Why prayer can help those who have committed suicide

Prayer is a form of love.  It is the teaching of the Catholic Church that, "We should not despair of the eternal salvation of persons who have taken their own lives. By ways known to him alone, God can provide the opportunity for salutary repentance. The Church prays for persons who have taken their own lives" (Catechism of the Catholic Church 2283). 

There are many important points to remember when someone we love has made the terrible choice of committing suicide.  The first is that God, our Creator and Father, is a God of Mercy and He loves this person far more than we do and has in fact loved this person from all eternity and has created this person as a unique, irreplaceable image of Himself.

The second point to remember is that God is outside of time.  He has no beginning and no end.  The past, present, and future are all known and present to Him.  St. Padre Pio said that he could just as easily pray for the happy death of one of his great grandparents as pray for someone who was dying that day.  For example if I pray for the happy death of someone who died 40 years ago, God, Who was present at that death and Who always knows the future, could see my future prayer and apply it to that present.

Once a widow whose husband had committed suicide by jumping off a bridge came to Ars to try to speak to St. John Vianney about the great concern she had for her husband's eternal salvation.  When she arrived the saint was hearing confessions and a very long line of people were waiting for confession. She did not have time to wait in that long line and so she just began to pray in the Church.  Suddenly St. John Vianney came out of his confessional and went up to the widow.  He told her that at the moment of her husband's death Jesus had offered Him the opportunity to turn to Him for Mercy.  He had given the man this opportunity because he had once allowed his wife to put up a picture of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in their home.  St. John Vianney said that when given this opportunity the man had turned to Jesus for mercy and his soul had been saved.  This shows that when we pray for those who have committed suicide we should pray that they will turn to Jesus for His Mercy because He greatly desires to pour out His loving forgiveness on them. 


 This picture of the Sacred Heart of Jesus was painted by one of the Carmelite nuns of Danvers, Massachusetts.