When I was very small, my mother’s sister Patricia died at a very young age. I don’t remember as I was still an infant when her death occurred. What I do remember is that for many years after, my whole family would drive to my grandparents’ church and join with them and my aunts and uncles and cousins on the Saturday closest to “Aunt Pat’s” anniversary for a memorial Mass. It was usually in the lower church, the organist and cantor would sing the Requiem Mass parts, and the priest would wear black (later on white). This would all be followed by breakfast at my grandparents’ house.
This fostered in me very early on the practice of praying for the souls of our deceased relatives and friends. Additionally, whenever we prayed along with Evening Rosary on the radio, one of the intentions would often be for “the souls in purgatory.” I began to work my head around the reality of purgatory as something I found consoling. That if I died, I didn’t have to be perfect as much as I might try, but that through the prayers of others and my own “purgation” — I remember that word from Catechism class — I could still be welcomed into heaven. I still find myself praying with that simple understanding of purgatory for the souls of those I love and those most in need of our prayers. It is consoling to know that others may do so for me when my time comes.
I want to share a story that involves a confidence I shared with a man, but in a way that keeps his privacy. This happened within my 38 years of priesthood at a time and place that is private. “Joe” (not his real name) was an elderly man who was dying of cancer. He was beloved within his family, friends and parish. He was known by everyone to be the most Christian and generous of men, a daily communicant, a “saint.”
I visited Joe in hospice a few days before he died. In the course of our conversation, he shared with me his dread of dying and asked me to pray for his soul. I told him he had nothing to fear as he was a good man and God was merciful. He then told me of something that had happened when he was in the military while deployed many years before, something awful that involved the killing of innocents. He was not in command but he was part of what happened. He had borne the guilt of this all his life, and even though he confessed it over and over again, he could not forgive himself nor did he think God would forgive him. I once again told him that God in his mercy would forgive him. He listened but ended up by saying, “Please promise you’ll pray for me.”
At the funeral, Joe’s son gave a eulogy calling his father a “saint” and placing him among the pantheon of the blessed in heaven. Of course, he did not know what I knew, that his father had not been so sure of his heavenly crown and that he would be more consoled by prayers than praise.
All this reminds me that you never know what each of us truly brings before the judgment seat of God in the privacy of our lives. Even the most saintly among us are still worthy of our prayers for in charity, prayers for the deceased are a work of mercy. I still say a prayer for the repose of Joe’s soul once in a while. I hope someday, others will do the same for me.
By Archbishop Christopher J. Coyne