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Exploring the word

01 Nov 2015 - Solemnity of All Saints, Cycle B

What good does it do to honor the saints? Bernard of Clairvaux posed this question to his brothers in the monastery on the Feast of All Saints. It certainly doesn’t give the saints anything they need or don’t already have in abundance in eternity to praise them here. So what’s in it for the saints that we offer them, not only individual feast days on the church calendar, but also this one big annual solemnity bash each November? Maybe that’s the wrong question. Maybe it matters more what’s in it for us that we honor the saints. Honoring them involves remembering their stories, asking for their intercession, and attempting in our own clumsy way to imitate their spiritual success. Why do these things? Because the saints have found perfect joy, and I’ve yet to meet anyone who doesn’t long to be happy. If you and I hope to “rejoice and be glad” once and forever, and to know that “great reward” Jesus promises on the mountain in his Beatitudes, then modeling our hearts on the saints is our golden ticket to such happiness. The holy men and women across the centuries are like so many “souls standing on tiptoe,” to borrow a phrase from Saint Anselm. Like children peering over a high windowsill, the saints are men and women who wanted to see more than the confused reflection in the mirror dimly, which is how Saint Paul described our perspective from the bleachers of history. They believed in the window before they were high enough to see through its panes. They believed in the “more” before they were tall enough in stature to actually view it. What do you and I believe in? Do we think there’s more to this world than meets the eye? Do we live to make a living—or to make a killing—or to merely get by—or to acquire as much stuff as possible? Even experiences are “stuff.” Travel is stuff. Wracking up years and merit badges and a fine resume is just more stuff. How many trophies can fit in a garage? How much stuff can fit into a life before we’re completely stuffed? Gregory the Great said whatever you own must be under the power of your soul. If you don’t control what’s yours, then it surely controls you. The more you have, the more complicated it gets to hold onto the reins. Pretty soon the mortgage and credit card bills are calling the shots. Pretty soon the overextended commitments are devouring our time and our peace. The saints’ possessions were modest: their poverty, meekness, mercy, purity. They learned to play Beatitude virtues like a harp. Which is good practice, I hear, for eternity. Related scripture links Beatitudes: Ps. 1:1; 32:1-2; 41:1; 65:4; 84:4-5; 106:3; 112:1; 128:1; Luke 6:17-26 Children of God: Matt. 18:1-6; Luke 6:35; 18:15-17; John 12:35-36; Rom. 8:14-16; Gal. 3:26; 4:6-7; Heb. 12:4-11; 1 John 5:2, 19 A clean heart: Ps. 51:10 Holiness: Eph. 4:22-24; 1 Thess. 3:13; Heb. 12:14 The saints: Phil. 4:21

Authors Alice Camille

Saints

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The inner word

01 Nov 2015 - Solemnity of All Saints, Cycle B

What is a saint? How do you define the term? Whom do you think of when you think of saints? You might also ask yourself who comes to mind when you think of those blessed in the gospel beatitudes: the poor in spirit, pure in heart, the merciful, sorrowing, honest, the peacemakers, those who suffer for the sake of righteousness. What “vision of a great multitude” do you see? What are the blessings in your own life?

Saints

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Homily stories

01 Nov 2015 - Solemnity of All Saints, Cycle B

My sister, Annamaria, died in 1946, ten months before I was born, during the terrible polio epidemics that ravaged our cities in those years. She received her First Holy Communion on her deathbed and was buried in the dress she would have worn on that special day. Recently, I was graced to meet with her second-grade teacher, who told me how kind she was and what happened her last day in school. Our family always keeps a special place for her in our hearts, myself included. We attribute our good fortune to her. She is our own saint in heaven. This is far from being pietistic. In our tradition, those we celebrate today are the good, the innocent, the blessed whose lives have brought them to the eternity of heaven. There are many more of them than those listed in the canon of saints, but they are no less important. So the question today, All Saints Day, is who are those saints in our lives? Pick just one of them. Find a picture of them if you can. Or just remember them in your mind’s eye. Then honor them by saying a prayer asking them to intercede for you with whatever is troubling you.

Authors Father Dominic Grassi

Saints intercession

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Homily themes

01 Nov 2015 - Solemnity of All Saints, Cycle B

“He began to teach them, saying, ‘Blessed are the poor in Spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.’” The beatitudes in Matthew mark the beginning of the first of the five great speeches or discourses on which this gospel is built. Jesus goes up a mountain, traditionally a place of revelation, to address his disciples and deliver a set of beatitudes three times longer than those in the Gospel of Luke. Beatitudes were not new. They’re a form found in the Psalms, where blessings, and sometimes the reasons for them, are proclaimed. The gospel takes the beatitudes a step further by using them to describe the inhabitants of the kingdom of God: those who rely on God, grieve, are humble, and do God’s will; the merciful, peacemakers, and the persecuted. Not a bad description for all the saints—and those to whom God gives the fullness of life.

Saints beatitudes

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Quotes

01 Nov 2015 - Solemnity of All Saints, Cycle B

Our community with the saints joins us to Christ, from whom as from its fountain and head issues all grace and the life of the People of God itself. —Lumen Gentium, 1964 Holiness is not the luxury of a few. It is a simple duty for you and for me. –Mother Teresa (1910-1997)

Mother Teresa Saints

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Solemnity of All Saints, Cycle B

01 Nov 2015

SUNDAY SUMMARY Revelation 7:2-4, 9-14 Those marked as God’s possession will withstand the time of distress. Psalm 24:1bc-2, 3-4ab, 5-6 The world around us has its foundation in the God we seek. 1 John 3:1-3 Just as the world is established in God, so we are God’s children. Matthew 5:1-12a Like Moses, Jesus ascends the mountain in order to reveal divine truths.

Matthew 5:1-12a Revelation 7:2-4, 9-14 Psalm 24:1bc-2, 3-4ab, 5-6 1 John 3:1-3 All Saints' Day Feast of All Saints

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Solemnity of All Saints, Cycle B

01 Nov 2015

SUNDAY SUMMARY Revelation 7:2-4, 9-14 Those marked as God’s possession will withstand the time of distress. Psalm 24:1bc-2, 3-4ab, 5-6 The world around us has its foundation in the God we seek. 1 John 3:1-3 Just as the world is established in God, so we are God’s children. Matthew 5:1-12a Like Moses, Jesus ascends the mountain in order to reveal divine truths.

Matthew 5:1-12a Revelation 7:2-4, 9-14 Psalm 24:1bc-2, 3-4ab, 5-6 1 John 3:1-3 All Saints' Day Feast of All Saints

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The inner word

22 Feb 2015 - First Sunday of Lent, Cycle B

Saint Paul reminded the Corinthians that with Silvanus and Timothy he proclaimed “the Son of God, Jesus Christ” to them. It was a message he himself received as an apostle. The “amen” from them went through Jesus to God. The gospel the Corinthians knew, then, was the real thing and they should not equivocate about it; it was not a matter of “yes-or-no” but always “yes.” How is your life and work an “Amen” and a “yes” to God?

Saint Paul Amen

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