All Saints Day reminds us that it’s all about holiness, that it’s only
about holiness – that holiness is our reason for being – it’s our call,
our destiny. But there’s a problem: our idea of holiness may be so
exalted and other-worldly that we shy away from it, regarding it as the
preserve of only the truly exceptional and the extraordinary.
But that’s a mistake. For most of us, holiness
has less to do with great and heroic deeds than it does with simple,
daily fidelity to the call of our baptism and our calling in life.
Holiness is parents loving each other, loving their kids, sacrificing
for them, doing their best to lead them to God; holiness is kids loving
their parents, having fun, taking delight in life, finding the joy of
getting to know Jesus. Holiness is students discovering new and exciting
things about the world and its wonders; holiness is workers who get on
with their co-workers – even difficult ones - and who put in an honest
day’s work even when working from home. Holiness is employers who care
about justice and who hold themselves to its highest standards; holiness
is elected leaders who care about truth and integrity and who put people
before partisan politics - especially the most needy and vulnerable.
Holiness is sick people who hold onto hope and find Jesus in the midst
of their sufferings; holiness is elderly people full of wisdom and
gratitude who remember how to smile. Holiness is found in all those
places. It’s not out there. It’s right here.
And to that I would add that there is a happy
side to holiness – or should be, because, as St. John of the Cross tells
us, “joy is the infallible sign of the presence of God.” In an All
Saints Day homily, Pope Francis said that “if there is one thing typical
of holy people it’s that they’re genuinely happy.” And that takes us to
today’s gospel reading – the Beatitudes. In those familiar verses
from the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus makes it clear where true holiness,
true happiness are to be found. And it’s not in the places where we
might think. It’s not in possessions or property or in things we
have or hoard. No, Jesus says that blessedness is a way of being.
It’s about trusting in God and letting God be enough; it’s about
depending on God and not on ourselves (that’s what being poor in spirit
means); it’s about being pure of heart, single-minded, meek and
merciful; it’s about being passionate for justice and passionate for
peace; and, yes, sometimes it’s about paying the price for what we
believe in.
Five years ago, Pope Francis gave a
history-making address in the U.S. Capitol before both houses of
Congress. In it, he held up as models for lawmakers and for every one of
us, four American ‘saints’ – none of them canonized by the Church but
each embodying what sainthood is about and what this feast of All Saints
is about. Let me remind you who they were: Abraham Lincoln, Martin
Luther King, Jr., Dorothy Day, and Thomas Merton. American ‘saints.’ Was
there ever a time in our history when we were more in need of ‘saints,’
heroes like them?
Let me zero in on just one of them: Thomas
Merton - intellectual, seeker, social activist-turned-Trappist-monk, and
an immensely influential figure in mid-20th century America. His
autobiography, The Seven Storey Mountain was an unlikely bestseller that
changed a lot of lives. In the book, Merton tells of a conversation he
had with a friend shortly after his conversion to Catholicism. He told
his friend that he all he wanted in life was to be a good Catholic. His
friend told him, “What you should say is that you want to be a saint.”
Merton replied that that struck him as a little weird. “How do you
expect me to become a saint?” he asked. And the friend told him, “By
wanting to. All that is necessary to be a saint is to want to be one.
That’s because God wants you to be a saint and all you have to do is to
want what God wants for you.”
Now, even though this may sound a bit
simplistic, Merton’s friend’s logic is iron-clad. If God created each of
us to be saints (and God surely did), then doesn’t it follow that God
will give us what we need to fulfill that destiny. So, I have a question
for you on this feast of All Saints, my friends: do you want to be a
saint?
Merton found the idea “weird.” I think many of
us do. That’s because our idea of saint probably needs some
tweaking. Forget plaster statues. Forget the pale, bloodless faces and
modestly downcast eyes of holy cards; forget the furrowed brow, the
frozen face, the perpetual seriousness. Forget life without laughs, life
without joy.
Forget all that and start, instead, with who
you are: the unique and wonderful person God made you to be. That’s the
raw material of your sainthood. Who you are. No one else can
be a saint in quite the same way as you can. And don’t let your
awareness of your shortcomings - your warts and flaws, your sins and
failings - don’t let those things convince you that you’re way too human
to be a saint, that too much has happened, that sainthood may have been
a possibility way back, but not now, that sainthood is for others, not
for you. That in itself would a sin, a denial of God’s power,
God’s grace.
Someone once said that there’s no saint without
a past and no sinner without a future. I like that. There’s no
saint without a past and no sinner without a future! It’s true, my
friends. It’s true. We all have a past, spotted though it
may be, and we all have a future. A glorious future beyond our
imagining.
As we celebrate today all the saints who have
gone before us – our fellow members of the human family from all times
and places, countless in number, who stumbled and fell along the way but
who kept faith, kept letting God work wonders of grace in their lives -
let us take courage knowing that they are cheering us on along the way
and that we can get to where they’ve gotten. Get to where God wants us
to be. Get to be saints. We can, my friends. We must!
Happy Feast Day!
Father Michael G. Ryan
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