Word to the Wise
Thursday, November 1, 2018 - Nov. 1 - All Saints
[Rev 7:2-4, 9-14; 1 John 3:1-3; Matt 5:1-12a]See what love the Father has bestowed on us that we may be called the children of God. Yet so we are. The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, we are God's children now; what we shall be has not yet been revealed. We do know that when it is revealed we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. Everyone who has the hope based on him makes himself pure, as he is pure. [1 John]
A pastor once went to a school room to talk about saints. He asked the whole room how many wanted to become saints? All hands but one went up. The pastor asked that one why not? The child answered, "'Cuz they're all dead!" We Catholics have often confused the formal process of the "cause for canonization" with sanctity and sainthood. That process does indeed require a dead body. But sanctity and sainthood do not. The second scripture for today's feast points out that we are God's children NOW. At the celebration of the Eucharist today we will make the profession of faith which includes "the communion of saints!" That includes all those whose lives reflect God's love. The vast majority are unknown to us but are known to God..
Oscar Wilde is quoted as saying, "The only difference between a saint and a sinner is that every saint has a past and every sinner has a future." That is true of every one of us. A wise confessor once said to me that he likes to tell people in the confessional after he gives them absolution, "Go in peace. You are now a saint!" The value of a canonized saint is not that they belong to some exclusive club of holy people but that they and we all had and have a past and a future in responding to the baptismal call to holiness. (We have only to look at the life of St. Augustine to find a famous example.)
Today we celebrate the lives and struggles of all those men and women who inspire us to aim for holiness. They don't have to be dead to do that. AMEN