The Sánchez Archives ALL SAINTS Year C

By
Patricia Datchuck Sánchez

Saints, Here and Now

REVELATION 7:2-4, 9-14
1 JOHN 3:1-3
MATTHEW 5:1-12

More often than not, when the subject of saints and/or saintliness make an inroad into casual conversation, many of us tend to think of faceless names of long ago who make an annual appearance on the calendar as heroes and heroines of past generations whose feasts of faith have left their mark on the corporate Christian memory. Many of us have favorites among the sainted numbers who have gone before us, setting an admirable example but seemingly impossible standard. If encouraged to think in a more contemporary mode, some of us might attribute the status of saint to such great hearts as Damian of Molokai, Mother Teresa of Calcutta, Pope John XXIII, Mohandas Gandhi, or Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador. Today’s feast with its accent on sainthood, prompts us to direct our focus even closer to home; indeed, on this day, designated to honor All Saints, each of us is invited to recognize and name ourselves and one another as saints.

As noted in the book, Texts For Preaching (W. Brueggemann, C. Cousar, B. Gaventa, J. Newsome, Westminster John Knox Press, Louisville: 1995), the themes of this day have the power to reshape our identity, to teach us who we are and what we are about. The themes of this day remind us of our connectedness to a great company of believers of every age and generation and to acknowledge that this “great cloud of witnesses” (Hebrews 12:1), past, present and to come, diverse yet unified, are bound by a bond that transcends death. Today, we the saints on earth join our voices with all who have gone before us, to announce to all who will come after us, that we are all God’s people in Christ.

Before the title of saint was bestowed through the process of canonization, it was used in both the Jewish and Christian scriptures to describe the special blessedness of those who belong to God. Called into being by the all holy God and called into covenant with the God who is all holiness, the people of Israel were charged with being similarly qodesh (Hebrew) or holy (see Leviticus 11:44; 19:2). In the New Testament, the church or the new Israel is similarly described. Called and sanctified or made holy by Christ’s saving words and works, believers in Jesus are challenged to live as true hagios (Greek), i.e., holy ones, or more simply, saints (Romans 1:7; Ephesians 1:1, 4, 15, 18; 2:19; 3:8, 18; 9:12; 5:3; 6:18; 1 Corinthians 1:2; Philippians 1:1; 1 Peter 2:9).

Such holiness or saintliness derives, first and foremost from modeling our lives on Jesus Christ who was holiness incarnate. However, as Michael Maher (“Honoring the Saints Today,” The Saints in Season, Austin Flannery, Ed., The Liturgical Press, Collegeville: 1975) has pointed out, the extraordinary variety among those whom we call holy points to the almost infinite multiplicity of ways in which Christian holiness or saintliness can be acquired and practiced. Each of us is personally called and gifted; therefore, each of us must discover our own personal brand of sanctity and take our place in the ongoing struggle which is the human experience. Just as the world we live in is a tenuous mélange of good and evil, each of us is a microcosm in which that mélange also exists. To support us in the struggle against evil and in our striving to be worthy of the title, saint, John, the seer (first reading from Revelation) offers the assurance that that we are not alone. We are one with the numberless myriad who stand before God and the Lamb. We are, as the Johannine author (second reading from 1 John) reminds us, the loved children of God. Therefore, God has pronounced us blest (gospel). Whether we be poor or sorrowing, lowly, hungry or thirsty, when we show mercy and make peace, even when we are persecuted and insulted, we are the blest children, i.e., the sainted, holy ones of God, by whose power each of us can survive the struggle and make a difference in the lives of those we touch.

When the struggle seems too severe and the difference we make is too miniscule, it is, perhaps, heartening to remember that authentic saintliness is not necessarily other-worldly but very down to earth.

REVELATION 7:2-4, 9-14

Battle-weary soldiers often support and sustain one another through difficult situations by sharing their imaginings of what they will do after the war. With little foretastes of victory, they lend to one another much needed encouragement to persevere. In a sense, the author of Revelation was similarly serving his contemporaries with visions of the rejoicing that would be theirs if they remained committed to Christ. Sensitive to the fact that his embattled readers were being severely persecuted for their faith during the reign of the Roman emperor, Domitian (81-96 C.E.), John the seer offered them a literary respite from their struggle. With vision after vision of the glory that awaited them, John stoked the fires of saintliness in their hearts. Through the centuries, the prospect of participating in an eternal victory celebration such as that portrayed in today’s first reading has strengthened the resolve of many a struggling saint.

