Bishop Glen John Provost
Bishop of Lake Charles
Homily for the 31st Sunday in Ordinary Time
Sunday, November 4, 2007
Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception
“For no one can lay a foundation other than the one that is there, namely Jesus Christ. If anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, or straw, the work of each will come to light, for the Day will disclose it. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each one’s work. If the work stands that someone built upon the foundation, that person will receive a wage. But if someone’s work is burned up, that one will suffer loss; the person will be saved, but only as through fire.” I Corinthians 3:11-15

Msgr. Ronald Knox, a noted convert to Catholicism in the last century, writer, and preacher and amongst other things the literary executor of the estate of Evelyn Waugh, once made a keen observation about why All Souls Day, November 2, found itself in the late fall. He said the reason was that nature was purifying itself at that time of year. To understand the observation we need to refresh our knowledge of what All Souls Day is.

All Souls Day is a time when we remember our deceased and pray for them in a special way. In so doing we follow the example of Judas Maccabee in the Second Book of Maccabees who prayed for the souls of his fallen troops in battle so that their sins might be forgiven (II Maccabees 12:43-46). In that passage, praying for the dead is actually called “a holy and pious thought” (II Maccabees 12:45). In praying for the dead, Catholics express hope in the Resurrection and a hope that forgiveness is possible even “in the age to come” (Matthew 12:32), as our Lord implied. All Souls Day indicates a belief in a state of purification, purgation as it were, where the souls of the dead are prepared for eternal bliss. “As gold in the furnace,” they become purified “as sacrificial offerings” taken to God (Wisdom 3:6). Most of all, I think, All Souls Day gives us hope, because we are joined to a Body of Christ who is being redeemed. Christ redemption is a purifying from sin and its effects, and the People of God “await the blessed hope” of the final coming of Jesus Christ, when He will “cleanse for himself a people as his own” (Titus 2:11-14).

The observation of Msgr. Knox about the timing of All Souls Day recalled something I remembered as a child, the burning of leaves. In the fall of the year nature is preparing for the sleep of winter. As in death, nature is dying, the leaves are falling from the trees, and farmers are harvesting their crops. In Southwest Louisiana the harvest of sugar cane is a perfect example. The roads are filled with trucks bearing harvested cane, the smell of burning cane debris is in the air, and where syrup is still made, the flakes of ash settle to the ground. All of this activity calls attention to a season of the year, what Our Lord in the Greek Scriptures calls “kairos,” an age or period of time, a cycle in which we are intimately involved. It is a harvest time, like the one Jesus used as an image for the end of the age and judgment. As Jesus will say, “The harvest is the end of the age” (Matthew 13:39).

In the late fall, my parents would send me out into the yard. Like the master of the harvest, I would separate the good from the bad. Under a pecan tree, I would pick up those precious pecans that had fallen, so that we could have pecan pie at Thanksgiving. The acorns of oaks remained on the ground so that slowly, ever so slowly, they could sprout and, if lucky, grow for someone else’s benefit. The dead leaves were gathered into piles, carried to the street and burnt. When the cleaning of the yard was complete, the grounds had a purified look, a little naked but ready for the winter months, until the budding of spring would awaken it to a resurrection from the dead. Then, color and smell would once again fill the yard, and nature would remind us of the lesson of the Gospel. “Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit” (John 12:24).

Modern times and ways have brought their changes. We can no longer burn leaves in the city. We buy our pecan pies at the bakery year round. We cut down oak trees to provide land for parking lots. Indoor climate control makes us oblivious even to the cycle of seasons. Nowhere was this made more obvious to me recently, when, in the middle of June, I walked into the lobby of a resort where the air conditioner was turned down and the fireplace lit, not doubt to make the residents feel cozy. All this in the name of progress, but nature will not let us forget the lesson of the Gospel and of All Souls.

Dying for the sake of life is a lesson we see all around us. This purgation happens in repentance. When a confused addict or a troubled alcoholic experiences a genuine change by God’s grace and is freed from enslavement, then fall has passed, and winter is passing. When a marriage is saved or an egotist comes to realize the hurt caused to others, then the leaves have been burnt, and a new spring is upon us. When I kneel before God and pray for a deceased loved one, who was a good person but not perfect, I am confident because of All Souls that “hope springs eternal” and we may be one with the Lord on the day of His coming. That I can pray and sacrifice for the sake of another is an act of love that joins me to Christ. “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13). I not only believe Jesus died for His friends but also that in imitation of him I can do the same.

All Souls and All Saints is a testimony to a great communion. We are one and not separated. That communion requires purification, for to know love we must be in love, and to know perfect love, we must be perfect as our “heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). The dead leaves must be carried out and burnt. The ground must be made ready for the warmth of spring to awaken it. For this reason All Souls, my union with the Church in purification, is my hope in the fall of the year.