CEC News
… Father Riley will lead us in Holy Eucharist November 10 and 17 and we will celebrate Morning Prayer led by Mrs. Jane Barnett November 24.
… It is time for our annual giving campaign. Pledge letters and cards have been mailed.
… The Rt. Rev. Bishop Jacob “Jake” W. Owensby will visit us on Sunday, December 8th to celebrate with us. A pot-luck luncheon is planned for all to attend. More news later.
ALL SAINTS SUNDAY - C -19
Today the Church celebrates All Saints and All Faithful departed. It is a dual celebration that occurs on the Sunday following November 1, which is All Saints Day and November 2, All Souls Day.
The celebration of All Saints dates to 373 in the East. In the West, it was celebrated as early as 610 but not moved to November 1 until 741. The feast of All Souls came later, and dates from the year 998.
All Saints Day is one of the 7 Principal feasts of the church in which we celebrate the lives of those men and women who have a perpetual place on the Church’ calendar. They are remembered for their contribution to the life of the Church and their witness to their faith in their respective generation.
In addition to our celebrating them, we will, in just a few moments, remember before God’s altar the names of those faithful departed we have known and loved who are now in the greater presence of the God who created them, the Lord who redeemed them, and the Holy Spirit who sanctified them.
The word “saint” is not a word the church created as some later date in order to remember and identify the Apostles and early martyrs. It is found in the New Testament.
When we think of a saint, we usually think of one of the individuals the Church commemorates on its calendar. They have a particular day assigned to them on which the Church celebrates their life. For example, the Holy Apostles and martyrs of the early church, or the Blessed Virgin Mary.
In recent days, we were reminded of such individuals as John Henry Newman, a one time Anglican priest, who later in life converted to Catholicism, was made a saint in the Catholic Church.
He will now be given his own day on the Church’s calendar with the appropriate collects and prayers that commemorate his life and contribution to the life of the Church.
He and those like him are the ones most of us think of in terms of being a saint. We may never meet an individual in this life that will end up being on the Church’s calendar of saints. However, some have, like those who knew and worked with Mother Teresa of
For the rest of us our hope is that we will meet them on the other side when we have obtained the inheritance
Between now and then we are called to live a life following the examples of those the Church commemorates, as well as those we have known and loved in this life that lived their lives in praise of God. How do we do that? How did they do that?
First, we look to the pioneer and perfector of our faith, Jesus Christ. It is his blessed footsteps we seek to follow, his examples, his words, and his deeds. Today’s gospel reading is a portion of Christ’ sermon on the mount in which he gives us a blueprint for sainthood.
If we find ourselves reviled and abused, Jesus says, because we are Christians, which is not hard to do in today’s world, we are to rejoice for we are in good company. Instead of reacting as the world would react, that is retaliating, Christ teaches us, we are to love those who oppose our faith and do good to those who hate us.
Jesus says we are to bless those who curse us and pray for those who abuse us. When we stop and look at his words, we say I can’t do all of that. It is impossible. I am only human. To love those who hate me? To do good to those who abuse me? I may be able to pray for them, but to love them.
Jesus sums it up for us in the final verse of today’s passage: “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” That makes it a little easier to swallow, doesn’t it? But even then, it is not that easy. If that is what it takes to be a saint, and most of us are honest with ourselves, we have to admit we are far from it. We don’t always treat others the way we want to be treated.
To be faithful is one thing; to live each day by the “Golden Rule” is another. People being who they are makes it difficult to love some of them. But I suppose some would same the same thing about us.
Were it not for God’s grace none of us would be able to follow the examples of those blessed saints who have gone before us or those who are in the very midst of us right now. For the communion of saints is made up of both the living and the departed.
I have always loved the collect for today. “Almighty God, you have knit together your elect in one communion and fellowship…” It is such a wonderful image. I think of it more of a patchwork quilt like the one my grandmother used to make sewing together one piece at a time.
I watched as she took pieces of different sizes and shapes, colors and materials and brought them together to create a beautiful oneness. God calls all us through his Son, Jesus Christ to virtuous and godly living, to be one with him who is our life. We accept that call in Faith.
At our baptism we were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit, which according to Paul, is the pledge of our inheritance toward redemption as God’s own people, to the praise of his glory. Through the gift of the Holy Spirit the eyes of our hearts have been enlightened, so that we may know what is the hope to which we have been called.
We may not see ourselves as saints, but we are, as
For now, we live, work, witness, and pray for the day when we will join the Church triumphant and are reunited with those we have known and loved who are now in the greater company of the saints in light with the Holy Apostles, martyrs, virgins and doctors of the church, whom God has knit together in one holy fellowship we call the Communion of Saints. Amen+
(Readings: Daniel 7:1-3, 15-18; Psalm 149; Ephesians 1:11-23; Luke 6:20-31)
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