Latest / The Manly Catholic: Training Soldiers for Christ / Father Dom's Homs - Halloween Was Never Theirs - All Saint's Day
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- all saints homily: This is The Manly Catholic, the podcast that calls you out of the shadows and into the fight. Here we forge men into warriors for Christ, husbands, fathers, and leaders who refuse to kneel to the modern world's lies. No more passivity, no more excuses, no more lukewarm faith. This is your battle cry, your call to arms. The time for weakness is over. It's time to fight. Welcome to the Manly Catholic. Let's get to work. The name the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Well, happy hollowtide triduum. What was that? Happy hallowtide triduum. What is that? That's a great question. That's the season we're in right now. Every year during this time, the church enters into hollowtide triduum. Well, there's many Catholics that really don't know about this great tradition and celebration that we're in. A lot of the secular focuses isn't is on Halloween and and and and that's it. Though Halloween as a Catholic celebration is deeply connected to the triduum in which we celebrate. When the word triduum is used, maybe it takes you back to Easter time where we celebrate what? We celebrate the Holy Triduum, the three days of God's Passion, His Death, and His resurrection. Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday. It's the Holy Triduum. Right, there's three. That's what triduum means. But that's what we celebrate during this time. And it's supposed to be celebrated during this time every year. Halloween kicks that off, but Halloween is actually all hallows Eve. And then after that, the next day, you celebrate All Saints Day, which is today. And then the day after that, you celebrate all souls, the faithful departed. That is the triduum. And they're all connected, and they're all holy. We all know that All Saints Day is a holy day of obligation. It usually falls sometime during the week, which we're required to go to Mass. That is a holy day of obligation to celebrate All Saints. But sometimes liturgically all saints falls on a Sunday. And we get to celebrate that today, which is very special, which is very important. So I'd like to share with you a little of history, just a little bit. of this great celebration, this great triduum. Before the day of Halloween, as we know it, secularly, before the day became associated with pumpkins the trick or treating, Halloween or Oh's Eve was a liturgical event in the life of the church. The history of Halloween is commonly linked back to the ancient pagan Celtic religious observance known as Shawin. During this festival, which happened on october thirty first, Celtics apparently believed that the veil between the living and the dead blurred and otherwise buried spirits came back to walk the land of the living. It is theorized that this is where the practice of dressing up came from a way of disguising disguising oneself to blend in among the wandering spirits. Of course, this is a pagan ritual. This often led to pagan practices that bind themselves to the evil one. The church recognized this. The origin of pumpkins and trick-or-treating seems to be more modern, of course. The former and initiative of Irish immigrants to America, this is how it began to come to America. And the later, in early 20th century, American innovation. Admittedly, though. The history of Halloween and how it came to about from a European perspective, where it originated. The history of this is difficult to pin down. But this is what we think, in the church at least, this is where it came from. How do we know this? Well, the Catholic Church has a really good practice of going around the world and Catholicizing things and bringing light into the darkness. Christ meaning instead of something different, pointing towards heaven, light, love, peace, joy. They take pagan practices and infuse Christianity into them, turning them into something good. While there are certainly analogies between the way Halloween is celebrated now and more ancient rituals, the term actually comes from the church's liturgy, which we're in right now. The solemnity of all saints, which is in the middle of the triduum, which is today, was also known as Ohallos. Hallow simply means holy. Prior to the nineteen fifty-five liturgical reforms in the church, there was such a thing as hallowed tide, a kind of triduum that began with All Hallows Eve or Hol Halloween. So Halloween or Hall All Hallows Eve was meant to prepare the faithful to enter into the rest of the triduum. So all Hallows Eve in the evening was one of prayer and preparation and giving thanks to the Lord for the saints. And also for heaven and departing from this world, knowing we are pilgrim people. So that evening was all preparation of prayer, getting ready to celebrate the universal church in All Saints' Day and All Souls Day. While the Easter Triduum revolves around the death and resurrection of Christ, this triduum was centered around the eternal destiny of our souls. Halloween, All Saints, and All Souls Day. In 1484, the vigil of All Hallows Eve or Halloween, All Hallows Eve, was instituted by Pope Sixtus IV, though things of this nature had been being celebrated in churches all around Europe. He brought everything together under one banner and called it All Hallows Eve to begin to sanctify it. This also turned into an octave, a celebration lasting eight days, the triduum of celebration of All Hallows Eve. Preparing for all saints, giving honor to the saints in heaven, showing us the way home, and then the holy souls in purgatory praying for them. Then after that, there's eight days of festivities. However, the solemnity of all saints, which proceeds, had already been a long part of the liturgy in the church. So they kind of brought everything together back then. Originally, it