October 29, 2017
At the beginning of the month of November as the days are becoming shorter and nature seems to go to sleep the Church remembers those who have gone before us. Gone where? The feast of ll saints is an occasion to thank God for those great Christians throughout the centuries who have lived the Gospel in a radical way and also for all the wonderful people we have met in our lives and who have reflected to us something of the goodness and beauty of God. As we reflect about the “the last things”, let us begin by clarifying a misunderstanding. In the creed, which we pray at every Sunday mass we say that Jesus after his death and resurrection “descended into hell”. In the liturgical renewal after the Vatican Council this phrase was translated “He descended to the dead” as we also say in the German Mass text “Er stieg hinab in das Reich des Todes”. This is a more correct translation that reflects the world view of people in ancient, pre-scientific times. They imagined the earth to be like a house, the sky being the “roof” and it was the realm of the living. Above it was the realm of the god’s or for Christians the one God. And below it was a dark and unfriendly place where the dead dwelt. In Greek it is called hades, in Hebrew sheol. The second letter of St Peter speaks of “the spirits in prison” to whom Jesus “went to preach” (1 Pet 3:19). It is a way of saying that the saving power of the cross and resurrection of Jesus is open to all, even the many generations that lived and died before him. Jesus died for all, for the whole of humanity, past, present and future. Death is a mystery. If you have ever been present when a person dies you will have felt that strange sensation how from one moment to the next what was a living person has become a lifeless matter. Where has the person gone? “Where is granny now?” children will ask their parents. It is a question that is hard to answer, because at death we leave the world of time and space. The best answer would be: Granny is with God. Like God, who is Spirit, is nowhere (cannot be fixed to a definite place) and at the same time everywhere. The dead are nowhere and yet everywhere, they are with us. The church speaks of three “places”: purgatory, heaven and hell. We imagine them to be places because we think of everything as being in a place. But in fact, purgatory, heaven and hell are not places, but ways of being. Poets and painters have depicted purgatory as a place of physical torture. But is means rather a process of purification. When we die we are not perfect. Yes, we do love God, but not yet with our whole heart, soul and mind, as the first and most important commandment tells us. Part of us is still selfish. But God is pure love. So, whatever is not love in us we will have to let go. That is a painful process, but it is a spiritual pain, a process that is meant to make us fit for heaven, capable of enjoying the fullness of life in the presence of God who is love.
Fr Wolfgang Schonecke