The flow of sainthood

Tuesday, November 01, 2016

All Saints’ Day

6 propositions about the saints

1. The Church has an exacting process for canonization and all of the “official” saints named by the Church have undergone that process. As you may or may not know, sometimes the process takes centuries; sometimes its moves along more quickly. However, there are a great many more saints in heaven than the ones the Church has honored with the title “saint.” Perhaps you know some of your own. Perhaps there is someone you have asked to intercede for you and your prayers have been answered. Sometimes the “miracles” attributed to a particular saint are not as heroic or sublime as the little “miracles” you have experienced in your own life.

2. Let’s take a look at the saints the Church has canonized. What we are looking at here is the magnificent mystery of grace; that is, of gifts freely given to those who perhaps have never asked for them. And when we consider the Church’s saints, what we are given to look at is the reality that God has poured blessings and graces into a particular saint’s life that went far beyond the ordinary and normal. Consider, for example, Saint Mother Theresa and the extraordinary gift she has to see Christ in the poorest of the poor and to devote all of her being to their care and to gather around herself a very large number of people who would be given the grace to imitate her.

3. Consider any of the saints and consider their gifts and the fact that they cooperated with the graces that were given them. Could it be, perhaps, that we too have been given gifts that we have not been able to embody or express into the world? If so, we do well to ask the saints to intercede for us.

4. We do well if we never cease asking for even a small portion of the graces that were given to those we know as saints, and that we ask for the openness it takes to let those graces flow through us.

5. Ultimately, it is all about love: the love God has poured into the lives of the saints themselves, as well as how he has used these men and women to show His love to the particular people they have cared for in their lives.

6. We are part and parcel of the flow of that love. It is all around us. It is in us, even when we don’t seem to be able to recognize it. It will carry us to sainthood as well if we stay open to it and let it express itself in our lives.

May God bless you on this wonderful feast day!