All Souls' Day: The faithful departed gazing on no stranger!

Today we celebrate “All Souls Day.”  In Job 19: 23-27, Job says: “I know that I have a living Defender and that he will rise up last, on the dust of the earth.   After my awakening, he will set me close to him, and from my flesh I shall look on God. He whom I shall see will take my part: my eyes will be gazing on no stranger. My heart sinks within me.  …. since the wrath bursts into flame at wicked deeds and then  you will learn that there is indeed a judgement!”  Our loved ones who have passed through the threshold of death have learned that there is indeed a judgment.  In purgatory, the faithful departed are between death and eternal happiness as they endure the purification necessary to enter into the presence of God. Heaven is theirs but not yet. That intense longing is the pain that purifies them.  “They are joyful with their desires, for they already possess what they seek; they are sorrowful with their desires, for they do not completely possess what they seek. Their pain, consequently, is evoked by the intensity of their desire. This pain is purifying,… The more it purifies, the greater the love, the closer the full possession, and mysteriously  enough the greater the pain. Loving ever more passionately yet separated ever more slightly, how much more painful is the longing for the loved one”  (Carroll Stuhlmeuller, C.P., Biblical Meditation for Ordinary Time—Weeks 23-34, p. 414).