War broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. The dragon and his angels fought back, but they were defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.
Then I heard a loud voice in heaven, proclaiming, ‘Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Messiah, for the accuser of our comrades has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God. But they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they did not cling to life even in the face of death.
FromDialogue of Comfort against Tribulationsby St. Thomas More
Our Saviour was himself taken prisoner for our sake, and prisoner was he carried, and prisoner was he kept to the end of his passion. The time of his imprisonment, I grant, was not long, but as for hard handling which our hearts most abhor, he had as much in that short time, as many men in a much longer time. And surely then if we consider of what estate he was, and therewith that he was prisoner in such wise for our sake, we shall I hope never shamefully play the unkind coward as for fear of imprisonment sinfully to forsake him, neither let us be so foolish as by forsaking him to give him the occasion to forsake us.
How can any faithful wise man dread death so sore out of fear of shame when his reason and his faith together may shortly make him perceive that herein there is no shame at all? For how can that death be shameful that is glorious? Or how can it be but glorious to die for the faith of Christ, if we die both for the faith and in the faith, joined with hope and charity, when Scripture so plainly says,Precious in the sight of God is the death of his saints?Now if the death of his saints be glorious in the sight of God, it can never be shameful in fact, however shameful it may seem here in the sight of men. For here we may see and be sure, that not at the death of Saint Stephen only, to whom he showed himself with heaven open over his head, but at the death also over every man that so dies for the faith, God with his heavenly company beholds his whole passion and verily looks on him.
This same short and momentary tribulation of ours that is in this present time works within us the weight of glory above measure on high. Now to this great glory can no man come headless. Our head is Christ and therefore to him must we be joined and as members of his must we follow him if he will come in before us, and he therefore that will enter in after, the same way that Christ walked, the same way must he walk too. And what was the way by which he walked into heaven? He himself shows what way it was that his Father had provided for him, when he said to the two disciples going toward Emmaus:Knew you not that Christ must suffer passion and by that way enter into his kingdom?Who canfor very shame desire to enter into the kingdom of heaven with ease when Christ himself entered not into his own without pain?
Musical Selection(Fauré)
In paradisum deducant te angeli, In tuo adventu Suscipiant te martyres, Et perducant te In civitatem sanctam Jerusalem. Chorus angelorum te suscipiat, Et cum Lazaro quondam paupere Aeternam habeas requiem.
May the angels lead you into paradise; may the martyrs receive you at your arrival and lead you to the holy city Jerusalem. May choirs of angels receive you and with Lazarus, once a poor man, may you have eternal rest.
Prayer
God, our shelter and our strength,
you listen in love to the cry of your people:
hear the prayers we offer for our departed brothers and sisters.