Daily Reflection All Saints, Solemnity

When I was in the Fifth Grade, Sister Mary Frances read us the story of St. Rose of

Lima. What stood out in my young imagination was how Rose wove a crown of thorns

and placed it on her head in imitation of the suffering Jesus. Yes, I wanted to be a saint!

I wanted to suffer like Jesus! And how else to do it—weave a crown of thorns from my

mother’s rose bush in the front yard. That I did and wore it for five minutes! Somehow,

there had to be a better way to become a saint! What I did not realize at age10 is that

saints are just like you and me. What suffering they experienced came from their

response to live their everyday lives according to what Jesus has taught us.

We don’t celebrate today’s feast to honor people who led sinless lives. Oh, no! With

the Church today we celebrate all those people who, just like us, struggled throughout

their lives to follow Jesus’ way. People are saints in the way they live—not what

happens to them after they die. When we read closely the life of St. Ignatius, for

instance, we find that his vanity drew him to Jesus. After the surgery to mend his leg,

Ignatius did not like that it was crooked and asked the doctor to re-break his leg and

straighten it. During this second recuperation, he stayed with his brother and sister-in-

law who had only the Bible and the lives of the saints for Ignatius to read. So, Jesus

used Ignatius’ vanity to draw him closer to God!

The Book of Revelation tells us today that “the saints are the ones who have

survived the time of great distress.” Jesus gives us the map, the blueprint in how to

grow deeper in our experience of God: the beatitudes. Let’s remember that there are

far more saints than any of us are aware. Just in our own lifetime, we have people who

have given their lives openly to save others from persecution. Many individuals

struggle to keep our neighborhoods and nation safe. People in the medical fields,

crossing guards, teachers—all risk something in order to maintain health and safety.

There are many people who are saints well before they die.

Those saints we honor today began life in their mother’s womb just like each of us.

They struggled with their own tendencies to sin. They battled with their own personal

relationships. Yes, they were like us! What saved them was their living out the

beatitudes with their own personalities and their own responses to grace.

Let us again reach into those gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit that we were given in

Baptism and Confirmation. A saint is a person who has responded to God’s invitation to

nurture a friendship with the Divine in ordinary interactions with people, encountering

and solving problems. We become saints through our humanness.

The saints can be successful models for us only to the extent that we allow them

to be real human beings, living in the real world just like us.

They remind us that we are all called to be better than we are,

more loving, more giving, more peace-making,

and more justice-doing

in the image of Christ.

They show us that it is possible.

-- Rev. Michael T. Hayes