SOME time ago, a parishioner caught my attention when she expressed her concern about the “forgotten souls”: those who have no one praying for them anymore. They may be the ones whose tombs that family members no longer visits. They are the ones who might be in purgatory and are still in desperate need of our prayers.
On this month of November, we remember not only our deceased family members and friends, but also every soul that needs our prayers and longs to be with God.
An important element of our faith is our task to intercede for the needs of our brothers and sisters. We’re called to pray for everyone. That is why at Mass, after the homily, we pray the General Intercessions or the Prayers of the Faithful, which is a beautiful expression of our deep bond with the rest of humanity, the world, and, indeed, with those who have gone before us.
In one of our weekday readings last week, someone asked Jesus, “Lord, will only a few be saved?” As I reflected on this question, I thought that it would be selfish for us to wish that a “few” souls should only be saved. This is never the intention of God. Rather, he desires that everyone is saved, for as author of the Book of Wisdom (11:26) tells us so poetically, God is the “lover of souls” who “rebuke offenders little by little, warn them and remind them of the sins they are committing, that they may abandon their wickedness and believe in you, O Lord!”
Our Gospel Reading (Lk 19:1-10) this Sunday expressed clearly the desire of God to save everyone. It’s the story of Zacchaeus, a chief tax collector and a wealthy man who wanted to see who Jesus was, but he could not see him because of the crowd, for he was short in stature. And so, he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree in order to see Jesus. When he reached the place, Jesus looked up and said, “Zacchaeus, come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house.” When Jesus reached the home of Zacchaeus, he conveyed his Father’s innermost desire to seek out the lost and to forgive sinners, “Today salvation has come to this house because this man is a descendent of Abraham.”
I hope that God’s desire is ours too, that we want everyone to be saved, to have an eternal life. After all, isn’t this is our fundamental mission as followers of Christ? We want everyone to believe in God and to be close to him through his Son, Jesus Christ. We want every soul in this world and in the afterlife to be in union with God and to experience eternal bliss in heaven.
May all the souls of the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace! Amen!
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Reverend Rodel G. Balagtas attended St. John Seminary in Camarillo, California and earned his Doctor of Ministry in Preaching from Aquinas Institute of Theology in St. Louis, Missouri.? For twenty years, he has been in the parish ministry of large multi-cultural communities. ?Since 2002, he has been the pastor of Immaculate Heart of Mary Church in Los Angeles. Please email Fr. Rodel at [email protected].
