Requiescant in Pace
Fr Richard Clarke
On All Souls’ Day we offer this prayer for those who are not only saints, but saints on the very threshold of paradise, waiting to be admitted to the immediate presence of God. It is always a privilege to do a service to the friends of God, it is so above all when those who need our help will in a short time behold His face in heaven, and will gratefully remember to all eternity each little prayer offered on their behalf.
These saints waiting for heaven cry out to us to help them. They have a claim on us by reason of the intensity of their suffering. No words can tell what they suffer, and their very love for God increases their pain. Every compassionate heart will desire to do something to relieve them and to shorten the time of their banishment. Yet how little I do for them!
They are moreover, unable to help themselves. If we saw one whom we knew to be a saint enduring some affliction in which he could do nothing in his own behalf, we should be eager to assist him. The holy souls are utterly helpless, their own prayers avail them nothing. To us they look for aid, to us for an abridgement of their time of punishment. Do I respond to their appeal as I ought?
ETERNAL REST
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord
and may perpetual light shine upon them
and may the souls of all the faithful departed,
through the mercy of God,
rest in peace.
Amen
