is a good time to talk about ghosts and spirits, since we are also close to Halloween and our cultural obsession with mediums and soothsayers. The Church, from its theological studies and from God's Eternal Word, believes in four (4) kinds of spiritual beings - we don't believe in ghosts and visits from the dead (sorry Abigail's). The four types of spiritual beings are: God (supernatural), Angels (messengers from God), disembodied souls (the human soul at death), and demons (preternatural). At death, the human body and the soul separate and the body is reverently placed in its burial resting place. God does not call "aunt Mary or uncle Joe" back to life (remember the soul and the human body are separated and the body is in the grave, thus we have no feet or hands) to rattle about in the attic or to throw pots in the kitchen at 1 a.m. All that is for Halloween movies, restaurant marketing, and for fleecing. God does only that which is logical and since He desires us to be with Him in the eternal kingdom, the movie-like hype goes against what God would do. To believe in mediums or soothsayers is to not believe in the glorious power of God and in His desire to have us with Him eternally.

Let's get back to praying for the faithfully departed. Today's reading from the Book of Wisdom gives us great hope: "The souls of the just are in the hands of God and no torment shall touch them. They seemed, in the view of the foolish to be dead, and their passing away was thought an affliction and their going forth from us, utter destruction but they are in peace." (Wisdom 3) Wisdom tells us that there is great peace after death for those who follow the Lord. And in today's Gospel of John we are assured by Jesus Himself that God desires us for all eternity to join with Him in His divine life: "And this is the will of the one who sent me, that I should not lose anything of what he gave me, but that I should raise it on the last day." (John 6:37-40).

With this confidence in God's great love for our immortal souls, let us remember our part - to pray for all the faithfully departed, especially our family and friends - at Mass, by lighting a candle or at the end of the grace at meals saying a prayer for the dead. We can offer our rosary for them or in our thoughts about them ask God to be merciful to them so that they will greet us when we come to the Gates of the Kingdom. And, in passing on our faith we can assure that there will be someone on earth praying for our souls.

Today's culture calls for people to ignore death, as if we can. To skip the funeral rites, to not visit the dying for fearing of remembering them "that way," or so as not to upset the children. Death - and eternal life - is a part of our existence. For we were all created for union with the Divine. And to ignore it does us an eternal disservice. Let us pray now for all the faithfully departed, for their immortal and invaluable souls and that the Communion of Saints will be our eternal resting place.