Sunday, October 26, 2025

All Souls Day and Its Indulgences

Homily was about All Saints Day, All Souls Day, and indulgences.

Here's the criteria for the indulgences:


The 3 constants for all indulgences:

1) Prayers for the intentions of the Holy Father (usually an Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be)

2) Receive the Holy Eucharist.*

3) Make a good Confession. A Confession made up to a week before or a week after the 4th item applies.


And then there is the 4th criteria, which changes with each indulgence. The two I mentioned today as being connected to All Souls Day and Allhallowstide (the octave of All Saints, i.e. the First through the Eighth) are:


For Nov. 2nd only: A plenary indulgence, applicable only to the souls in Purgatory, may be obtained by those who, on All Souls Day, piously visit a church, public oratory, or (for those entitled to use it) a semi-public oratory. On visiting the church or oratory it is required that one Our Father and the Creed be recited for the dead.

For Nov. 1st-8th: Visit to a Cemetery. Applicable only to the souls in Purgatory when one devoutly visits and prays for the departed. A plenary indulgence is bestowed for this work each day between November 1 and November 8, inclusive.


* Note: Holy Communion follows the same "week before or after" rule that applies to Confession, except, if a person is seeking indulgences on multiple days, while they don't need multiple Confessions, they do need separate Communions. So if a person went to Confession on November 5th and visited cemeteries on Nov. 1st, 2nd, and 7th, they do need 3 Holy Communions (and prayers for the Holy Father, but those usually go with the "work"). As best as I can tell, the Communions don't have to be on the same days as the works, but probably follow the "week before or after" rule. But I don't think a separate Communion is called for if a person both visits a cemetery and a church on Nov. 2nd.





Sunday, October 5, 2025

Recovering The Saints

In the rearranging of the Roman Missal and Calendar after Vatican II, a new emphasis was placed on Sunday Mass being about the Paschal Mystery and the Scriptures, which is great but it means we rarely get Sunday homilies about saints, traditions, or pious devotions. So today I discussed that trajectory, the benefit of the saints, and about three of the most important ones: Augustine of Hippo, Francis of Assisi, Thérèse of Lisieux.