Over in the school one week, I posed two questions to our 8th
graders: “Please raise your hand,” I
asked them, “if you wish to go to heaven.”
All of them raised their hands, thanks be to God. “Very good”, I said,
“I would hope so.” Then I asked, “Raise
your hands if you wish to be a saint.”
There was a little bit of hesitation, and only about half of the hands
went up. I detected there was a bit of
confusion.
Why would they hesitate?
Why did only half of the 8th graders raise their hands? Why did only half of our 8th
graders want to be saints? When you hear the word saint, what do you think
of? An unfealing statue, a fanatic, a
figure in a nice story?
A little over a week ago, Pope Francis made two new saints,
or should I say, added their names to our list of saints, Louis and Zelie
Martin, a married couple. Louis and
Zelie were the parents of St. Therese the Little Flower, but that’s not what
made them saints; they in fact had nine children, that perhaps helped them
develop the virtue of patience, but that’s not what made them saints. Both Louis and Zelie suffered greatly in
their lives, Zelie suffered and died from breast cancer, Louis suffered serious
anxiety, mental problems, and died after suffering several strokes; both offered
up their sufferings to God, uniting themselves to the suffering Lord, but
that’s not entirely what made them saints. Both practiced prayer, spiritual
reading, meditation, both of course had deep devotion to the Eucharist,
frequent recourse to the sacrament of confession, many good faithful Christians
do that, and those spiritual practices were definitely part of their journey to
sainthood.
So, what made them saints? Why does the universal Church
headed by the successor of St. Peter, now recognize this ordinary Catholic couple
as among the blessed? Pope Francis, at their canonization said, “The holy
spouses Louis and Zelie Martin practiced Christian service in the family,
creating day by day an environment of faith and love. The radiant witness of
these new saints inspires us to persevere in joyful service to our brothers and
sisters.” There’s why, they gave radiant witness, serving God in their ordinary
lives to a heroic level. And that’s
really the story of every saint: they give radiant witness to Jesus Christ by
serving God in their ordinary life.
I told the story of Louis and Zelie Martin, yesterday, at
the wedding I celebrated here at St. Clare.
I thought it would be fitting to talk about the saints yesterday, at
their All Hallow’s Eve Wedding. For as
the Church gathers these weekend to celebrate the Saints, shouldn’t all married
couples, all families, look to the Saints as great examples of radical holiness
and love which we are all called to imitate.
And how wonderful that we have the wonderful recent examples of Saints
Louis and Zelie Martin, a saintly married couple. They aren’t the first set of married couples
to both become saints. There are many
examples: The Holy Roman Emperor, Saint Henry, and His Wife, the Empress, Saint
Cunegunda; Saint Joachim and Anne, grandparents of Jesus; Mary and Joseph, of course;
the Spanish couple, saint Isadore and his wife, Saint Maria de la Cabeza; there
are quite a few couples who have been beatified, and whose causes for
canonization are still progressing. Again, ordinary people, who respond to God
with heroic surrender.
In the Sacrament of Marriage, bride and groom make promises
to love and serve each other. Someone
once said, marriage is a life laboratory in which we can discover the real
meaning of faithfulness and unconditional love.
Therefore marriage provides bride and groom and opportunity to become
saints. Yes, that nice couple yesterday,
as so many of you, get married because you want to form happy memories with
your spouse, you want to start a happy holy family with your spouse, you want
someone to accompany you through life’s difficulties. But the primary duty of spouses, is to help
each other become saints, to help each other follow Jesus Christ faithfully, so
that you can come to share the wedding feast of heaven.
One of my favorite prayers in the whole wedding ceremony
comes in the last blessing. The priest extends his hands over the bride and
groom and prays: “may God the eternal father keep you of one heart in love for
one another, that the peace of Christ may dwell in you and abide always in your
home. May you be blessed in your children, have solace in your friends and
enjoy true peace with everyone. May you
be witnesses in the world to God’s charity, so that the afflicted and needy who
have known your kindness may one day receive you thankfully into the eternal
dwelling of God.”
There’s the key to holiness, there’s the key to becoming
saints: “becoming witnesses in the world of God’s charity”. We hold up the saints today, we honor them,
not for their benefit…they are in no need of our praises. They’ve crossed the
finish line, they’ve won the race, they’ve made the pilgrimage, they’ve
fulfilled their life’s purpose and made it to the banquet! We don’t praise the saints because they need
our praises, but because we need to praise them, we need to learn from them.
None of the saints had an easy ride. They didn’t wake up one day, and find that
being faithful to God was easy. This great cloud of witnesses in heaven shows
us to persevere when faith is hard. And so they pray for us constantly, they
teach us by their example, instruct us by their preaching, and they accompany
us in our difficulties, encouraging us to remain faithful to Christ, amidst
temptations and trials.
And we truly celebrate the Saints with great joy. When a family member wins an award we are
joyful. My little sister was into
gymnastics and cheerleading, and it filled me with joy when she would win
medals for her excellent performances.
Or when our countrymen win gold medals at the Olympics, even though
we’ve never met them, we are filled with delight.
Well something greater than Olympic gold is being celebrated
today. The saints, our brothers and
sisters in Christ, have won the glorious and imperishable crown, and we rejoice
in their glory.
In
the Gospel for this Solemnity of All Saints, we hear Jesus proclaim the
beatitudes. In the beatitudes Jesus
promises that if we follow his teaching, we will become holy. He promises
heaven to his disciples. Notice he doesn’t promise heaven to those who seek
financial success, earthly riches, or worldly pleasures. He doesn’t say, blessed are you if you earn a
million dollars; he doesn’t say, blessed are you if you become the best basketball
player in the world; he doesn’t say, blessed are you if people bow down to you
and serve you, blessed are you if get everything you want in this life. No, he promises beatitude, happiness, holiness
to those who seek heaven with their whole hearts—those who become humble as he
is humble, those who seek purity of heart as he is pure, those who hunger and
thirst for justice as he does, those who seek total abandonment to the will of
God as he does.
At
Saint Louis and Marie Martin’s canonization Mass, Pope Francis said, Jesus’
life and death are “marked by an attitude of utter service…[so] faced with people who seek
power and success in order to be noticed, who want their achievements and
efforts to be acknowledged, [disciples of Jesus] are called to do the opposite…
Jesus calls us…to
pass from the thirst for power to the joy of quiet service.” “Each of us,” the
Pope said, “through baptism…can receive the charity which flows from his open
heart…and become channels of compassion, especially for those who are
suffering, discouraged, and alone.”
The
saints are those who have abandoned all to become instruments of God’s
compassion, and that is the invitation made to each one of us. From heaven may the saints continue to watch
over us and sustain us by their powerful intercession, that we like them may
become channels of God’s charity for the glory of God and salvation of souls.
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