Holy Mass for the Dead in Almudena Cemetery (2 November 1982)

In the Almudena Cemetery, Madrid, on 2 November 1982, All Souls Day, the Holy Father celebrated Mass for the dead. In his homily, the Pope spoke of real communion with their diseased loved ones that is not interrupted by death. 

We prepare to celebrate the Eucharist in this sacred place, where the mortal remains of your deceased are buried, dear brothers and sisters of Madrid. Here rest people who had a decisive meaning in your existence. Many of you, perhaps, have very close relatives here, perhaps the same parents from whom you received life. At this moment they return to everyone's memory, emerging from the past, as if animated by a desire to restart a dialogue that death abruptly interrupted. Thus, in this "Almudena" cemetery - as happens today, All Souls' Day, in other Christian cemeteries in every part of the world - an admirable assembly is formed, in which the living meet their deceased, and strengthen their bonds with them of a communion that death could not interrupt.

Real communion, not illusory. Guaranteed by Christ who wanted to live the experience of our death in his flesh, to triumph over it - for the benefit of all of us - with the prodigious event of the resurrection. “Why do you seek among the dead the one who is alive? He is not here, and resurrected ”( Luke 24, 5-6). The announcement of the Angels, proclaimed on that Easter morning at the empty tomb, has reached us through the centuries. This announcement offers us, even in this liturgical assembly, the essential reason for our hope. Indeed, "if we have died with Christ - Saint Paul reminds us, alluding to what happened in baptism - we believe that we will also live with him" ( Rom 6:8).

Corroborated in this certainty, we raise to the sky - even among the tombs of a cemetery - the joyful song of Alleluia, which is the song of victory. Our deceased "live with Christ", after being buried with him in death (cf. Rom 6:4). For them the time of trial is over, giving way to the time of reward. For this reason - despite the veil of sadness aroused by the nostalgia of their visible presence - we rejoice in knowing that they have already achieved the serenity of the "homeland".

However, given that they too shared in the fragility of every human being, we feel the duty - which is at the same time a necessity of the heart - to offer them the affectionate help of our prayers, so that any possible residue of human weakness, that can still delay their happy meeting with God, be definitively canceled. With this intention we are preparing to celebrate the Eucharist for all the deceased who rest in this cemetery, including in our suffrage also the deceased from the cemeteries of Madrid and the whole of Spain, as well as those of all the nations of the world.

© Copyright 1982 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana

Copyright © Dicastery for Communication - Libreria Editrice Vaticana