Unfortunately, however, John’s message of encouragement has often been misread and misapplied. His apocalyptic visions of a universal and innumerable throng, sealed by God and joined together in the liturgy of the Lamb have been skewed. Whereas John intended that the number 144,000 (v. 4) be understood as inclusive of all peoples, some have interpreted it as a signal that the number of those saved will be confined to a predestined few. As William Barclay (“The Revelation of John,” The Daily Study Bible, The Saint Andrew Press, Edinburgh: 1976) explained, the special number stands not for limitation but for completeness and perfection; it is comprised of 12 multiplied by 12 -the perfect square—and then rendered even more inclusive and complete by being multiplied by 1000. The number saved will not be small, but too great to count.

This excerpted text also includes another corrective to literalism in that it describes the saved as those who “have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the lamb” (v. 14). Some within the Christian family are fond of asking, “Are you saved?” or of proclaiming, “Once saved, always saved!” These statements spring from an understanding of salvation as a once-and-for-always gift of God that is absolutely assured to those who have made a decisive commitment for Christ; regardless of however far they may backslide or stray, proponents of this view believe that salvation will never be lost except by a formal rejection of Jesus Christ. Although, as Martin Pable (Catholics and Fundamentalists, ACTA Publications, Chicago: 1997) has noted, this is certainly a comforting doctrine, it strains credibility. Moreover, it obviates human free will and the responsibility each of us has for actively appropriating God’s saving gift in Christ. Notice how the author of Revelation has explained the necessity of cooperating with the saving mercies of God. The white-robed throng who survived the great trial are described as having washed their own robes in the blood of the Lamb. Salvation is a grace available to all, but it does not fall from the sky like a warm blanket upon a world of sleepy, passive Linuses; it is a gift that must be unwrapped, opened and appropriated by faith. Washing one’s robes in the blood of the Lamb means being baptized into the death and resurrection of Jesus; it means being willing to take part in the daily struggle with sin and evil until we are called home to God. Whereas, this vision of John was intended to buoy our hopes and strengthen our resolve, it also challenges us to be mindful and responsible participants in the ongoing process of salvation.

1 JOHN 3:1-3

In this short text from the Johannine letters, the author seems to be exclaiming to his readers. . . “All this and heaven too!” “See,” he commands, “see the lavish gifts that a loving God has already bestowed upon humankind.” “But, wait”, he promises, “you haven’t seen anything yet – there will be more in the world to come.” Raymond E. Brown (The Epistles of John, Doubleday and Company, Inc., New York: 1984) has proposed that the Johannine author was attempting to balance realized eschatology (i.e., the enjoyment of God’s saving gifts, here and now) with future eschatology (i.e., the everlasting enjoyment of God’s presence in eternity). Such balance was required because there were conflicting interpretations of the good news amid the saints of the Johannine church. So pronounced were their differences that two distinct groups formed within the community, one of which eventually seceded and leaned heavily toward gnosticism and other heretical trends. The two groups were polarized as regards the preeminence of Jesus, his incarnation, the ethical demands of discipleship, the role of the Holy Spirit and eschatology. Insisting that the last days had already arrived, the secessionists claimed that their union with God made them pure, perfect and incapable of sin, and freed them of any moral obligations to love their brothers and sisters. Aware of the dangers these ideas posed to the community and in an effort to combat the secessionists, whom he called “Antichrists,” the author of 1 John repeatedly offered his contemporaries criteria by which to recognize and refute their errors.

