Priest Enters Church At 5:45am on Christmas Morning to Find 50 People (Souls) Wandering Around.

Priest Enters Church At 5:45am On Christmas Morning to Find 50 People (Souls) Wandering Around. 

Many of you know this wonderful priest who ministered in the Archdiocese of San Francisco...

A true story that Fr. Francis P. Filice  shared with his friends and family before he died.  Fr. Filice gave permission to share this story with our friends, so pass it on.  Be sure to read all the way through his letter.  Father's thoughts that perhaps some of the poor that we meet might not be living gives you a whole new perspective in helping the poor. If you want to know more about this amazing priest you can read his obituary at:  http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/sfgate/obituary.aspx?pid=175317130
And a beautiful articel about the three vocations to Orders in the family: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/deaconsbench/2014/06/history-one-mass-three-generations-of-clergy-at-the-altar-and-a-fourth-serving-his-first-mass/

Dear Descendants and Families,
 
November, being the month of the Poor Souls, is a good time to reflect on the fact that  although we seem to be involved in a physical, three-dimensional time-warp world,- in reality this world is only the beginning and a shadow of something very different, very spiritual and much more real because this world is passing away all the time, whereas that world is the spiritual world by which we are formed and is forever.
 
I want to tell you a true story about what happened to me about forty years ago when I was a deacon, serving at St. Anne's Church in San Francisco.  I was preparing to be ordained the following May. This was my deacon year.
 
What happened to me is something that is given to people who are usually weak in faith and need to have their faith strengthened.  It has nothing to do with any spiritual value that I have, but is something the Lord allowed so I could teach you this story.
 
It was Christmas Eve of 1978. I had served as deacon at the midnight Mass with Msgr. Foudy. After Mass, around 1 or 2 in the morning we all went to bed. I had to get up early to prepare for the 6:30 A.M. Mass for Christmas Day. Around 5:45 a.m. I went into the sacristy in St. Anne's, turned on the lights, and went to open the doors of the Church. I stepped out into the sanctuary and to my surprise the Church was full of people - about fifty or so. I presumed immediately that they were a group of party-goers who had wandered in through an open door during the night. They were people not well dressed - something like reformed hippies, thin and kind of wan. They were in different spots - some were walking around, some were going to the creche at St. Joseph's altar. None had gone through the communion rail into the sanctuary. I walked to one of the men sitting there and I started to berate him - " don't you realize this is a church. You can't just walk into a Church in the dark and just sit down like that; you have to be more respectful". He just looked at the tabernacle and looked kind of embarrassed. I started in again, and a woman sitting in the back - who seemed to be in charge of the group - a woman I recognized but couldn't remember where I had seen her before - she said to me "do you realize that on this night some wonderful things happen? " That kind of stopped me so I went to open the doors of the church, and all the doors were locked. There was no way they could've walked in. When I turned around and went back into the Church I saw there was no one there. They had all disappeared. When I related this to my spiritual director, Father Llorente - a Jesuit - he said that it is well known that the poor souls in Purgatory are often in Catholic Churches. Reflecting on this experience, I realized I had never felt alone in a Catholic Church - I had always felt there was someone there with me. There is also a remarkable connection with  how the Poor Souls are treated.
 
The ancient Penitentiaries - the books that said how to say Mass and hear the Sacrament of Confession - shows that the original way of hearing Confession is like the Orthodox Catholics do now - rather than the method that we use where we have a confessional and we tell our sins anonymously - this is something that started around the 4th century with the Irish monks. The Peniteniary of St. Basil the Great - a Cappadocian Father from Syria - describes the method which they used to use.
 
When someone committed a serious sin, he went to the Bishop where he lived, confessed his sin and asked for forgiveness - it was face-to-face. The Bishop would give him a penance, but the penance was very remarkable. A mortal sin was held in great horror. For example, suppose a person committed the sin of adultery. He would have to stand at the door of the Church for several years asking the pardon of everyone who entered. After that he might have  be allowed into the Church but had to lay down and leave after the Creed He'd do this for several years. After that,  he might be able to stand up to the Creed for another two years. After that, maybe he could stand for the entire Mass but not receive Communion - that was maybe for two years (unless he was dying). So that is a mirror of what happens to the Poor Souls. The Poor Souls - when the person first dies and is going to go to Heaven - he has to be purified. To be in Heaven one has to love the way God loves - something impossible for human beings
to do. He has to go through a purification. The first stage is a very difficult time - talked about like the pains of hell. After a while, depending upon the graces gained by the people in the world praying for the Poor Souls, he is now allowed to be in the world. He has to be purified by different kinds of things he has to do in the world - maybe beg, act as a docent, in a church, etc.  So when you see a poor person in the world, it might be a Poor Soul working off his sentence. What purifies us is God's love, and so we can help him by the charity we show them, either by prayers, Masses, taking care of the poor in the world. It is important to realize that the poor are not always living people. After that, when the person has been purified, he's allowed to be in church - that's how he spends his time, adoring the Blessed Sacrament. The length of this purification process depends upon what he's done, the amount of graces we provide by our prayers and sacrifice. It is only God's love that will finally allow him to enter the kingdom of Heaven. So when you go into a Church, never forget to pray for the souls that are there.
 
At some point a particular soul will be ready and he will enter into the Tabernacle and so be with God forever. So the Church has always known this - you can offer you acts of love for the Poor Souls - prayer and sacrifice.
 
Fr. Frank Filice