All Saints’ Day

“These are those who have come out of the great ordeal; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.”

Today we celebrate the major feast of All Saints’ Day, and I wanted to talk for a minute about what role the saints play in our Christian life today. I think this feast affords us the opportunity to consider the saints as our role models.

I studied philosophy in college, and Aristotle, in his book on ethics, wrote about how important it can be to hold before your mind the example of a good role model. Aristotle felt that when we have a clear view of the good, our will is naturally going to incline in that direction. So there is this motivating power of the good; and beholding a life well lived has an impact on us, in what we desire.

In this way, the saints, in their virtuous and godly living, can hold some power, some sway over our wills. It is good to think about their examples, because this can help to shape our hearts to desire the same kind of which they lived. This day, therefore, comes to us as a reminder to bear the good examples of the saints in our minds.

As John says in Revelation, “there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages.” This means that there are saints of every different stripe, saints from all walks of life. And this is how the idea of “patron saints” arose.

Depending on what vocation the Lord has called you to, there is bound to be some saint from the last two thousand years who has found holiness in that calling. As we sing in the popular hymn, “I Sing a Song of the Saints of God,” we say, “And one was a doctor, and one was a queen, and one was a shepherdess on the green: they were all of them saints of God—and I mean, God helping, to be one, too… And one was a soldier, and one was a priest, and one was slain by a fierce wild beast: and there’s not any reason—no, not the least, why I shouldn’t be one, too.”

There are patron saints for every vocation from comedian (St. Lawrence) to doctor (St. Luke), from students (St. Thomas) to farmers (St. Isidore). If you are a pacifist, there are the early martyrs. If you are a warrior, there is St. Joan of Arc. If your name is Mary, there is Our Lady. If you’re a priest, like me, there is St. John Vianney. For we who are here at this parish, there is St. Margaret of Scotland. The purpose of these patron saints is for us to remember that we are being prayed for and that by following their examples, it is possible for us, God helping, to attain to a holy life, in the context of our own specific callings.

The Church Kalendar affords us the opportunity to become acquainted with this great multitude and to learn from their examples and be motivated by them towards the good. So this is a huge benefit to us coming together each Wednesday and having the chance to celebrate the saint of the day in the Church Kalendar. It allows us to get to know our family in Christ, those who have shown forth something of what it means to be a Christian.

This is the multitude of saints to which you and I aspire, and in which we will take our part, should we continue to the end. Christ calls us to perseverance, that we would receive the white robe, the holiness of life when we are confirmed in virtue; the palm, which is a token of our victory. Can we live in such a way as to join the holy ones whom we celebrate today?

This is not a life which is lived in our own strength, but which is lived in openness to the slowly-transforming grace of Christ. For what is it that the saints cry out? “Salvation belongs to *God* who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!” In other words, they have attained this heavenly glory, and yet chalk it up to the salvation which God worked in them.

Therefore we ask for the prayers and we come before God’s throne, asking that he would do the same work within us. “Almighty God, you have knit together your elect in one communion and fellowship in the mystical body of your Son Christ our Lord: Give us grace so to follow your blessed saints in all virtuous and godly living, that we may come to those ineffable joys that you have prepared for those who truly love you; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”