While explaining the need for Christians to bring our faith and live our faith in the many different levels of society in which we find ourselves, Gaudium et Spes is also very realistic in speaking about monumental struggle against the powers of evil and darkness. History is not just the story of human progress, right? We are opposed by satan, the father of lies, who seeks to corrupt souls and bring ruin to nations and families and the Church.
Last week, when we celebrated Priesthood Sunday, I asked for and thanked you for your prayers for priests—because there is a real battle involved in working for the good of souls. And if the devil can bring ruin to priests, well, that’s going to have an impact on parishes and families, isn’t it?
But it’s not just priests, Vatican II says, all Christians are involved in this struggle, this battle. Facing such hostility and wickedness and personal demons, we recognize we need God. We need the Sacraments. We need prayer. We need the guidance of good solid Catholic teaching from our Pope and Bishops. If we are going to survive the battle with our souls intact, we need to make sure that we are drawing as much strength and protection and light from our faith as possible.
And, this weekend, on this solemn feast, we look to the holy souls, the saints, the men and women and children, from every age, and place, and profession, who “survived the time of great distress," as St John calls this life on earth in our First Reading. The survivors, the spiritual war heroes, those who are glorified by God in eternity because of their Christian faith, hope, and love.
Contemplating these brothers and sisters in Christ encourages us: for if they can do it, so can we. I propose three short lessons on how the saints can be our teachers and guides.
The first lesson is that the saints live with the destination in mind—they know what is at stake—that there is more to life than this earthly life. In the first reading, we get a glimpse of those saintly victors standing, robed in white in the heavenly throne room. In the presence of God stand this great multitude—people of every nation, race, and tongue, who have put on the wedding garment of Christ, who have been baptized, and have kept their faith amidst all the temptations and persecutions in this life—again, knowing what was at stake: in the end they would stand victorious in the heavenly throne room, or be banished from it for all eternity.
Why do we resist those terrible onslaughts of temptation? Why do we pray to remain faithful in the midst of persecution? Because heaven is at stake. Not only does sin diminish us—weaking our will and clouding our mind—it puts our souls at risk of hell.
This first lesson is so important—because if we aren’t living with the destination in mind, we are likely to veer off the path—perhaps even forget there is path. There are many souls living this way--as if this earthly life was all that is—eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we shall die, and that’s it. And their souls are in danger. Because if you don’t live as if heaven exists in this life—why would anything be different in eternity?
So the saints remind us to live with the destination always on our minds.
Secondly, it’s not enough to know the destination—you have to know where you are starting from—where you are, right now, spiritually, and who you are. If you can’t pinpoint yourself on the map—how do you know the direction in which you are to walk?
And this is the second lesson: the saints understand who they are: they understand that they are human beings, with fallen natures due to sin in need of salvation. They know they need Christ. They know they need the Sacraments. They know they need prayer.
And, they know that through baptism they have become Children of God. We read in our second reading: "See what love the Father has bestowed on us that we may be called the children of God. Yet so we are." Children of God. Members of God's family. God’s love for us is so profound—we are gathered into his family through the blood of Christ. And the saints are animated by this profound self-knowledge. In whatever hostilities we face, whatever temptations: we do so as Children of God.
The saints know that they were made for love, by the one who is love. Love animates us, love guides us, love fills us, love protects us. The saints recognize because they are loved they need to become love--loving God and neighbor in the concrete details of their life.
And that’s the third Lesson. it is not enough just to know who we are and where we are supposed to be going, but we also need to know how to get there. In order to cross a lake, you need a boat. In order to cross a mountain, you need mountain gear. In order to get to heaven, the home of the saints, you need to practice saintliness, blessedness.
This is what today's Gospel passage reminds us of: the Beatitudes are the practices and attitudes that you and I must cultivate if we wish to join the saints.
We must practice poverty of spirit—recognizing our fundamental need for God in all things. We must mourn for our sins—those lost opportunities to live for God. We must be meek—treating each other with gentleness. We must hunger and thirst for righteousness—seeking to justly give God what belongs to God and to treat our neighbor and the poor with the respect and fairness due to every living human person. We must not just be just but merciful—going beyond what is merely fair and just—but practicing true mercy to become a blessing for others. We must be clean of heart—turning away from anything impure, corrupt, perverted, vile, or selfish, in order to seek God through prayer and worship and divine contemplation. And we must keep the faith amidst persecution—in fact, if we are not living our faith in such away that the world hates us, we might not be really living the faith.
Live with the destination in mind, live with the humble knowledge that you are a sinner, reborn in baptism as a child of God, now called to strive to live the beatitudes in this life, that we may join the ranks of the blessed in eternity.
May the saints help us and preserve us for this our destiny, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.
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