RBWords - Volume 34 - Number 10: October 2021
Something to Think About
R.B.WORDS - VOL. 34 - NO. 10 - OCTOBER 2022 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT The approach of All Saints Day and All Souls Day always reminds me of the movie, THE PRIVATE WAR OF MAJOR BENSON. Charleton Heston played the role of a military man who was in trouble with his superiors, who sent him, as a last chance, to be ROTC instructor at a private boys’ military academy run by nuns. When he arrives, the mother superior shows him around the building and they pause before a full length portrait of a stern looking cleric. Heston asks, “Who is that?” She replies, “He is our holy founder. He was canonized recently.” Heston responds, “Oh! I’m so sorry!” I should make it clear that one need not be “canonized” to be a saint unless one wants the official public recognition of the church, which few of those actually canonized sought. It’s their fans who press for that recognition. Sainthood is a matter of one’s relationship to God and how one expresses it either inwardly or outwardly. St. Teresa of Calcutta wrote in her journal about her feeling of abandonment by God for years!!! Yet her ministry to the most destitute in Calcutta (continued internationally by the religious order she founded, The Missionaries of Charity) was internationally acclaimed and recognized by a Nobel Prize for Peace!!! Classic works by St. Therese of Lisieux on her “little way” and Bro. Lawrence on the practice of the presence of God can acquaint one with the inner thoughts of saints. But, in the end, it is the intentional effort to build the relationship with God that makes a difference. The official canonization process involves minute examination of the candidate’s life plus miracles to get from Servant of God to Venerable to Blessed to Saint. The vast majority of saints will always be free of that process and live wonderful lives in our midst. On All Saints Day and All Souls Day we can celebrate all holy people (yes, even those who might be “in purgatory”). Think of the ones you know and remember that they and you are all members of the communion of saints who praise and love God. IT’S SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT.
It Has Been Said
The commandment we have been given is to love God, neighbor and self - all of our selves - with Love’s single movement. It is the same breath of God pouring life into our neighbor and our selves that fires the life of the blessed Trinity, into which we are sublimely integrated as we embrace this Love and are embraced. As we become more attuned to the love of God, as we become more mindful of the beauty of creation, as our senses become more acute, we discover each leaf, each creature, each human being to be limned with fire. The holy forest of creation call to the deep fires in our hearts, and on reflection, we may become aware that we have responded with all our incarnate being.
From THE FIRE OF YOUR LIFE - A SOLITUDE SHARED
By Maggie Ross