About All Hallows Eve, All Saints Day and All Souls Day:
You are probably familiar with the Easter Triduum: Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday. Triduum is Latin for three days.
Here we talk about another triduum. Also known as “Allhallowtide“, a word comes from the Middle English words All Halewentid and All Halowtid, which mean “all saints’ season.
What some call the Triduum of Death are the three days listed below. All three days here have to do with death and what awaits all of us..Catholic or not. It is surprising how many people (Catholics included) just don’t want to think about it….”too morbid” they will say. Just a way to avoid thinking about it, we suppose. But no one can avoid it….rich or poor…famous or not….death comes to us all. What a joy to know that Christians have hope in the Resurrection and life after this world.
All Hallows Eve (Halloween): October 31
The word itself is taken an older English term, “hallows,” meaning “holy”; and “e’en”, a truncation of the word evening, in reference to the Vigil of the feast. So it’s a day when Catholics celebrate the triumph of the Church in heaven, and the lives of the saints on earth.
The modern focus on the eerie or mysterious also has a Catholic aspect. “When we think of Halloween, I think we often think of ghosts and goblins, and ghoulish faces”, Dr Brown said. “But even these, in the Catholic tradition, are supposed to be reminders of death and of the last things”.
Although Halloween, on October 31 each year, has become one of the most important holidays of the year, with millions of children and adults dressing up as their favorite heroes, superstars, ghouls and goblins, the term Halloween actually derives from “All Hallows Eve”, the Vigil of All Saints’ Day, when Catholics remember those who have gone before us to enter our heavenly home. All Saints Day follows, when we remember the Saints in Heaven.
But we need to remember the importance of keeping the Catholic meaning and purpose of these days, especially when the popular culture has taken on things that are contrary to the teachings of the Catholic Faith. While dressing up for Halloween and appealing, it need to be done in a Catholic spirit. Not easy!
All Saints Day: November 1
We commemorate the feast of All Saints on November 1st, focusing on the last things: death, judgment, heaven, and hell.
All Saints’ Day was created to commemorate every last individual in heaven, even those whose salvation is known to God alone. If you read Revelation (7:9-10), John says “After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no man could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits upon the throne, and to the Lamb!”
On All Saints’ Day, the Catholic Church commemorates those who we remember those who have passed on in Grace (most of whom are known only to God), alongside the more famous saints. We include, of course, our family members and friends.
All Saints Day is a Holy Day of Obligation.
All Souls Day: November 2
We commemorate those who have passed within the faith, and to pray for those in purgatory. According to Catholic belief, the soul of a person who dies can go to one of three places. The first is heaven, where a person who dies in a state of perfect grace and communion with God goes. The second is hell, where those who die in a state of mortal sin are naturally condemned by their choice. The intermediate option is purgatory, which is thought to be where most people, free of mortal sin, but still in a state of lesser (venial) sin, must go.
Purgatory is necessary so that souls can be cleansed and perfected before they enter into heaven.
There is scriptural basis for this belief. The primary reference is in 2 Maccabees, 12:26 and 12:32. “Turning to supplication, they prayed that the sinful deed might be fully blotted out… Thus made atonement for the dead that they might be free from sin.” You might want to check out the Purgatory Museum in Rome.
Note that most protestant denominations do not recognize the holiday and disagree with the theology behind it; however, The Anglican church does celebrate All Souls Day.