On November 1 the Church keeps the feast of All Saints — every soul, in every age, who has been received into the joy of God. It is a feast of the whole communion of saints: martyrs and confessors, virgins and widows, religious and lay, the famous and (most of all) the unknown, the grandmothers and the unnamed peasants who lived their faith quietly and now share in the resurrection.
The day is one of holy obligation in most of the Catholic world, paired with the commemoration of All Souls on November 2 — for those who have died and may still be on their way. Together the two days are the Church's great November remembrance of those who have gone before us, marked with the rituals of light, of visits to graves, and of trust in the mercy of God.