We have a Christian duty to the dead

Dear Editor, On the subject of funerals, Sarah Carey, (whose articles I enjoy), recently expressed shock at not being able to assume that her recently deceased friend, "a great lady who reared a large family", wasn't already in Heaven. She wrote: "I think the majority of the congregation would be severely taken aback to learn they're not supposed to mention what they assumed was a certainty (namely Heaven) – for those so deserving of course!" Please God we will all make it to Heaven even though we may not always be so deserving. It is important to remember though that all judgement on our final destination belongs not to the family nor to the community nor the Church, but to God alone. The Church who carries a mother's concern for the eternal wellbeing of all her children teaches us that: "Each man receives his eternal retribution in his immortal soul at the very moment of his death, in a particular judgement that refers his life to Christ: either entrance into the blessedness of Heaven – through a purification or immediately – or immediate and everlasting damnation." (ccc1022). It is out of her motherly concern for all her deceased children that the Church says to us that: "It is a holy and a wholesome thought to pray for the dead that they may be loosed from their sins. It is for this very reason she "offers her suffrages for them". (ccc958)         

There is a danger today, I believe, of undermining the sense of urgency that both the people and the Church in Ireland have always had in praying for the souls of the faithful departed. While the warm family based liturgy and moving eulogy does comfort the living and assuages the shock of death, yet it mustn't  be allowed to seduce us into the false belief that death is no more than an immediate passover into eternal blessedness. That is not our Catholic faith. We have an important Christian duty towards the dead. "Our prayer for them is capable not only of helping them, but also of making their intercession for us effective." (ccc958).

Yours etc.,

Fr Freddy Warner SMA,

Portumna,

Co. Galway.