was called the Feast of All Martyrs. We hear that in the book of Revelations today, didn't we? Who are those people in those robes? Well, those are the people who've been washed clean by the blood of the Lamb, the martyrs in the church, who gave their lives for us to keep continue celebrating Christ's. Mysteries and sacraments in the church throughout the world. And this was originally celebrated on May 13th. So All Saints was first of all celebrated on May 13th to mark the consecration of the Roman Pantheon. The Roman Pantheon was this huge building in Rome. If you've ever been there, it's magnificent. But around the year 313 to about 400, Rome became Christianized, and so the emperor let the church sanctify the pagan Roman pantheon pantheon and Dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary. So in honor of that began All Saints Day. was dedicated, as I said, to Mary and the martyrs by Pope Boniface IV. This was around the year six hundred AD. In 844, Pope Gregory IV moved the feast to where we celebrated today, November 1st, and named it All Saints, combining the triduum together. It is theorized that one of the reasons for this change was so that all saints could serve as a Christian substitute for the pagan Celtic festivals, All Saints Day. Christianity was often Christianized, important non-Christian. Christianity has often Christianized important non-Christian practices, as I said earlier, which usually meant developing its own traditions with themes that coincided with it while while replacing it. So as missionaries went to the world and went to pagan areas, or sometimes there was animal sacrifice, human sacrifice, they brought the light of Christ. But they didn't want to completely eradicate their pagan practices for fear of losing them. So they would begin to teach them over time that their pagan practices actually mean the birth of Christ. Resurrection, all saints, the Holy Souls in purgatory. With the Vigil of All Hallows Eve, which we celebrated yesterday. Friday, right? No, yesterday. What day is it? With the Vigil of All Hallows Eve, which was not too long ago, we can certainly see some thematic similarities. On the Vigil, Halloween, or All Hallows Eve, on that evening, it was common to sing with the church at At churches with the people and the priests, the vespers of the dead, or which they called black vespers that evening, since the liturgical vestments that the priests wore when people came into the church to pray on Halloween evening, the antiphon for the black vespers was from Psalms 116, verse 9. I walk in the presence of the Lord in the land of the living. It was the beginning of a liturgical celebration that turned people's minds towards the dead, our own death, purgatory, heaven. With the saints, so not only to the saints in heaven, but also to the suffering souls in purgatory, which is church teaching. We can actually find purgatory in scripture as well. The first major solemnity as we keep it today is all saints, which we celebrate today. And the purpose of this great feast is to direct us towards the glory of the saints in heaven. Appropriately, the gospel reading of the day is the Beatitudes from Jesus' famous Sermon on the Mount. At the heart of this feast. Which we celebrate now is a reminder of our ultimate calling to eternal happiness in and with God who loves us so much. A happiness that lies beyond the veil of tears in this world and beyond death. It is also a chance to remember the great cloud of witnesses around us as well, praying for us on this journey. The ending of this triduum is All Souls Day, which is tomorrow. While All Saints has often been celebrated by both Catholic and Protestant traditions. All Souls Day, though, has proven a bit more complicated and controversial. Not least because of its focus on the souls of purgatory, traditionally referred to as the church suffering. For the body of Christ is made up of three parts: the church triumphant, the saints glorious in heaven. The church militant, us here, battling against temptation and Satan, the evil one, being nourished by the sacraments in the Catholic Church, directing us towards heaven, fighting the good fight, persevering. And then underneath that, to finish the body of Christ, which is a triptych, is the holy souls in purgatory. These are all who die in God's grace and friendship, according to the Catholic Church teaching and scripture, but still imperfectly purified when they die, not in mortal sin, but maybe attachment to earthly things and venial sin, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation. They will make it to heaven, but after death, they undergo a certain form of purification so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven. That comes from the catechism of the Catholic Church. The practice of praying for the dead has been a staple part of our Catholicism since the earliest centuries of the church, rooted in both the witnesses of Scripture, even Old Testament and the Book of Maccabees, and the apostolic tradition, the successors of the apostles. All Souls Day, which is tomorrow, is this very special feast allowing us to commemorate the souls undergoing post mortem purification and to dedicate special prayers and We can help them. Offering up our suffering in this world for them, redemptive suffering, uniting to Christ's suffering, to bring about grace, to pour forth on the holy souls of purgatory, to release them. Believing that our prayers aid their sanctification, which is very true. St. John Christmas says about purgatory, let us help and commemorate them. If Job's sons, so the story of Job in Old and the Old Testament, which we all know very well, if Job's sons were purified by their father's sacrifice, why would we doubt that our offerings for the dead on this world during our life bring them consolation? And they do much. They are our brothers and sisters in Christ, united