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Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone celebrated a Mass for the Homeless Dead Nov. 23 at Church of the Visitacion. (Photo by Debra Greenblat/Office of Human Life & Dignity)
Nicholas Wolfram Smith
Catholic San Francisco
The Archdiocese of San Francisco held its second annual Mass for the Homeless Dead on Nov. 23 at Church of the Vistitacion. According to its sponsor, the archdiocesan Office of Human Life & Dignity, the Mass gives Catholics an opportunity “to pray for those who are often forgotten both in life and in death.”
In 2018, the San Francisco medical examiner recorded the deaths of 135 homeless people. In 2019, San Francisco counted 8,011 homeless individuals on a single evening in shelters and on the streets. A different city database that records access to health care and other city services counted 17,595 homeless people in 2019.
Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone celebrated the Mass at 11 a.m. In his homily, the archbishop said praying for the dead was a “spiritual work of mercy," especially when praying for strangers.
Poverty and homelessness are so widespread that people die on the streets in the city, the archbishop said. Worse than the material poverty, though, is the "the loss of the sacred, the loss of human dignity," treating the homeless "as if they didn’t exist,” he said.
In contrast to the inattention given to the homeless, God renews those who hope in him, the archbishop said.
“We see this fulfilled in our Lord Jesus Christ, in his public ministry, him offering his life for us,” he said. Jesus raising the dead son of a widow shows that he is “not oblivious to the suffering of the poor and destitute.” Jesus notices the funeral procession and understands that the woman would be left impoverished and unprotected by her son’s death and intervenes unprompted.
Because of Christ's death and resurrection, the archbishop continued, Christians understand their “true and lasting home” is with God, not on earth.
“For the true believer, this world is a foreign land. The true believer is homeless here,” he said.
The archbishop emphasized that focusing on God does not mean escaping from the pressing problems of earthly existence but allows Christians to enter more deeply into them.
Archbishop Cordileone said only by paying attention to God can all people see how human dignity is shared. “When we focus on God, then we will notice our brothers and sisters whom others neglect. If we pay attention to God, if we notice him, then we will notice those who suffer, those whose soul is deprived at peace and have forgotten what happiness is,” he said.
“Then and only then, if we notice God, will we also notice him in them."