What is All Saints Day? All Saints Day is a feast day of the Catholic Church that is celebrated every November 1st. “This feast celebrates all the unknown saints who are now in Heaven. Sanctity is within everyone’s reach; through the Communion of Saints each part of the Mystical Body of Christ helps every other grow in holiness.”[i]
MUSIC – When the Saints go Marching in
One of the iconic American songs of all time is “The Saints”. It was first written as a Church Hymn, but later became a jazz and rock sensation. The entire song is that of one who has passed away wanting to be in the number of the saints. It was typically started out as a dirge or solemn style then picked more upbeat. This video shows it being played at a funeral, which is a norm in New Orleans. It shows the beauty of the afterlife. Yes, there is sorrow in the person’s death, but great hope and celebration that one day we too will join with the great saints.
When did All Saints Day become a feast day? “Pope Boniface IV first suggested the celebration of this festival, when in 610 he ordered that the Pantheon, a pagan temple at Rom, dedicated to all the gods, should be converted into a Christian church, and the relics of the saints, dispersed through the different Roman cemeteries, taken up and placed therein. He then dedicated the Church to the honor of the Blessed Virgin and all the martyrs, and thus for the first time celebrated the Festival of All Saints, directing that it should be observed in Rom every year. Pope Gregory IV extended this feast to the whole Catholic Church, and appointed the 1st of November as the day of its celebration.”[ii]
Why do we have a feast day for all the saints? There are many reasons as to why we have a feast honoring the saints. Here are four reasons.
1. First, just as we give praise to athletes for their accomplishments, and honor them into the Hall of Fame of their sports so too do we honor and celebrate the accomplishments of the greatest of the men and women who are in heaven. “To give praise to God in His saints (Ps. 150), and to pay to the saints themselves the honor which they merit for having made it the work of their earthly life to promote the honor of God.”[iii]
2. The second reason why we celebrate All Saint’s Day is really part of a two-day feast. We start today celebrating and asking for the intercession of the Church Triumphant, the Saints, and the very next day we show our intercessory powers by praying for the Church Suffering, the holy souls in Purgatory. November 1st and 2nd help bring us closer together as one body of Christ. “To impress vividly upon our minds that we are members of that holy Catholic Church which believes in the communion of saints, that is, in the communion of all true Christians, who belong to the Church triumphant in heaven, to the Church suffering in purgatory, or to the Church militant upon earth; but, more particularly, to cause us earnestly to consider the communion of the saints in heaven with us, who are yet battling on earth.”[iv] Today we celebrate the triumph of the saints who made it to heaven. Tomorrow, November 2nd, the Church celebrate and pray All Souls Day. We celebrate the souls who have died and have been promised eternal life, but still need to be made completely pure to enter into heaven to be with the saints and the Church Triumphant. We pray for the Church Suffering on All Souls Day, those who are in purgatory.
Search: Purgatory
3. The feast day helps us to stop and remember that we too can become of the saints in Heaven one day no matter whom we are or where we come from. God is calling each and every one of us to be with Him. “To exhort us to raise our eyes and hearts, especially on this day, to heaven, where before the throne of God is gathered the innumerable multitude of saints of all countries, times, nationalities and ranks of life, who have faithfully followed Christ and left us glorious examples of virtues, which we ought to imitate. This we can do for the saints, too, were weak men, who fought and conquered only by the grace of God, which will not be denied to us.”[v] “We remember in a special way that sanctity is accessible to everyone in their various jobs and situations, and that to help us reach this goal we ought to put into practice the dogma of the Communion of Saints. The Church invites us to raise our hearts and minds to the immense multitude of men and women from all walks of life who followed Christ here on earth and are already enjoying his presence in Heaven.”[vi]
4. Finally, the Church has thousands of canonized saints. Not to mention the countless saints who are not canonized, but are in heaven. We wish to honor every saint, those that we know of, and the one’s who are in heaven that we do not know of, and ask for their intercession. “To honor those saints, for whom during the year there is no special festival appointed by the Church. Finally, that in consideration of so many intercessors God may grant us perfect reconciliation, may permit us to share in their merits, and may grant us the grace to enjoy with them, one day, the bliss of heaven.”[vii]
Why is the Gospel Reading for this feast day about the Beatitudes? “Because they form, so to speak, the steps on which the saints courageously ascended to heaven. If you desire to be with the saints in heaven, you must also mount patiently and perseveringly these steps, then God’s hand will assuredly aid you.”[viii] “The liturgy of the Church in pilgrimage on earth unites today with that of the Church in heaven in honoring Christ the Lord, the source of the holiness and of the glory of the elect.”[ix]
[i] Daily Roman Missal, pg. 1974
[ii] Goffines, the Church’s Year, pg. 718
[iii] Goffines, the Church’s Year, pg. 718
[iv] Goffines, the Church’s Year, pg. 718
[v] Goffines, the Church’s Year, pg. 718
[vi] Fernandez, In Conversation with God 7, 38 Introduction
[vii] Goffines, the Church’s Year, pg. 718
[viii] Goffines, the Church’s Year, pg. 720
[ix] Gabriel, Divine Intimacy vol. IV pg. 262