Today, we are here to celebrate, and to honor and to commemorate, the dead and the living, the young men, who in every war, since this country began, have given testimony to their loyalty to their country, and their own great courage.
On this day of remembrance, let us pray in the name of those who have fallen in this country’s wars, and most especially, who have fallen in the First World War, and in the Second World War, that there will be no veterans of any further war, not because all shall have perished, but because all shall have learned to live together in peace.
And to the dead here in this cemetery, we say, they are the race. They are the race immortal, whose beams make broad the common light of day. Though time may dim, though death has barred their portal, these we salute, which nameless passed away.
Thoughtful men and women, with hearts craving the truth, have come to seek in the Catholic Church the road which leads to eternal life.
There is in the Sacred Heart the symbol and express image of the infinite love of Jesus Christ which moves us to love in return.
Our Lord came to the aid of each great tribulation with a special devotion. The present and future tribulations of the Church and of nations are greater than at any other period, and this persecution is more dangerous than those of previous times. Hence, the devotion which God sends to the succor of His Church and of the nations at the present time is the devotion to the Most Holy Eucharist. It is the highest of all devotions.
A first essential setting for learning hope is prayer. When no one listens to me any more, God still listens to me. When I can no longer talk to anyone or call upon anyone, I can always talk to God. When there is no longer anyone to help me deal with a need or expectation that goes beyond the human capacity for hope, he can help me. When I have been plunged into complete solitude … if I pray I am never totally alone.
In our time more than in the past, people are so absorbed by earthly things that at times they find it difficult to think about God as the protagonist of history and of our own existence.
In the face of the enigma of death, the desire for and hope of meeting their loved ones again in Heaven is alive in many, just as there is a strong conviction that a Last Judgment will re-establish justice, and the expectation of a definitive encounter in which each person will be given his reward.
For us as Christians, however, “eternal life” does not merely mean a life that lasts for ever but rather a new quality of existence, fully immersed in God’s love, which frees us from evil and death and places us in never-ending communion with all our brothers and sisters who share in the same Love.
Thus, eternity can already be present at the heart of earthly and temporal life when the soul is united through grace with God, its ultimate foundation.
Everything passes, God alone never changes. A Psalm says: “Though my flesh and my heart waste away, God is the rock of my heart and my portion for ever” (Ps 73[72]: 26). All Christians, called to holiness, are men and women who live firmly anchored to this “Rock”, their feet on the ground but their hearts already in Heaven, the final dwelling-place of friends of God.
Dear brothers and sisters, let us meditate on these realities with our souls turned toward our final and definitive destiny, which gives meaning to the circumstances of our daily lives. Let us enliven the joyous sentiment of the communion of Saints and allow ourselves to be drawn by them towards the goal of our existence: the face-to-face encounter with God.
Let us pray that this may be the inheritance of all the faithful departed, not only our own loved ones but also of all souls, especially those most forgotten and most in need of divine mercy.
May the Virgin Mary, Queen of all the Saints, guide us to choose the world of eternal life at every moment, “and life everlasting”, as we say in the Creed; a world already inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ, whose coming we can hasten with our sincere conversion and charitable acts.
