Homily: Solemnity of All Saints

Readings: Rv 7:2-4, 9-1; Ps 24; 1 Jn 3:1-3; Mt 5:1-12

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Good evening, all you saints in training!

"Who are these wearing white robes, and where did they come from?" [Rv 7:13]

I’ve always loved this verse from the Book of Revelation. This might sound odd, but whenever I read it, I can’t help but think of a line from the movie, “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”, when Cassidy, the outlaw, speaking of the posse tracking them so successfully, asks, “Who are those guys?” It’s really what was asked of John when he encountered that crowd in his heavenly vision: Who are these people?

Who are these saints? Where did they come from? How did they manage to live in this weird world of ours and yet live such holy lives? Yes, it’s these people and their lives of heroic virtue, these saints, that we celebrate at this vigil Mass of the Solemnity of All Saints.

Some years ago, during the canonization ceremony of Popes John XXIII and John Paul II, I heard a news anchor say, “Today the Catholic Church made two saints and let them enter heaven.” What an odd thing to say. Of course, he was wrong, terribly wrong, and provided another good reason to ignore what the secular media say about the Church. In truth, the Church doesn’t make saints. God makes them. All the Church does is recognize a few of the saints God has made.

Perhaps more importantly, the canonization of a saint doesn’t get them through heaven’s gates. Indeed, canonization does absolutely nothing for the saint, who is already with God. No, the Church canonizes saints for us, for by doing so she hopes to inspire you and me to strive for the holiness that is our true destiny. This is why the Church chants the Litany of the Saints at its most solemn liturgical celebrations. That Litany is the roster of the Church’s Hall of Fame, its family album, the names of those who form that “great cloud of witnesses” so eloquently described in the Letter to the Hebrews [Heb 12:1].

One of my theology professors at Georgetown, who taught me the New Testament 60 years ago, was a priest who had spent years in a Communist Chinese prison. Once, while speaking of St. Peter, a man filled with doubts and fears and so often lacking in faith, this saintly Jesuit said, “All saints are sinners, but not all sinners are saints.”

The difference, he went on to tell us, is that the saints recognize, understand, and repent of their sinfulness because they accepted God’s grace and recognize the Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ. More than anything else they desire union with Jesus Christ and so they struggle mightily in the lifelong process of conversion that God offers us all. The others, he said, not only don’t recognize the Son, but too often don’t even recognize their sinfulness for what it is. And that, he believed, was an eternal sadness.

Yes, brothers and sisters, we are all called to be saints, to be one with Jesus Christ. Even now, in this life, we’re united with the Communion of Saints, a part of All Saints, Christ’s Mystical Body, the People of God.

By our baptism we were sanctified, made holy, deep down, in grace – no longer banished, disaffected children, outside God’s family. In Baptism we become part of the in-crowd. Even though we’re sinners, as John reminds us, we’re still God’s children, adopted children of the Father. John continued, “What we shall be has not yet been revealed…But we shall be like Him” [1 Jn 3:2].

Yes, there’s so much we don’t know. Our vison is blurred by the mystic’s “cloud of unknowing,” until clarity comes when we rise with Jesus Christ. In the meantime, we move in the world – not just the world of good, of God’s creative act, but the world of a fallen race, the world that won’t recognize us because it won’t recognize Jesus Christ [1 Jn 3:1]. It’s a world that tries to extinguish the light of Christ, to drown out the Gospel with a cacophony of meaningless noise. It’s a world that ignores All Saints Day, preferring instead Halloween, All Hallows Eve, by celebrating the craziness of our world.

But God continues to raise up saints, and He wants each one of us to be among them; so, He gives us a guidebook, a map, to help us find our way to His Way. Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount in Matthew’s Gospel distills the essence of His teachings. And it opens with the Beatitudes, the essence of the essence.

When we first hear them, our tendency is to select one or two qualities as applicable to us. “Oh, yeah, that’s me, the merciful peacemaker. I guess that means I’m okay, living the life Jesus wants for me.”