to the body of Christ, which we are part of, nourished by the Eucharist, brought in by baptism, healed by confession, guiding us towards heaven. We are united with the church triumphant, the church militant, and the church suffering. That is the body of Christ. And we can help each other in a supernatural way. That is the faith, part of our faith. Even though we don't officially celebrate all Hollows Eve today, it it is a tradition that is actually starting to come back in the church, which I think is a good thing. Its themes still resonate throughout the two great solemnities following, all saints and all souls. We are reminded of how the boundaries between the living and the dead are in a sense blurred by a virtue of our baptism that bring us into the body of Christ. The church, which is the mystical body of Christ, is not only made up of those on earth, but also those who have died in purgatory and those in heaven praying for us. So there is a beautiful reciprocity to our prayer, whereby, as the catechism says, our prayer for them is capable not only of helping them, but also of making their intercession for us effective. The more we help the souls of those in purgatory with our prayers, the more they are actually able to help us. If they are released with our prayers and go to heaven, they pray for us, they remember us. So tomorrow there is a plenary indulgence that is granted to the church. If you go through a cemetery with your family, you pray for the holy souls in purgatory, with all the other requirements for plenary indulgence included, and you can receive a great plenary indulgence from the great riches and tri treasures of God's Catholic Church. This prayer could be used as you walk through the cemetery, and this was by Pope Saint John the twenty third, and it's called the churchyard prayer. Hail all you faithful souls whose bodies rest here and elsewhere in dust. May our Lord Jesus Christ who redeemed you and us with his most precious blood vouchsafe to release you from your pains, to unite you to the hosts of the angels of saints, and there do you be mindful of us who pray for for you, so pray for us that we may join your company and be crowned along with you in heaven. So the last mass when I started this homily, I didn't realize that this article would take so long. I was thinking to myself, I want to talk about my favorite saint. So please bear with me. I'm almost almost finished. There's so much to talk about on this day. It's so beautiful. So we have a confirmation saint. We have saints that pray for us. Look into your confirmation saint and embrace everything about this person, this this man or woman who can help you to to heaven. That's what they want to do. They so desperately want us to ask for their intercessory prayer through Christ who saves us. Bring you into heaven. My favorite saint is Saint Ignatius of Antioch. He was martyred around the year 110. He was a bishop in Antioch, where they were first called Christians. The third bishop to Antioch, the first one was Saint Peter, before he went to Rome. Saint Peter and the Apostles ordained Saint Ignatius of Antioch, who was a disciple of the beloved apostle Paul, John, deigned into the priesthood and then to bishop. Tradition has it that in the Gospel of Mark, Ignatius, as a little baby or a child, was one of the ones who sat on the lap of Jesus. He's an apostolic father. And he wrote as he was traveling to Rome during a time of persecution, the Roman Emperor at that time came down to Antioch and came to Ignatius, who said he said to him, Renounce your faith in this Jesus Christ and pinch incense to the pagan gods of Rome. And then Ignatius said, No, and neither will all my people. I will protect them. Good bishop. The Emperor himself. Dragged him from Antioch all the way to Rome, where he was thrown in the Colosseum and along with other Christians and killed by the wild beasts. On his way to Rome, Saint Ignatius wrote many letters to his people, the churches. And I stumbled across one of these letters while I was desperately trying to find a truth. And it brought me into the Catholic faithfully. And I owe him a date great debt of gratitude because his power as a saint helped me and helped save me. And that letter was to the Philadelphians, chapter 4. And in it he said this remind you, this is only sixty-five or seventy years after the death of Jesus, and he's a bishop building the church. He says this take heed then to have but one Eucharist. For there is one flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ and one cup to show forth the unity of his blood, one altar of sacrifice, as there is one bishop, along with the priests and deacons, my fellow servants, that so whatever you do, you will be do it according to the will of God. If you do not have bishops, priests, or deacons, you do not have the Catholic Church. These words are powerful because this happened 70 years after Christ. There were no other Christian denominations, but the words you use are very Catholic. And I knew I had to be Catholic. And I entered into the church. Saint Mother Teresa helps me as well. She said this, and I'll end with this to priests. Helps me pray the Mass, the most beautiful thing in all of the universe. He said this, she said this to priests. Priests, pray this Mass like it's your first mass. Pray this mass, like it's your only menace. Pray this mass as if it's your last mass. The saints can help us. Let us give honor to them today and ask for their strength to guide us home, for they know the way. Jesus Christ. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Brothers, thank you so much for listening to this episode. If the show has added value to your life, I'm going to ask you to do three things. Share with the brother who needs it, leave us a review, and finally support the show so we can keep fighting. Links are in the show notes. We'll see you next week.