I Don’t Fight Alone: The Beauty of Remembering

This weekend we attended a Día de los Muertos festival. There was music, dancing, beautiful artwork, vibrant colors, and the unmistakable joy of a culture that has found a way to remember its dead with tenderness rather than silence.

I knew what Día de los Muertos was. I understood the traditions, at least in part. But I wasn’t prepared for how deeply it would move me. We sat down to eat when I noticed an elderly man playing his guitar for a baby. I watched as he played, then offered a prayer of blessing over the child and handed over a medal. And I began to cry watching strangers to me and to one another. Something about that moment was beautiful.

An elderly man with a lifetime of stories written into his years blessing a child whose story was only beginning. A prayer offered. A medal passed from one generation to another. Faith, love, and blessing moving quietly between two people. And I thought about the communion of saints.

One of the most beautiful discoveries of my journey into Catholicism has been the Church’s teaching on the communion of saints. As a Protestant, I believed that those who died in Christ were alive with Him. But I hadn’t fully considered what that meant for those of us still here.

The Catholic Church teaches that the Body of Christ is not divided by death. Those of us still making our pilgrimage on earth remain united in Christ with those who have entered the glory of heaven.

We are not separated into unrelated communities. We are one Church. And those who have gone before us in faith have not ceased to love us. They pray for us. They intercede for us. They are not replacements for Christ, who is our one Mediator. Rather, their prayers participate in His mediation, just as we participate in His work when we pray for one another here on earth.

Death has not rendered their love powerless.

Hebrews 12:1 describes us as surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses. The image follows Hebrews 11, where we encounter generations of faithful men and women who trusted God through suffering, uncertainty, sacrifice, and extraordinary circumstances. Their lives testify to His faithfulness. And in the Catholic understanding of the Church, our communion with those who have gone before us continues in Christ.

This morning a song came on the radio as we drove: Jon Reddick’s Don’t Fight Alone.

“There are angel armies I have yet to see, I believe

There are prayers I've never heard surrounding me…

There's a cloud of witnesses, thеy cheer for me

The giants of thе faith

The giants of the faith, they cheer for me…

The God of our fathers, was faithful to them

Over and over, they trusted in Him

We stand on their shoulders, and carry the flame

He's been faithful before, He'll be faithful again

Oh, the God of our fathers, was faithful to them

Over and over, they trusted in Him

So, we stand on their shoulders, and carry the flame

He's been faithful before, He'll be faithful again

He's been faithful before, He'll be faithful again.”

There’s a cloud of witnesses, they cheer for me.

As I watched that elderly man bless that baby, it was almost as though I was seeing a small, earthly picture of a much greater heavenly reality. Someone who had traveled farther along life’s road was offering a blessing to someone just beginning the journey. And suddenly, the communion of saints didn’t feel like an abstract theological doctrine.

It felt like family.

The traditions of Día de los Muertos are not identical to Catholic doctrine, but the festival invited me to contemplate something else the Church has encouraged Christians to remember for centuries: Memento mori. Remember that you will die.

At first, that sounds terribly depressing.

We spend so much of our lives trying not to think about death. We avoid the conversation, postpone the difficult questions, and behave as though tomorrow is guaranteed. But Christian remembrance of death is not supposed to make us afraid of living. It is supposed to teach us how to live.

To love more generously.

To forgive more readily.

To stop postponing the things that matter.

To recognize that the people sitting across from us are not permanent fixtures in our earthly lives, however much we wish they could be. And to remember that our earthly lives are not the entirety of our stories. Even for Christians, death is real. Grief is real. Separation hurts. Jesus Himself wept at the tomb of Lazarus. Our hope in the Resurrection does not require us to pretend otherwise.

But because of Christ, death does not have the final word.

Today’s Gospel, Luke 13:1–9, seems especially appropriate: Jesus speaks about people who died unexpectedly, reminding His listeners that tragedy is not proof that its victims were greater sinners than anyone else. Then He tells the parable of a fig tree that has failed to produce fruit.

The owner wants to cut it down, but the gardener asks for more time to cultivate the soil and nourish the roots. More time for the tree to bear fruit.

Isn’t that what so much of life is?

We are given time we haven’t earned and cannot guarantee. Time to grow. Time to change. Time to repent. Time to become more fully who God created us to be.

And we have no idea how much of that time remains.

Memento mori is not simply a reminder that death is coming. It is a reminder that today is a gift.

A gift to be cultivated, and a gift that ought to bear fruit.

And the patient gardener in Jesus’ parable reminds us that God is merciful, even as He calls us to take seriously the time we have been given.

There is another beautiful connection in today’s first reading. In Ephesians 4, St. Paul describes the Church as the Body of Christ, joined together and growing in love under Christ, its Head.

I love that image: We are not a collection of isolated believers, each attempting to navigate the world alone. Rather we are a body. Connected. Dependent upon Christ. Called to support and strengthen one another.

And then today’s responsorial psalm gives us this refrain:

“Let us go rejoicing to the house of the Lord.” — Psalm 122:1

The psalm speaks of Jerusalem, the place where God’s people gather in worship. But for Christians, it also calls to mind the heavenly Jerusalem, our ultimate home. What a beautiful thought as we approach All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day. We are all traveling toward home. Some have already finished their earthly pilgrimage. Some are still walking. Some, like that precious baby, have only just begun.

But in Christ, we belong to something greater than the years allotted to us on earth. And we do not make this pilgrimage alone.

There are prayers I have never heard. Life has felt heavy at times. There are prayers I have prayed so often that I struggle to find new words. There are circumstances I cannot fix, burdens I cannot simply set down, and people I love whom I cannot protect from every sorrow. And sometimes, even when we know intellectually that God is near, the road feels terribly lonely. But the communion of saints reminds me that the visible world is not the whole story. There are prayers being offered that I will never hear. There are faithful lives that have helped make my own faith possible. There is a whole Church united in Christ, even when I cannot see it.

And above all, there is Jesus. He has conquered death and promised never to abandon us. The saints are not cheering us toward themselves. They are pointing us toward Him. We are not meant to travel through this life without the prayers and love of others. And that love need not end at the grave.

As I walked through a festival filled with reminders of death, I found myself thinking more about life: the people who have gone before me, the people entrusted to my care, the fruit I hope my own life will bear, the mercy of being given another day. And about the extraordinary Christian hope that one day, by the grace of God, we will enter that heavenly Jerusalem and join the great company of saints in worship before the Lord.

Until then, we keep walking.

We keep praying.

We keep loving.

We keep cultivating the soil.

And when the road becomes difficult, we can remember that beautiful image of an old man blessing a baby, and the generations of faithful souls who have carried the light of Christ before us. We belong to a communion far greater than what our eyes can see.

And we do not fight alone.