Sine Nomine
Earlier today, I read the Facebook status update of a friend of mine who is the rector of a parish on the East Coast. She posted (with some bit of resigned dismay) the greeting she received serveral times this morning from well meaning parishioners, "Happy Day-After-Halloween!"
All Saints' Day, a Major Feast in the Church (like Christmas, Easter and Pentecost), reduced to also-ran status. Squashed, like a rotten Jack-o-lantern, by the commercial success of ghouls, goblins and bags of candy.
This isn't anyone's fault, really. It's not that clergy haven't done enough teaching -- though I suspect we could always do more. It's not that congregants haven't paid enough attention -- though I wish there weren't so many distractions. The simple fact is our cultural calendars are better established in our day to day lives than our ecclesiastical ones.
But for me, for today, I have been profoundly aware of our interconnections with one another (family and friends; strangers and enemies), with those who have gone before us in this life and with those who will, God willing, come after us. All Saints' Day simultaneously reminds us that none of us will get out of this life alive, and that none of us can live life fully in isolation from others. As a Johnny-Come-Lately to the glories of All Saints' Day, this idea that each of us is, at every moment, a recipient, a steward and a benefactor of the Faith means more and more to me with every passing year.
As one of the opening anthems in the Burial Office starkly states, "For none of us has life in himself, and none becomes his own master when he dies. For if we have life, we are alive in the Lord, and if we die, we die in the Lord. So then, whether we live or die, we are the Lord's possession." (Book of Common Prayer, page 491)
Halloween may be about getting dressed in a costume to either hide our identity or reveal a portion of our identity we keep hidden from view. All Saints' Day is about coming to terms with the identity given to us at Baptism -- the identity of a people set apart by God's grace and surrounded by a community to travel with us through this life until we leave it for the destination known only to God. Halloween may be about dealing with our collective fear of death, but All Saints' is about encouraging us to fully embrace a life that is eternal. Halloween may be about the darker side of the human psyche, but All Saints' is about the light of God's glory shining through imperfect people; people who leak a bit of that light onto every person they encounter.
I've spent some time today thinking about all the people who have shed God's light on my life -- people whose names many will never know. But these people -- people who prayed with me, taught me Bible stories, encouraged me in my walk with God, challenged me when I was rebellious, supported me when I was discouraged, surrounded me with love when I was unloveable, stuck with me when I had given up on myself, walked with me through many a dark valley -- these are the people who taught me what it means to be a follower of Jesus. They are not sine nomine -- without a name -- because I carry their memories, their stories, their voices, their names with me each and every day of my life. I am the beneficiary of their witness to the Faith. I have inherited their stories and those stories have become intertwined with my own.
Nothing too glamorous, this life of faith. Pretty mundane really. But the brightness of the saints -- in all of their imperfections -- shines like the stars. And that beats a Jack-o-lantern any day.
O God, the King of saints, we praise and glorify your holy Name for all your servants who have finished their course in your faith and fear: for the blessed Virgin Mary; for the holy patriarchs, prophets, apostles, and martyrs; and for all your other righteous servants, known to us and unknown; and we pray that, encouraged by their examples, aided by their prayers, and strengthened by their fellowship, we also may be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light; through the merits of your Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (BCP, p. 504)
Earlier today, I read the Facebook status update of a friend of mine who is the rector of a parish on the East Coast. She posted (with some bit of resigned dismay) the greeting she received serveral times this morning from well meaning parishioners, "Happy Day-After-Halloween!"
All Saints' Day, a Major Feast in the Church (like Christmas, Easter and Pentecost), reduced to also-ran status. Squashed, like a rotten Jack-o-lantern, by the commercial success of ghouls, goblins and bags of candy.
This isn't anyone's fault, really. It's not that clergy haven't done enough teaching -- though I suspect we could always do more. It's not that congregants haven't paid enough attention -- though I wish there weren't so many distractions. The simple fact is our cultural calendars are better established in our day to day lives than our ecclesiastical ones.
But for me, for today, I have been profoundly aware of our interconnections with one another (family and friends; strangers and enemies), with those who have gone before us in this life and with those who will, God willing, come after us. All Saints' Day simultaneously reminds us that none of us will get out of this life alive, and that none of us can live life fully in isolation from others. As a Johnny-Come-Lately to the glories of All Saints' Day, this idea that each of us is, at every moment, a recipient, a steward and a benefactor of the Faith means more and more to me with every passing year.
As one of the opening anthems in the Burial Office starkly states, "For none of us has life in himself, and none becomes his own master when he dies. For if we have life, we are alive in the Lord, and if we die, we die in the Lord. So then, whether we live or die, we are the Lord's possession." (Book of Common Prayer, page 491)
Halloween may be about getting dressed in a costume to either hide our identity or reveal a portion of our identity we keep hidden from view. All Saints' Day is about coming to terms with the identity given to us at Baptism -- the identity of a people set apart by God's grace and surrounded by a community to travel with us through this life until we leave it for the destination known only to God. Halloween may be about dealing with our collective fear of death, but All Saints' is about encouraging us to fully embrace a life that is eternal. Halloween may be about the darker side of the human psyche, but All Saints' is about the light of God's glory shining through imperfect people; people who leak a bit of that light onto every person they encounter.
I've spent some time today thinking about all the people who have shed God's light on my life -- people whose names many will never know. But these people -- people who prayed with me, taught me Bible stories, encouraged me in my walk with God, challenged me when I was rebellious, supported me when I was discouraged, surrounded me with love when I was unloveable, stuck with me when I had given up on myself, walked with me through many a dark valley -- these are the people who taught me what it means to be a follower of Jesus. They are not sine nomine -- without a name -- because I carry their memories, their stories, their voices, their names with me each and every day of my life. I am the beneficiary of their witness to the Faith. I have inherited their stories and those stories have become intertwined with my own.
Nothing too glamorous, this life of faith. Pretty mundane really. But the brightness of the saints -- in all of their imperfections -- shines like the stars. And that beats a Jack-o-lantern any day.
O God, the King of saints, we praise and glorify your holy Name for all your servants who have finished their course in your faith and fear: for the blessed Virgin Mary; for the holy patriarchs, prophets, apostles, and martyrs; and for all your other righteous servants, known to us and unknown; and we pray that, encouraged by their examples, aided by their prayers, and strengthened by their fellowship, we also may be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light; through the merits of your Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (BCP, p. 504)
posted by FrGaryB | 8:52 PM
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