But that’s not what the Beatitudes are. They’re not items in a cafeteria from which we can pick and choose what we like, while ignoring the rest. They’re really a manifesto for the complete, normal Christian life.  Christ opens to us eight avenues through which we will find the fullness of blessing. To be blessed means to find wholeness, joy, well-being – to experience the true peace of Christ. To be fully blessed is to depend solely on God.

With that we come to recognize our own spiritual poverty, the insignificance of all we thought was so important. And when we cry out to God, fearful, hopeful, thankful, He sends His Spirit to show us the way. In sorrow, not only for our own sin but the sins and injustices of the world, we encounter the deep, abiding presence of the Holy Spirit.

Mourning our dead, praying for their salvation, we cast our prayers into eternity knowing that “with God all things are possible.” God blesses us with wisdom and compassion as we carry God’s love to others. 

Called to be meek, not weak, we walk with a humility that recognizes Jesus Christ in everyone we meet, reminding us that we are called to love. We move, not filled with vengeful anger, but as living signs of God’s mercy. 

Through prayer we experience the shock of humility, a rightness in our relationship with God, with each other, and with creation. True humility is merely the acceptance of reality, that we are all completely dependent on God. Humility is to recognize God’s divine life in others, and the need to love God and one’s neighbor as oneself.

I remember a story about a young mother who was trying to help her little boy understand God’s great commandment. “God put us here to help others,” she told him. He thought for a moment and then asked, “What are the others here for?” The little lad would have made a good Pharisee.

Yes, we’re called by Jesus to extend to each other the same mercy we expect from Him. At the soup kitchen we had a saying, “We don’t serve food, we serve Jesus Christ.” But do we open ourselves wide so that all who walk in that door, see Jesus in us?

As we long and work for peace in our lives, our merciful God rests His hand gently upon our heads and speaks to us as His favored children. Having received a sevenfold blessing, seized by the Holy Spirit, taken captive, we allow ourselves to receive an eighth blessing, to be emptied and enter into the perfection of Christ.

Then, being like Christ, we’re not surprised when called to share in the likeness of his suffering and death. For we, too, will carry our cross knowing always that Jesus walks by our side. Perhaps, then, someone will look at us and ask, “Who are they who seem to love so much?”

And for this, like the Saints we honor today, we will be greatly blessed.

 

Happy All Saints Eve and All Saints

[Thursday Afternoon] 

I've been more than busy lately, so the blog has received little attention. Just as well...it's mostly drivel anyway. I'm don't know why I continue. Perhaps I don't want to know. Vanity just might be involved. Maybe I'll give it a rest, now that I've achieved senior deacon status by reaching the 3/4 century mark. Rest is good, both physical and mental, but I think I just need a spiritual boost, some quiet time with our Lord -- no phones or iPads or laptops or blogs... Another retreat perhaps? We'll see.

But today I'm actually well rested. I'm awake and aware of my surroundings, having taken a rare short nap after an enjoyable morning at the Wildwood Soup Kitchen and a meeting of the parish Faith Formation team. In truth, my work at the soup kitchen really isn't all that tiring or taxing. Over the years I've recruited several other men to help out with the heavy lifting on Thursday, thus allowing me to spend my time supervising, leading our brief morning prayer, making preparations for meal deliveries to 200+ shut-ins, answering the phone, receiving donations, and schmoozing with the guests -- all fairly low-energy tasks. Dear Diane and her team of cooking assistants and servers do all the hard work, preparing and serving the meals. I go home and rest. Diane goes home and collapses. There's a difference.

So, here I am, taking it easy in my down-filled easy chair, but unable to shut off the flow of thoughts that remind me of other stuff I should be doing. I can sense Maddie, the wonder dog, stretched out and sleeping contentedly at my feet. Because on Thursdays she must remain here alone for as long as seven hours, when we return she meets us at the door with mixed emotions. Although she greets us joyfully -- wagging and licking, jumping and dancing -- she must still express her displeasure at having been left alone for so long. And so, she barks. She barks her angry bark just to let us know the queen is not amused. But now, having been reunited with her pack, fed, and walked, she is a happy dog and so she sleeps. She sleeps the sleep of an uncluttered mind and a clear conscience. Would that I could do the same.

