A pious evangelical, well fortified with arguments against prayer for the departed, had been nursing her sick sister and taking care of the little daughter of the house.  The sister died, and the same evening the motherless girl knelt down at her aunt’s side to say her prayers.  “Auntie, may I say God bless dear mother?” The whole drift of the aunt’s training and theology would have led her to say “No” point blank.  There was no time for argument or explanation, for facing the inevitable “If not, why not?” The instincts of natural religion prevailed; the aunt replied, “Yes, dear”; and from that day onward never failed herself to say, when remembering her dear ones, “God bless my sister.”

Whatever the effect of such prayers in the other world, there is no shade of doubt that to the bereaved they bring an infinite sense of nearness to their beloved, and of the reality of the life of the world to come.

Thus far we have been speaking of those who may fairly be called the faithful departed, the cases in which hope may be reasonable and assured almost to certainty.

Now let us go a step further.  The mind staggers as it contemplates the tens of thousands being hurried into eternity who, either according to the teaching of the Catholic Church or the notions of popular theology, would be deemed unprepared.

We trust, in a dim sort of way, that the all-embracing mercy of God will accept their sacrifice of themselves for their country, and in some fashion place it to the credit side of their account.  No doubt He will.  But can we not get a more evangelical, and at the same time more catholic, view of the matter?  We find it in an extension of our conception of the possibilities of the intermediate state, the condition of souls between death and judgment.  Evangelical to the backbone, because it is the work of Christ which we conceive of as being there carried on.  Catholic, because the Church from very early times has recognised the idea of the discipline of souls as being a process continued after death.  The authority of S. Paul has been appealed to on account of his words to the Philippians (i. 6), “being confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ”; and to the Corinthians in that mysterious passage concerning “the fire which shall try every man’s work” (1 Cor. iii. 13).  The doctrine was developed and materialised till it resulted in those corruptions which were so largely responsible for the Reformation.  In their zeal to root out error, the Reformers fell into the opposite extreme and abolished the idea of the intermediate state altogether.  Hence arose the popular notion, unknown to the Catholic Church till then, of Heaven or Hell as the immediate issue of death.

Of course, the Church’s teaching had regard to the condition of its own members after death, and we cannot press it into an argument as to those not dying, technically, in a state of grace; but at least this much we may say:  Surely no intelligent person can contemplate the thought of these vast hosts being hurried off into eternal perdition, and at the same time retain his reason or his faith in a God of love.  Whatever the possibilities of the world to come, they are but the extension of the boundless love of God in Christ, and hold out no promise for us if we wilfully neglect our day of grace.