ETERNAL REST GIVE UNTO THEM, O LORD, AND LET PERPETUAL LIGHT SHINE UPON THEM. AMEN.
"Pray for one another that you may be saved" (Jas. v. 16). Intercommunion throughout the earth is now so close on account of commercial relations and instant communication, that any great event in one country produces an immediate effect upon thousands in the most remote parts of the world. If it be a calamity, there is an outburst of sympathy and aid in every land. The three portions of the Kingdom of Christ, the Militant, the Triumphant and the Suffering, form one great corporate union in Him. The bond between them is not fanciful or figurative but real; and this consists in actual communication of reciprocal action from each towards the others. That action is a spiritual one, and consists chiefly in interceding for each other or asking intercession, "that you may be saved." No one lives for himself alone in the temporal order except those who are the enemies of their species; and still more in the supernatural order is this the case. The bond of union is to be kept up by bearing one another's burdens, and this is done by intercession. The blessed intercede for us, we intercede for the souls in purgatory; and Jesus Christ is the centre where all these influences meet and whence they radiate. Practice regularly this form of the prayer of petition. Exhibit in the spiritual order the same diffusive charity which you have to show in the temporal order. Pray for your brethren that they may be saved; they will pray for you that you may be saved.
