All Saints' Day
All Saints' Day is celebrated by Catholic Christians on November 1. Other Christians celebrate it as well. (May not be on the same day) It is a mandatory Catholic holiday. It is celebrated in the Catholic Church. The next day, November 2 is celebrated as All Souls' Day, souls in Purgatory are especially remembered. Both days are considered important and they are integrated with each other. The older name is All Hallows or Hallowmas[1]
All Saints is also a Christian formula involving all the faithful saints and martyrs, known and unknown.
Customs
In Portugal, Spain and Mexico, ofrendas (offerings) are made on this day. In Spain, the play Don Juan Tenorio is traditionally performed. In Spain, Portugal, Italy and France, people bring flowers to the graves of dead relatives. In Poland, Slovenia, Slovakia, Lithuania, Croatia, Austria and Germany, the tradition is to light candles and visit the graves of deceased relatives. In the Philippines, the day is spent visiting the graves of deceased relatives, where they offer prayers, lay flowers, and light candles, often in a picnic-like atmosphere. In English speaking countries the festival is traditionally celebrated with the hymn "For All the Saints" by William Walsham How. The most familiar tune for this hymn is Sine Nomine by Ralph Vaughan Williams.
The festival was retained after the Reformation in the calendar of the Church of England and in many Lutheran churches.
References
Other websites
- American Catholic - Saints FAQs, All Saints and All Souls Day
- All Saints' Day article in the Catholic Encyclopedia
- All Saints Sunday Orthodox England
- All Saints Church, Barbados Archived 2007-11-01 at the Wayback Machine
