All saints great and small

Sunday marks the Church's Feast of All Saints, but when this holy day falls on a weekend, the St. Robert School community will always celebrate at school as well.  This is not to replace our obligation to attend Mass on the weekend, but because it is a long-held tradition for our second graders to teach us what they've studied and learned about the holy men and women who are the heroes and role models for our community of Saints-in-training.

But, wait a minute, aren't we all saints?  This morning, we learned the meaning behind our creedal belief in "the communion of saints,"  beginning with the reminder that, indeed, everyone who believes in God is a member of His kingdom, and all members of the Kingdom are called saints - with a lower case s.  We also learned the remarkable mystery of the communion itself, namely, that every time we celebrate the sacrifice of the Holy Mass, our prayer is united with every saint in heaven and on earth. Finally, we learned that the holy men and women known to the entire Church - those Saints with a capital S - are not the only saints in heaven.  Those known and loved only by their own families and friends are no lesser citizens of heaven. Rather, the Church has given us the canonization process to verify heavenly citizenship. The lives and works of these saints have been subjected to a rigorous investigative process, including the documentation of miracles attributed to them after their deaths.  So, we can look to the canonized saints not only as inspirational models, but can pray with confidence to to them as intercessors who we know to be close to God.

The most remarkable thing about the capital S Saints, though, is that they were ordinary sinners like us. They achieved their greatness by knowing, loving, and serving God above all else - in ways from the simple to the heroic.  It is precisely their ordinariness that inspires us to the right-ordering of our faith and to know for certain that we, too, can achieve sainthood, whether great or small; recognized or not.

This would be a great weekend to teach your children about the origins of our Halloween traditions and to help them identify a patron saint as a personal friend and intercessor.  The comfort and blessings that will follow will be nothing short of miraculous.

Happy Feast Day!