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All Souls’ Day (Defuncts’ Day)

All Souls’ Day is a Roman Catholic holiday celebrated on November 2^nd. (If that day falls on a Sunday, then All Souls’ Day is moved to November 3^rd, since it is not permitted to wear black clothing on Sundays.) Like All Saints’ Day (November 1^st), it is celebrated in many countries, including Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador, France, Germany, Haiti, Mexico (Los Dias de Las Muertas), El Salvador, Uruguay, and Nicaragua. Formally, it is known as Commemoratio omnium Fidelium Defunctorum or “Commemoration of all the Faithful Departed,” which is why it is sometimes also called Defuncts’ Day.

All Souls’ Day is dedicated to the remembrance of friends and loved ones who have passed away. It follows immediately on All Saints’ Day, shifting the focus from the souls in heaven to those that are still in purgatory, the stage of the afterlife in which souls are purified before proceeding to heaven. In Catholic regions today, people set candles and lights in cemeteries the night before All Souls’ Day. In some homes, offerings of food are placed on altars decorated with flowers, candles, photos and other remembrances of the dead.

In some Latin American countries, All Souls’ Day caps off a three-day spectacular Dias de los Muertos celebration that encompasses All Hallow’s Eve, All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day. People celebrate with skulls made of paper mache or sugar skulls, and display coffins and skeletons in parades and mock funeral processions.

Origins

All Souls’ Day originated in the ancient pagan Festival of the Dead, whose traditions also inform the secular holiday of Halloween. The Festival of the Dead was based on the pre-Christian belief that the souls of the dead would return for a meal with the family. Candles were placed in the window to guide the souls back home, and families set an extra place at the table for the returning souls.

The first feast of general intercession for the faithful departed was established by St. Odilo of Cluny (d. 1048). According to legend, a pilgrim returning from the Holy Land was cast on a desolate island by a storm. There, a hermit told him that the island contained a chasm in the rocks that communicated with purgatory, from which he could hear the groans of tortured souls. The hermit also said that he had overheard demons complaining that the prayers of the faithful – especially the monks of Cluny – were effective in rescuing the tortured victims. On reaching home, the pilgrim informed the abbot of Cluny, who began the custom of commemorating the dead that soon spread to other parts of the church. Today, the practice of decorating graves on this day has become part of popular culture among non-Catholics as well.

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