Hope Does Not Disappoint

Today is "All Souls' Day," the commemoration of the dead. As a kid, this day didn't mean much to me—it followed All Saints' Day, which was a holy day of obligation (more to the point, a day off from school!), which followed Halloween—'nuff said.

But remembering loved ones and friends who have gone before us means more to me now. And selections from today's readings give those of us in the land of the living reason to hope and celebrate.

The souls of the just are in the hand of God,
and no torment shall touch them.
They seemed, in the view of the foolish, to be dead;
and their passing away was thought an affliction
and their going forth from us, utter destruction.
But they are in peace.

This certainly is comforting, when one considers what happens after this life. The passage goes on to say that these faithful departed have been tried and found to be worthy; if they suffered before men, they proved themselves before God "as gold in the furnace."

Life is full of trials, big and small. Most feel unjust and unnecessary, leaving us to ask, "What for?" Even when we know that things could be much worse, we also insist that they should be much better.

But "hope does not disappoint," Paul's letter to the Romans reminds us. Believing that things can be better, that WE can be better, that there is something to live for beyond the immediate strains that we find ourselves in—those hopes are the fuel for change in our hearts, in our actions and, perhaps, fuel to help us prove ourselves worthy, as those who went before us have done.