All Souls
Isaiah 25:6-9 | Psalm 26(27):1,4,7,8-9,13-14 | Romans 5:5-11 | Luke 7:11-17
That day, it will be said: See, this is our God
in whom we hoped for salvation;
the Lord is the one in whom we hoped. (Isaiah 25:9)
I think at least some lapsed Catholics wander off because something happened that made them lose hope in God, hope in salvation, hope in the hereafter.
Perhaps it was a loved one who suffered a tragic or particularly painful death,
or a successful family business that collapsed into bankruptcy when the latest economic bubble popped,
or a violent crime that left them in crippling fear,
or being jobless for many months and running low on funds.
Whatever the cause, many believers find it hard to bounce back from “WHAT KIND OF GOD ARE YOU, THAT YOU LET THIS HAPPEN TO ME?!?!” It’s often hard to look kindly at the next life and its promises, when you’re being drawn and quartered in this one.
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I lost hope during my junior year in college. I was struggling in my classes, and having to drive an hour each way from my apartment every weekday, looking in vain for a parking lot near campus, just exacerbated my frustration. I’d been singing regularly in the college chapel’s ensemble…until I simply stopped going, both to church and class. Naturally, I made the Dean’s Other List, the one that says “shape up or ship out”, but frankly, I was past caring at that point.
Then God must’ve decided a wake-up call was in order, and sent me and my 1982 Toyota Corolla off a steep embankment. The violent collision with an innocent bystanding tree, and the sudden stop at the bottom, turned my car into a sad wreck fit only for scrap, but left me with just a small gash on my arm to show for my traumatic experience.
I’d like to say that I immediately cleaned up my act and became a star student after that, but in reality, my senior year was only a modest improvement over the previous one. Still, I did get off my couch and back to class (and church), and I eventually graduated with a decent GPA.
Then a few years later, I looked back and realized that my car “died” to save me, just as Jesus died to save us all. I hadn’t really taken good care of it, but it was still there for me when it mattered, just as Christ has always been there even when I didn’t think he was, being too busy looking in the direction of sin.
It was only then that I started living in hope again.
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I’ve yet to read Dante’s Inferno, but I’m intimately familiar with one of the most famous phrases from his text, purportedly inscribed atop the gates of Hell:
Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch’entrate
(Abandon all hope, ye who enter here)
I see it as a reminder to us all, that we can and should reach out to those who are hope-less, to gently take their hand and lead them to the peace and solitude of the Blessed Sacrament. There, they might find Christ again, and be enlivened with such sure hope that, in the darkest of days, He is always there to guide, and protect, and love.
Ricevere ogne speranza, voi ch’entrate
(Receive all hope, ye who enter here)
Amen.