November 1, 2025 // Columns
Christ Purifies Us – Heals Us – from the Damage of Sin
Almost 1,000 years ago, the great Benedictine abbey of Cluny in France, situated roughly two-thirds of the way from Paris to Geneva, was a major center of learning, piety, caring for the needy, and of missionary outreach, initiated a feast of commemorating all the departed souls.
Eventually, Cluny’s feast of All Souls became an important date on the Catholic calendar. This weekend, instead of celebrating the 31st Sunday in Ordinary Time, the Church is observing the feast of All Souls, because the Church has a lesson to teach.
The first reading is from the Book of Wisdom. The purpose of this book is expressed in its name. It sees religious faith and devotion as the highest of human reasoning. Belief in God, and obedience to God, are only logical.
The reading is reassuring. It states that God will never forsake the righteous, but God will purify the righteous, as fire purifies gold.
For the next reading, the Church presents a passage from the Epistle to the Romans. For two millennia, Christians have regarded Romans to be one of the genuine masterpieces of Revelation. This reading consoles us that while we have sinned, God still loves us. Indeed, the Son of God died for sinners that they might have eternal life.
St. John’s Gospel supplies the last reading. In this reading, Jesus declares that no one who earnestly seeks God will be scorned. Each person is priceless. In God’s love, the plan is that no one shall be lost.
Reflection
Whenever the Church replaces the liturgy of a Sunday in the normal sequence of Ordinary Time with a feast, it intends to teach an important lesson.
The Church’s message this weekend is simple. Only the just may enter heaven, as the Scriptures teach (2 Maccabees 12:38ff.; Matthew 12:32; 1 Corinthians 3:12-15; 1 Peter 3:19).
Everyone has sinned. While forgiven, believers suffer the ill effects of their sins, while not suffering eternal death.
The ancient Christian belief, and consolation, is that committing sin does not necessarily condemn anyone to everlasting doom. The Lord forgave sins and bestowed on the apostles and their successors the same authority (Jn 20:23).
Purgatory is the Church’s theological explanation of how sinners overcome sin’s ill effects. Ultimately, it is about us as humans, and about God’s great love for us, even if we have sinned.
All Souls’ Day, first and foremost, calls Christians to be frank and honest with themselves. They are sinners. None is perfect. Accepting this fact is fundamental to Christianity – to any person’s choice to follow Christ.
Second, it proclaims the love and mercy of God, perfectly expressed in the ministry, and in the sacrificial death of the Lord. God lovingly forgives.
God loves us, the Church earnestly insists, but just as the ancient prophets and the Christian mystics knew quite well, sin injures humans. Even if we beg to be forgiven, and have been forgiven, we bear the effects of the injuries of sin..
Purgatory is the opportunity to be purified, for the wounds to be erased. It is a state of longing.
All people are united in their being children of God. Anyone can communicate with God, if they so choose. On All Souls’ Day, we pray that God will mercifully hurry the process of purification so that, in Christ, the souls in purgatory, our brothers and sisters, soon will fully live with God, healed, perfected, and cleansed.
Sin wounds us, often badly, but God forgives us. He loves us. Purgatory restores us.
READINGS
Sunday: Wisdom 3:1-9; Psalms 23:1-6; Romans 5:5-11 or Romans 6:3-9; John 6:37-40
Monday: Romans 11:29-36; Psalms 69:30-31, 33-34, 36; Luke 14:12-14
Tuesday: Romans 12:5-16b; Psalms 131:1b-3; Luke 14:15-24
Wednesday: Romans 13:8-10; Psalms 112:1b-2, 4-5, 9; Luke 14:25-33
Thursday: Romans 14:7-12; Psalms 27:1bcde, 4, 13-14; Luke 15:1-10
Friday: Romans 15:14-21; Psalms 98:1-4; Luke 16:1-8
Saturday: Romans 16:3-, 16, 22-27; Psalms 145:2-5, 10-11; Luke 16:9-15
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