This week’s Saturday of Meatfare preceding the Sunday of Last Judgment is known as the Saturday of the Commemoration of the Dead. Keeping in line with belief in eternal life, the Holy Church has established this day to commemorate all people who died from the ages in faith and piety.

A prayer about the deceased is not something required by church but what the soul of a faithful Christian needs. Before the special days of repentance of Great Lent, when we plead with God to be merciful for us, we also act mercifully ourselves by praying to God for forgiveness of all who departed this temporary life unto the life eternal.

Death often takes the man unawares, unexpectedly and suddenly, that’s why we raise our universal prayer about “the Christian ending of our life: painless, blameless, peaceful, and good defense before the dread Judgment Seat of the Lord.”

The holy fathers assure that, before the universal Judgment of God, it is possible to amend the state of the deceased after death. Christ, the Destroyer of hell, has the power to open and close the doors of Hades, so all living members of the Church must pray to the Lord to have mercy upon the dead.

On Friday evening, the evening memorial remembrance services, or parastas, were served at the Seraphim-Diveyevo monastery’s Trinity Cathedral and the Church of All Saints of Russia. On Meatfare Saturday morning, an early-morning, mid-morning, and late-morning Divine Liturgy services with altar prayers for the dead were celebrated followed by the panikhidas and litya services at the graves of the deceased.