Bulletin Column from October 31, 2021

Dear Friends at Saint Frances Cabrini Parish and Saint Mary’s Immaculate Conception Parish:

Praised be Jesus Christ! This Sunday lands us on the doorstep of November and also the doorstep of the great feast of All the Saints. Though it is not a holy day of obligation this year (the obligation drops if it lands on a Monday or Saturday), All Saints Day is one of the most important feasts on our liturgical calendar. It is a joyful day and it has always been one of my favorite celebrations.

Who can go wrong with the Saints? To learn any one of their stories is to discover a treasure of the adventure of dedicating a life to Jesus Christ, with all of its joys and crosses. The Saints we have canonized, or officially declared to be in Heaven, number in the thousands. The same is true of the ranks of the Beatified. Their lives, their stories, and their sheer numbers are wellsprings of grace and holiness for believers in every era.

Strictly speaking however, All Saints Day is not exactly about the Saints and Beati that we know by name, though they are indeed part of the grand celebration. All Saints Day is the day on the calendar when the Church celebrates the multitudes of all the saints that do not have a feast day and who are not venerated by name. It is the day to celebrate all of the saved in Heaven. It is such a joyful day not so much because we celebrate the countless heavenly dwellers themselves, but rather because we celebrate and praise God who accomplishes the marvelous work of salvation. God makes saints. God rescues from death. God washes away sin, restores broken souls, and fills hearts and lives with grace. All Saints Day is when the Church pauses to marvel in wonder at the God who has filled heaven, so amazing he is to accomplish something so glorious.

The sweetness of the feast day is only enhanced if we begin from the doctrinal starting point that none of us deserves heaven or can get there automatically. The world is fallen, and so are we, and the truth is that everyone is in the same sorry state when we are born. God, in his vast love, comes to our rescue in the Sacraments, beginning with Baptism. He nourishes us with the Eucharist, his Word, the life of grace, Confession, Adoration, and devotions. His grace flows into lives dedicated to justice, charity, good works, and the obedience of the moral law. The entire apparatus of the Catholic Church exists for what lies at the core of All Saints Day: to transform fallen man into redeemed man; to raise up saints out of the sinful. All Saints Day means that, through the Church, God has done his finest work of re-creating fallen creation, so that the largest segment of the Church’s population is not here on the earth, but is instead in heaven. Indeed, God is glorious, his Church is essential, and the feast reminds believers everywhere of who we are and who we need to be: saints in the making.