Solemnity of All Saints

We Sons and Daughters
Fools, weaklings, outcasts, dreamers
O blessed kingdom!

Rv 7:2-4, 9-14 / 1 Jn 3:1-3 / Mt 5:1-12a

Solemnity of All Saints

"When our Lord saw the crowds, he went up the mountain, and after he had sat down, he whipped out his smartphone and began to tweet at them, saying: 'Shame on them who ...'"

How many of us long for that version of "The Sermon on the Mount"? How many of us look around at our brothers and sisters and struggle to find any worthy of the label "blessed"? How many of us prefer our petty little tribes to the strange and confusing beauty of our Parent's family?

There is a certain smallness to American culture and politics at our present moment in time. Everyone is stuck in their corners, bleating about this wound or that slight; each tribe attempting to outshout the others, but none succeeding. It is more tiresome than I can possibly describe, especially standing in comparison to that which we celebrate today: the Communion of Saints, aka our family.

In saying such things, I do not deny the reality of injustice and sin. But the Beatitudes are creatures of the kingdom, not the world. They are meant to be lived in the kingdom, not the world. Yes, this realm exists in the here and now, but not as the utopia of any of our plethora of isms. It cannot be found via human ingenuity, nor built by human institutions. The kingdom is a choice of heart and soul, a path to be trod each and every day; not the easiest to be sure, but the only road worth traveling.

So how does one get there? Choose the simplicity of loving your neighbor. Choose the nobility of doing good to those who hate you. Choose the truth that no amount of "progress" in technology or ideology can ever transform the world into something other than an unholy mess. And despite the latter, choose the honor of bearing grace to your siblings, starting with the most sinful and unworthy.

This is a vision made tangible in a set of tapestries hanging in the cathedral of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles: a true communion of saints, ancient and new, famous and ordinary, a rainbow of diversity, all reveling in God's light and love with absolutely no regard for "official" saintly status.

This is the kingdom. This is our family. This is who we can be, if we so choose. It is perhaps a foolish vision. But if thus, then let me be an eternal fool, for it is a vision blessedly wonderful.

Revelation 7:2-14; Psalms 24:1-6; 1 John 3:1-3; Matthew 5:1-12

Solemnity of All Saints

Today I celebrate my friend, Fr. Gregory Coiro, OFM Cap. He was a good priest; the best I have ever known. And while I cannot imagine him getting canonized, I am quite certain of his holiness. He gave so much in the hope that we, his brothers and sisters, might "ascend the mountain of the LORD". And I know that even now he is doing everything within his power to help us find our way into our Parent's "holy place". Yes, blessed are we. So with joy and love I say, Brother Greg, pray for us!

Revelation 7:2-14; Psalms 24:1-6; 1 John 3:1-3; Matthew 5:1-12

Solemnity of All Saints

Who is part of this family that we celebrate today? Yes, we know the meek and the weak are blessed. But what about the elephants and the octopuses? Are such thoughts absurd or blasphemous? Are we so blinded by anthropocentrism that we can only see animals as pets, or tools, or objects of worship? Is it possible that they might actually be our brothers and sisters, or is that merely the stuff of legend and fantasy? If we dared to embrace them as siblings, what wisdom might they teach us? About life? About our Parent? Yes, blessed are they who long to see our family's true and full face.

Revelation 7:2-14; Psalms 24:1-6; 1 John 3:1-3; Matthew 5:1-12

Solemnity of All Saints

1 John 3:1-3; Matthew 5:1-12

Is there one among us who is not named in the Beatitudes? No, somehow, someway, we can all be found there. We are all blessed. Even when we think we are not. Even when we are told we are not. We are blessed. You are blessed. For no other reason than the simple truth that you are God's child, and our Parent will never neglect their offspring. And that is the truth behind our Brother's words; that somehow, someway, a divine inheritance awaits each of us.

Solemnity of All Saints

Revelation 7:2-14; 1 John 3:1-3; Matthew 5:1-12

Today is my favorite holy day, because today we celebrate our family. We are all saints. We are all holy. Not because of anything we might do, but simply because of who we are: "the children of God." Our common calling is to recognize and acknowledge that truth. Once we do, everything else will fall into place. Yes, most truly, blessed are we, for ours is a holy family.

Solemnity of All Saints

From a historical standpoint, almost all of us are unremarkable. We will not be in the textbooks of the next millennium, and no one will care about our absence. But here's the Good News: God is not a historian! She loves each of us as the most remarkable of their creations, and he knows that we are extraordinary. Just read your local newspaper's obituary pages, and the truth that each of our lives is exceptional will shine through. So our Good News today is this: we are a family of saints.

Revelation 7:2-14; 1 John 3:1-3; Matthew 5:1-12

Solemnity of All Saints

Matthew 5:1-12a

The Communion of Saints is the most authentic image of what it means to be Catholic. When Jesus shared the Beatitudes, he indicated what he truly desired to give birth to: the family of the blessed ones, not the institutional monstrosity we have today. The best depiction of that family I know is the tapestries of the cathedral in Los Angeles. They also represent one of the many paradoxes of the Church: the tapestries probably wouldn't exist without the institution, but if you really observe them, they are indicators of something going on that is far greater than an organization with its rulebooks. The corporate impulse will always be with us; we just shouldn't take it so seriously.

Solemnity of All Saints

Revelation 7: 2-4, 9-14; 1 John 3: 1-3; Matthew 5: 1-12a

The Communion of Saints is one of our hidden treasures. As a concept it reminds us that we are a family first and last. As a reality is tells us that we are children of God, not metaphorically or symbolically, but really and truly. This is powerful stuff: we are God's family. There are a lot of ways we could take this, and in our history we have taken it down some very dark roads. We did that because we weren't truly listening to what Jesus was telling us in the Beatitudes. He was not telling us how to be, but how we already are. He was our Brother telling his siblings the beauty he sees in every one of us. We are God's children! We are blessed! But these blessings are not ours alone: "Love your neighbor as yourself." We have been given these blessings to share. We are not an exclusive family, but one who welcomes everyone into its midst. That kind of family is truly a communion of saints.