“Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.
In the Beatitudes, Jesus shows us how we will become as we undergo conversion and mature in faith.
Today, on the Feast of All Saints, we need to ask ourselves some questions.
Why should the celebration of this feast day mean anything to the saints? What do they care about earthly honors when their heavenly Father honors them by fulfilling the faithful promise of the Son? What could we possibly give them, from us?
What does our praise mean to them? The saints have no need of honor from us. Our devotion to them does not add the slightest thing to what is theirs. Clearly, if we venerate their memory, it serves us, not them.
But I tell you honestly, when I think of them, I feel myself inflamed by a tremendous yearning. When I read the lives of the Saints, something in me stirs. It is familiar, because I experience that yearning when I have a conversion experience.
Calling the saints to mind arouses in us a longing to enjoy their company and friendship. We long to share in the citizenship of heaven, to dwell with the spirits of the blessed, to join the assembly of patriarchs, the ranks of the prophets, the council of apostles, the great family of martyrs, the noble company of confessors and the choir of virgins. In short, we long to be united in happiness with all the saints. That longing has been with me since the beginning of my conversion to Jesus Christ and His Church.
But our dispositions change. The Church of all the first followers of Christ awaits us, but we frequently do nothing about it. The saints want us to be with them. But we are indifferent. The souls of the just await us, and we ignore them.
We must arouse ourselves, spur ourselves on as St. Paul said, to “stir into flame” our faith. We must rise again with Christ. We must seek the world which is above and set our mind on the things of heaven. Heaven won’t just happen for us. We must ask for it, and seek it, or the world will be victorious over us. We have to long for Heaven and the company of the Saints.
Let us long for those who are longing for us, hasten to those who are waiting for us, and ask those who look for our coming to intercede for us. They are our hope. We need their help.
We should not only want to be with the saints, we should also hope to possess their happiness.
Do not imagine that there is anything harmful in such an ambition as this; there is no danger in setting our hearts on Heaven, and company with the Saints. When we attend Mass, we attend with them. You are in danger if your heart is set on things of this world, and you become indifferent to the saints and Heaven.
When we commemorate the saints we become inflamed with another yearning: that Christ our life may also appear to us as he appeared to them … and that we may one day share in his glory. Until then we see him, not as he is, but as he became for our sake. He is our head, crowned, not with glory, but with the thorns of our sins.
As members of that head, crowned with thorns, we should be ashamed to live in luxury; his purple robes are a mockery rather than an honor, the world’s mockery.
When Christ comes again, his death shall no longer be proclaimed, …. and we shall know that we also have died, and that our life is hidden with him. The glorious head of the Church will appear and his glorified members will shine in splendor with him, when he forms this lowly body anew into such glory as belongs to himself, its head.
If we read and reflect upon the lives of the Saints and see how Christ is reflected in their lives, we may rightly hope and strive for such blessedness.
We must above all seek the prayers of the saints. Thus, what is beyond our own powers to obtain will be granted through their intercession. We do not intercede for them. They intercede for us. We need this feast day.
I want to thank St. Bernard for these thoughts. I stole this homily from him, a saint who lived 900 years ago. He was a Cistercian monk, who reformed the Benedictine order. He is a Doctor of the Church and had a strong devotion to the Blessed Mother Mary throughout his life.
St. Bernard, pray for us.