Today’s second reading represents a pause in the author’s refutation of the secessionists. Brown (op. cit.) attributes the author’s obvious emotion to his amazement at the persistent recalcitrance of the secessionists; these may have been contending that by virtue of their special status as God’s children (v. 1), they were already like God, existing already in God, and knowing God fully. If that were so, the Johannine author contended, then the love of God would be manifested in their lives and they would cease deviating from the authentic tradition of the gospel. Just as children begin to discover who they are by looking to their parents, and just as children grow to become who they have been called to be by faithfully trusting in their parents’ wise counsel, the author of 1 John called his readers to see themselves as a work in progress. Parented by God, and counseled by the Spirit, believers can indeed call themselves the children of God, i.e., children who are daily growing in Christ, into the perfect union that Christ shares with God: We shall be like God!” (v. 2). Spurred on by the hope of this transformation (being like God), believers will find themselves increasingly alienated from “the world” which will not recognize and acclaim them just as it did not recognize or acclaim Christ. “World” in this context does not mean the created universe but all of the persons and forces who are hostile to Jesus and thereby to God and, by association, to the community of believers.

If the “world” takes no offense in us or recognizes in us no challenge to its values, and if the “world” is perfectly comfortable to welcome us as kindred spirits and finds in us no unseemly affront to its principles, then perhaps, today’s feast gives us due cause to consider whose children we are and if we are authentic participants in the communion of saints.

MATTHEW 5:1-12

Whenever this gospel is proclaimed, it leaves in its wake a readily identifiable shockwave. Jesus’ contemporaries were shocked by it, as were Matthew’s readers almost two generations later. When the beatitudes are read among the well-fed and well-to-do of contemporary society, they may appear to be implausible and pious platitudes to be realized in some future age by a virtuous few. But when they are announced in the midst of this world’s poor, , they are embraced, in that they deliver radical comfort while demanding a radical reversal of the status quo. Suggesting that the poor have much to teach the world about the good news and the true meaning of the beatitudes, Oscar Romero, the late Archbishop of El Salvador once said, when he preached the beatitudes: “Christ was sowing a moral revolution in which we human beings come to change ourselves from worldly thinking. . . Society says, ‘Blessed are the rich’, but Jesus said, ‘Blessed are the poor’. . . The poor have shown the church the true way to go. A church that does not join the poor in order to speak out from the side of the poor. . . is not the true church of Jesus Christ” (The Violence of Love, Harper and Row, San Francisco: 1988).

In declaring the poor and other of the world’s struggling people as blest, Jesus was, in effect, issuing a “Bill of Rights” for the reign of God he had come to establish. The kingdom would be comprised, not of the predilect of the world, i.e., the rich, the satisfied, the glad-handed elite, but of the predilect of God, the poor, the lowly, the sorrowing, etc. During his ministry, Jesus sought out and served the needs of these special members of the kingdom through his words and works, he modeled the ethic whereby membership in the kingdom is to be attained (showing mercy, peacemaking, accepting persecution for holiness’ sake) By their similar service, work-ethic and association with the needy, believers in Jesus will also find a share in the blessedness that Jesus pronounced upon them.

As Ben F. Meyer (Five Speeches That Changed The World, The Liturgical Press, Collegeville: 1994) has pointed out, there are two types of beatitude in the Bible: the apocalyptic kind which promises future joys of eschatological salvation to variously designated beneficiaries, and the sapiential kind, which enunciates the principle of blessings on the virtuous. In their original context, during Jesus’ earthly ministry, the beatitudes were apocalyptic, assuring a coming blessedness when God’s reign would reverse the fortunes of the needy and struggling. At their second level of development, the Matthean community interpreted the beatitudes as sapiential and converted them from a socio-economic category, e.g., the poor, into a religious one, e.g., the poor in spirit. This conversion reflects an earlier evolution in biblical tradition. Prior to the Babylonian exile (587-538 B.C.E.), the cause of the economically poor was championed by the law and the prophets; during and after the exile, “the poor” or anawim became synonymous with those who, having suffered the loss of everything, had learned to rely on God, who in turn, cherished and protected them. Gradually, and is reflected in Matthew’s gospel, “the poor” came to signify those who acknowledged a spiritual need for God.

Given the situation of contemporary society, wherein poverty of every sort continues to be rampant, and prompted by the insights of Oscar Romero, perhaps there is a third type or way of looking at the beatitudes. In addition to their eschatological and sapiential interpretations, these pronouncements of blessedness demand an existential application. Such an application would require that the saints of God, i.e., the truly, spiritually poor would, here and now, find their privilege in serving their sister and brother saints, i.e., the economically and politically poor, and that the church would “allow the poor to tell us about the world and what service the church must offer to the world” (Romero).

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