Sunday after All Saints’ Day, Nov. 2, 2003
Ecclus 44:1-10, 13-14; Psalm 149; Rev. 7:2-4, 9-17; Matt. 5:1-12
It is often the custom in Episcopal congregations to celebrate the feast of All Saints on the closest Sunday following its assigned date of Nov. 1. Therefore, for this Sunday let’s look at this feast instead of Proper 26.
We have our calendar of saints where many from ages past are held up for us as models of the Christian life. However, there are certainly many others from the past who are now in what has been called the church triumphant. Some of these we recall, such as a saintly aunt or neighbor. Others have completely passed from individual memory or at least from our collective mind. So on this day we not only want to celebrate those whom we have placed on the calendar, but we also desire to rejoice in all the saints from ages past whether we remember their names or not. It is in this inclusive attitude that our reading from Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) speaks of famous ancestors whose righteous deeds have not been forgotten. It then goes on to tell of others of whom there is no memory. Nevertheless, they also were godly and righteous.
On this day we not only remember saints from the past. In the Apostles’ Creed we say that we believe in “the communion of saints.” We believe in the union of those past, present and yet to come. The early Christians, as evidenced in the biblical record, referred to each other as saints, not that they were always all that good, but because they were graced by the presence of God. Even today it is God’s activity that makes all of us saints (holy ones). We in the present are in union with those who have gone before us.
This present condition is referred to in today’s gospel when Jesus calls “blessed” those who are in difficult and conflicted situations for the sake of the good news. Jesus does not say that they will be blessed someday in the future as some sort of reward. He says they are blessed right now. Blessed can also be translated “happy” (cf. The New Jerusalem Bible). This is not some sort of superficial giddiness but true joy. The kind of joy we can have in this life when God graces our difficult situations with divine presence.
The inclusiveness of the communion of saints is without number. Yet the Book of Revelation says there are only 144,000. This is a symbolic number of inclusiveness, multiples of completeness: 12 (all the tribes) x 12 (repeated for emphasis) x 10 (number of completeness, all the digits on our two hands added together) x 10 x 10 (repeated for emphasis). It is not saying that there are only 144,000. It rather says that everyone without limit is offered God’s happiness and graced by God’s presence. All can be saints (holy ones).
Look It Up
The Eucharist is one of the focal moments of unity. Carefully read these eucharistic prayers in the Book of Common Prayer (pp. 361, 369, 369, 372) and look for elements of the communion (union) of saints.
Think About It
The communion of saints can also include those yet to come. This is a debated point. Some may ask how this is possible. They do not yet exist. However, in God’s eternal time, may we not be in union with them even now?
Next Sunday
The 22nd Sunday after Pentecost, Nov. 9, 2003 (Proper 27B)
1 Kings 17:8-16; Psalm 146 (or Psalm 146:4-9); Heb. 9:24-28; Mark 12:38-44
