09/10/2026
The Holy Souls cannot help themselves. They can no longer earn merit. They wait — saved, loved by God, and still being purified — until they can see His face. We can still reach them. Charity does not end at the grave.
Here are five beautiful ways the Church gives us:
1. Offer the Holy Mass . This is the greatest gift you can give the dead. It is Christ Himself offered to the Father. Have a Mass said for someone you love. Offer your next Communion for a forgotten soul. St. Nicholas of Tolentino once offered Mass for seven days after a deceased friend appeared and asked for help. After those seven days, many souls were set free.
2. Pray for them A Rosary. The Divine Mercy Chaplet. The Stations of the Cross. One simple “Eternal Rest.” Our Lady consoles her children in purgatory the same way she consoles us. Even a short prayer said with love is never wasted.
3. Give alms in their name. “Almsgiving saves from death and purges away every sin.” (Tobit 12:9). Feed the hungry. Help a struggling family. Give quietly. Offer that act for a soul who can no longer give anything.
4. Offer your sacrifices A headache. A long line. A fast. A kind word when it costs you.
Nothing you suffer has to be wasted. Unite it to the Cross and give it away for someone waiting to enter heaven.
5. Gain an indulgence for them, The Church opens her treasury of grace and lets you apply it to the dead. A devout visit to a cemetery. A half hour of Adoration. A family Rosary. Reading Scripture for 30 minutes. (For a plenary indulgence: Confession, Communion, prayer for the Pope, and detachment from sin.) They will not forget you.
Ven. Fulton Sheen said that when we enter heaven, souls will come toward us saying, “I am the poor soul you prayed for in purgatory.”
Start with one soul today. A parent. A friend. Someone no one else remembers.
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace. Amen.
St. Nicholas of Tolentino, patron of the Holy Souls, pray for us. Amen! 🙏
