\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
What does it mean to be a saint?\u00c2\u00a0 I think we get some strong clues in today’s readings.<\/p>\n
Saints are people who are humble in spirit; who suffer quietly through life’s trials; and who are meek and not arrogant.\u00c2\u00a0 Saints thirst and hunger for the right thing to do, rather than the expedient thing to do.\u00c2\u00a0 They are merciful, forgiving those who do them wrong.\u00c2\u00a0 They have pure and clean hearts, and stay within God’s moral law; they don’t cheat when nobody is looking.\u00c2\u00a0 They are peacemakers, and avoid confrontations to get even; they rejoice at the success of others, even when they, themselves, fail.\u00c2\u00a0 And yet, saints endure persecution when they are defending their faith- they hang in there in faith even when they are insulted and berated for what they do.\u00c2\u00a0 These are things that characterize the saints.\u00c2\u00a0 They live a life that is patterned after Jesus.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Lot’s of times, we think the saints are just canonized saints-\u00c2\u00a0 the apostles, the martyrs, and great defenders of the faith from the past, people like Saints Peter and Paul and Augustine and Agatha and Catherine of Siena and Joan of Arc.\u00c2\u00a0 And indeed, the Church has recognized these people as saints.\u00c2\u00a0 But there is something we should all know about these saints.\u00c2\u00a0 They were not perfect.\u00c2\u00a0 Each of the classic saints I mentioned above had sinned.\u00c2\u00a0 Peter denied Christ three times; Paul persecuted the Christians before his conversion; and Augustine led a pleasure seeking life before his conversion.\u00c2\u00a0 But, they went on to practice one or more of the beatitudes with zeal.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now, there are many people who lived amongst us recently who were not perfect but who practiced one or more of the Beatitudes we mentioned above.\u00c2\u00a0 They lived them out of faith, and they lived them with a passion.\u00c2\u00a0 Some easily recognized modern day saints include war heroes who sacrificed their lives to save others; and people dedicated to relieving the suffering of the poor and lepers, and people who dedicated their lives to caring for unwed mothers who were considering abortion.\u00c2\u00a0 There are names we can think of that fit each of these three categories.\u00c2\u00a0 Yes, they may have been sinners as well.\u00c2\u00a0 But God’s mercy triumphs over justice.\u00c2\u00a0 And these people were surely saints for what they have done.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Likewise, there are many living amongst us today who are destined to become saints.\u00c2\u00a0 They are people in our own families who have given up their own dreams of personal achievement\u00c2\u00a0 In order to follow some task they have been called to do.\u00c2\u00a0 Like raising children; caring for aging parents; providing for their families; teaching others; using God’s resources to make life better for us all, and defending our country against terror.\u00c2\u00a0 They, also, are not perfect- they are sinners as well.\u00c2\u00a0 The point is that saints live their faith as imperfect humans.\u00c2\u00a0 They work at it with zeal, and God’s mercy triumphs over justice.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Today, we recognize all these latter day saints as well as the canonized ones.\u00c2\u00a0 They are amongst the great multitude which no one could count.\u00c2\u00a0 They survived the time of great distress.\u00c2\u00a0 The Kingdom of Heaven is theirs.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now, that calls to mind this question.\u00c2\u00a0 What does it mean to be a saint?\u00c2\u00a0 Yes, what is it that waits for those who become saints?\u00c2\u00a0 John answers that question for us.\u00c2\u00a0 He says that we are God’s children now.\u00c2\u00a0 So we are first of all, God’s children.\u00c2\u00a0 Now think about when you were a child.\u00c2\u00a0 We needed to learn to do what we were told just because our parents said so.\u00c2\u00a0 So also, we need to do what God wants us to do.\u00c2\u00a0 We need to do it even if we don’t understand it, just because God told us to do so.\u00c2\u00a0 Why? \u00c2\u00a0Because God loves us, just like our parents loved us.\u00c2\u00a0 How does God love us?\u00c2\u00a0 God’s love was displayed visibly by the gift of his Son Jesus.\u00c2\u00a0 His son suffered and died for us.\u00c2\u00a0 But then, he was resurrected.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
We have been told that it will be the same for us.\u00c2\u00a0 We will suffer and die, and most importantly, we will be resurrected, thanks to the gift of Jesus becoming human, a gift we will soon celebrate as we enter the Advent and Christmas season.\u00c2\u00a0 John goes on to say that even though we be resurrected, we don’t know what that will be like.\u00c2\u00a0 But he says that we will be like him, like Jesus.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Wow!\u00c2\u00a0 Think of that.\u00c2\u00a0 We will be like Jesus, and we will know the Father just like He does.\u00c2\u00a0 And knowing in this sense, is experiencing God.\u00c2\u00a0 So we will experience the love and the glory and the joy that is from God.\u00c2\u00a0 We will be part of the Kingdom of God.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
So rejoice everybody.\u00c2\u00a0 Rejoice that you are destined to become a saint, \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Imperfect though you may be.\u00c2\u00a0 And rejoice over the everlasting joy that will be yours.\u00c2\u00a0 Because this is your feast day, the feast of All Saints.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00c2\u00a0 All Saints Day Rev 7: 2-4, 9-14; 1 John 3: 1-3; Mt 5: 1-12a Dc. Larry Brockman What does it mean to be a saint?\u00c2\u00a0 I think we get some strong clues in today’s readings. Saints are people who are humble in spirit; who suffer quietly through life’s trials; and who are meek and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=87"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=87"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=87"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=87"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}