It is the evening of All Souls day. Always this day is, for me as for many others, a day filled with memories of those loved and loved by who have died. As we pray in the preface fof the Mass for the Dead, “life is changed not ended.”

It is for them of course, life changed, but so too for us. We are left behind, and at times the feeling of loss overwhelms us. Indeed, life is changed, not ended.

In my homily for Mass tonight I recalled the line that Monsignor Tom Liddy had written as the title of his Last Will and Testament:

My soul to God
My body to the earth
May they be in God’s kind keeping
Until the day of resurrection.

I also recalled the green cross that we placed on the coffins, then on the graves, of each of my parents at their funerals six and seven years ago. As people who worked with the earth they knew that the life was in the rich fertility of the soil rather than in the flowers that were the fleeting beauty of the garden. So instead of flowers we asked friends to make a simple green cross.

Throughout this month we will continue to remember those who have died, the Holy Souls, that they may be ready and able to embrace fully the life that God offers for eternity, and where we will (God & us willing) one day be reunited.