Larger than Death

All Souls Day

November 2, 2014

John 6:37-40

 

My junior high school years in Indonesia has been colored by songs coming from American boy band Backstreet Boys. One of the hits that got stuck in my head was ‘Larger than Life’. The song reflects that something is significantly affecting and changing our lives, and this is possible because this reality is bigger than life itself. This is no other than love. As the lyric goes, “Every time we're down, you can make it right, and that makes you larger than life.”

However, love is not only bigger than life. It is even bigger than that which ends our life: death. It is but natural for us to wish all the best for our beloved ones. Because we love them, we do not want them to get hurt, sick or far from us. We wish them well, success and happiness. Yet, human as we are, we have to embrace our limitations and imperfections. We cannot always prevent our loved ones from getting hurt, disappointed and away from us. Eventually, unavoidable physical separation enters into the picture as death brings conclusion to our mortal life and earthly relationship.

Yet, again, our love refuses to give up. We love even as death stands between us and our dearly beloved. In his letter, St. Paul speaks of love that never fails, and surely it will not fail even in the face of death. Then, how is our love truly larger than death? It is through prayer! In prayer, our love is stretching us even beyond the impenetrable wall of hades, and uniting us with our dearly departed. We pray for them because we love them. We hope that they may receive the eternal rest and in God’s time, we may be reunited. From this perspective, the doctrine of Purgatory is not a product of long biblical and theological research, but it turns to be a natural expression of our boundless love in Christ.

Our love for our deceased brothers and sisters is indeed essential in our faith. We call those who are in the purgatory as members of the suffering Church and those who are in heaven as the faithful of the triumphant Church. Despite biological death, they are never out from the communion, they remain bona fide members of the Church, and they are not far from us! This love and closeness is well expressed in our annual practices of visiting our beloved dead’s tombs. The Church has set unique date so that all the Christians may together offer prayer for them. In the Philippines, November 1 and 2 cause a huge numbers of faithful to troupe into the graveyards so much so that the government has to declare it as national holidays.

St. Paul would dare write that neither death, nor life, nor will angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom 8:38-39). Indeed, love is greater than life and even death.

Br. Valentinus Bayuhadi Ruseno, OP