All Souls’ Day 			November 2
All Souls’ Day is in many ways an extension of All Saints’ Day. As the word “saint” came to be restricted more and more to the heroes of the faith, the urge to commemorate all the members of the church who had died in the faith of Christ found its outlet in the development of All Souls’ Day. The commemoration was formalised in 998 by the abbot of Cluny, Odilo. It was he who decreed 2 November, the day after All Saints’ Day, as the appropriate day to commemorate “all the dead who have existed from the beginning of the world to the end of time”. As the reforming influence of Cluny in many areas of monastic life spread through other Benedictine houses, so the observance of All Souls’ Day grew throughout Europe and then beyond.
The feast was abolished in the Church of England at the Reformation because of its association with masses for the dead. The day has been restored to many modern Anglican Calendars as a more general commemoration of the faithful departed.
For Liturgical Use
In the New Testament “the saints” means “Christian believers”, that is, all members of the church. Gradually the term “saint” came to mean the heroes of the faith, and that was how All Saints’ Day on 1 November was eventually regarded. Odilo, the abbot of Cluny in the first half of the eleventh century, provided for the commemoration of all the departed on 2 November, and this Benedictine tradition spread throughout the church. The feast was abolished in England at the Reformation, but has been restored to many Anglican Calendars as a general commemoration of the faithful departed.
Sentence, Prayers and Readings as in A New Zealand Prayer Book - He Karakia Mihinare o Aotearoa, page 689