My rest will be short-lived, however, since I will assist the pastor at the 6:00 p.m. Vigil Mass for the Solemnity of All Saints. It's also Halloween so we'll have to be especially careful driving out there in the real world, beyond the borders of The Villages. Many families with young children live near our church and the costumed youngsters will be out in force trick or treating in the dark. Halloween celebrators tends to avoid The Villages. In fact, in the 15 years we've lived here no one has ever come to our door on Halloween. Of course, we always buy some candy...just in case.

Just a guess, but I expect perhaps nine of ten people who take part in Halloween festivities don't know that it's name is a compression of All Hallows Eve, or the Eve of All Saint's Day, November 1. 
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[Friday Morning]

Well, my afternoon was interrupted yesterday by a series of phone calls that demanded attention and kept me from returning to this post. By the time Diane and I returned home from the Vigil Mass, I had to take Maddie for her evening stroll through the neighborhood. Dodging old folks in their golf carts ain't easy. But having survived our walk, Maddie and I were tired and it was getting late, so I eased my brain into standby mode and just watched what Diane and I call the LOS, or least objectionable show, on TV. For me this was the Thursday Night NFL game between the Forty-Niners and the Cardinals. I lasted until the end of the first half and then went to bed. 

And so, back to All Saints...a wonderful solemnity that has unfortunately been eclipsed in our society by a gross distortion of its Vigil called Halloween. I don't have a problem with children having some Halloween fun by dressing up in scary costumes and filling their bags with begged candy and other goodies. But are they aware that this strange activity evolved from the tradition of praying for and honoring the faithful departed? In some Christian cultures that involved visiting cemeteries and decorating the graves of relatives. I suppose the idea of dressing up as ghosts and witches and goblins was simply a manifestation of related superstitions that emerged over time. I'm no Halloween historian, so this is just a guess.

But all Saints Day, as we tend to call it, is so much more than the day after Halloween. It's a day to reflect on all saints, those few that the Church recognizes and the millions of others who now enjoy God's Presence. It's a day to thank God for the saints we have known, the saints who have touched our lives with their holiness, the saints who have helped us along our own journey to salvation. The Church by canonizing a saint does nothing for the saint, who is already with God. No, the Church canonizes saints for us, for she hopes to inspire us to strive for the holiness that is our true destiny. This is why we chant the beautiful and moving Litany of the Saints during the Church's most solemn liturgical celebrations. The Litany of the Saints is the roster of the Church's hall of fame, its family album, the names of those who form the core of that "great cloud of witnesses" so eloquently described in the Letter to the Hebrews [Heb 12:1]. 

An aging Jesuit, who taught me the New Testament when I was an ignorant 18-year-old, had spent years in a Communist Chinese prison. Once, while speaking of St. Peter, a man plagued by doubts and fears and so often lacking in faith, this saintly priest reminded us that "all saints are sinners, but not all sinners are saints."

The difference, he went on to tell us, is that the saints recognize, understand, and repent of their sinfulness because they accept the Father's gifts of grace, mercy, and forgiveness, and because they recognize the Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ. More than anything else, they desire union with Jesus Christ, and so they struggle mightily in the lifelong process of conversion to which we are all called. The others, he said, not only don't recognize the Son, but too often fail even to recognize their sinfulness for what it is. That, he believed, is an eternal sadness.

We are all called to be saints, to be one with Jesus Christ. But even now, in this life, we are united with the Communion of Saints and with Jesus in God's family, the Mystical Body of Christ, the People of God, the Church in heaven and on earth. In this way, you and I are truly a part of All Saints. By our baptism we were sanctified, made holy, deep down in grace. We're no longer banished, disaffected children, outside the family of God. No indeed, we're in! We're in God's family as adopted children of the Father, We're in God, all of us together, because we're in Jesus Christ.