All Saints Homily of Fr. Raymond

 

 

Sunday, 1 November 2015

Fr. Raymond Homily All Saints Solemnity 1st. November 2015

ALL SAINTS 2015  

  Today, of course we celebrate, not so much the great saints of the church as the little, every day saints of the church The ordinary every day Christians who have fought the good fight and finished the course; all those ordinary acquaintances of all of us who have gone before us and become part of that great multitude in God's heaven.

In order to join that great company they didn't have to do any great and memorable deeds. But what they did have to do is detailed for us in the list of the Beatitudes that Jesus spells out for us in today's Gospel.

The Saints we celebrated today didn't have to give up absolutely everything like the great St Francis, but they did have to be poor in spirit. Their hearts had to have some degree of freedom from excessive desires for what we call the good things of life.

The Saints we celebrated today didn't have to leave home and family and friends and go off to preach the gospel in foreign lands like the twelve apostles or the great missionaries of Christian history; like St Francis Xavier or St Columba., but they did have to have a great love for their faith and a desire to share it with others, at least in their prayers. That is surely the meaning of "Thy Kingdom come" in the Our Father.

The Saints we celebrated today didn't have to minister to lepers or the plague stricken like St Peter Damien, but they did have to be gentle and compassionate in their dealings with others.

The Saints we celebrated today didn't have to undergo the great interior trials and spiritual darkness of the great mystics but they did have to practice perseverance in prayer and bear all the many troubles and trials that are the way in which we all have our share in the passion of Christ.

The Saints we celebrated today didn't have to forgive great injuries and injustices like the Holy Martyr Stephen who prayed for those who were stoning him to death. But they did have to be merciful and forgiving in their own little ways.  

The Saints we celebrated today didn't have to mediate between kings and, potentates like our own St 8ernrd, but they did have to learn how to be peacemakers in their own little circle of family and friends. And to be a peacemaker in such circumstances can sometimes make heroic demands on the least of us.   

Homily by Fr. Raymond

  

All Saints The Church Triumphant 'the life of glory is richer far than the life of grace'

  
Monastic Lectionary of the Divine Office, 

Karl Adam - The Spirit of Catholicism. 

  https://www.ewtn.com/library/THEOLOGY/SPIRCATH.HTM  

     

The Church Triumphant (eccles a triumphans).—Hosts of the redeemed are continually passing into heaven, whether directly, or mediately by the road of purification in the Suffering Church. They pass into the presence of the Lamb and of Him who sits upon the throne, in order face to face—and no longer in mere similitude and image—to contemplate the Trinity, in whose bosom are all possibilities and all realities, the unborn God from out of whose eternal wellspring of life all beings drink existence and strength, motion and beauty, truth and love. There is none there who has not been brought home by God's mercy alone. All are redeemed, from the highest seraph to the new- born child just sealed by the grace of baptism as it left the world. Delivered from all selfish limitations and raised above all earthly anxieties, they live, within that sphere of love which their life on earth has traced out for them, the great life of God. It is true life, no idle stagnation, but a continual activity of sense and mind and will. It is true that they can merit no longer, nor bear fruit now for the Kingdom of Heaven. For the Kingdom of Heaven is established and grace has finished its work. But the life of glory is richer far than the life of grace. The infinite spaces of the Being of God, in all Its width and depth, provide a source in which the soul seeks and finds the satisfaction of its most intimate yearnings. New possibilities continually reveal themselves, new vistas of truth, new springs of joy. Being incorporated in the most sacred Humanity of Jesus, the soul is joined in most mysterious intimacy to the Godhead Itself. It hears the heartbeats of God and feels the deep life that pulsates within the Divinity. The soul is set and lives at the center of all being, whence the sources of all life flow, where the meaning of all existence shines forth in the Triune God, where all power and all beauty, all peace and all blessedness, are become pure actuality and purest present, are made an eternal now.

This life of the saints, in its superabundant and inexhaustible fruitfulness, is at the same time a life of the rich est variety and fullness. The one Spirit of Jesus, their Head and Mediator, is manifested in His saints in all the rich variety of their individual lives, and according to the various measure in which every single soul, with its own special gifts and its own special call, has received and employed the grace of God. The one conception of the saintly man, of the servant of Christ, is embodied in an infinite variety of forms. The Litany of the Saints takes us rapidly through this "celestial hierarchy." Beginning at the throne of the most holy Trinity and passing thence to Mary, the Mother of God, and then through the hosts of the angelic choirs to the solitary penance of the great Precursor, St. John the Baptist, it leads us to St. Joseph, the foster-father of the Lord, the man of quiet dutifulness and simplicity of soul. Next to them tower the figures of the Patriarchs and Prophets, primitive and sometimes strange figures, but men of strong faith, of sacred constancy, of ardent desire. Sharply contrasted with them are the witnesses of the fulfillment, the apostles and disciples of the Lord: Peter, Paul, Andrew, James and the rest. And while every name denotes a special gift, a special character, a special life, yet all are united in one only love and in one gospel of joy and gladness. And around and about these outstanding figures what a harvest and rich crop of infinite color and in infinitely divese fields! All holy martyrs—All holy bishops and confessors—All holy doctors—All holy priests and levites—All holy monks and hermits—All holy virgins and widows—All saints of God. It is that "great multitude which no man can number, of all nations, and tribes, and peoples, and tongues: standing before the throne and in sight of the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands" (Apoc.vii, 9).

All Saints by St. Bernard 'Let us make haste to our brethren who are awaiting us'

The Monsaric Office of  Second Readings offers agenerous selection of iptions.
In fact the Breviary already has the most favoured Redind is from Saint Bernard, as below.

iBreviary    

Friday, 1 November 2013

All Saints

Office of Readings

SECOND READING

From a sermon by Saint Bernard, abbot
(Sermo 2: Opera omnia, Edit Cisterc 5 [1968], 364-368)

Let us make haste to our brethren who are awaiting us

Why should our praise and glorification, or even the celebration of this feast day mean anything to the saints? What do they care about earthly honors when their heavenly Father honors them by fulfilling the faithful promise of the Son? What does our commendation mean to them?

The saints have no need of honor from us; neither does our devotion add the slightest thing to what is theirs

Clearly, if we venerate their memory, it serves us, not them

But I tell you, when I think of them, I feel myself inflamed by a tremendous yearning.

Calling the saints to mind inspires, or rather arouses in us, above all else, a longing to enjoy their company, so desirable in itself

We long to share in the citizenship of heaven, to dwell with the spirits of the blessed, to join the assembly of patriarchs, the ranks of the prophets, the council of apostles, the great host of martyrs, the noble company of confessors and the choir of virgins

In short, we long to be united in happiness with all the saints

But our dispositions change

The Church of all the first followers of Christ awaits us, but we do nothing about it

The saints want us to be with them, and we are indifferent

The souls of the just await us, and we ignore them

Come, brothers, let us at length spur ourselves on

We must rise again with Christ, we must seek the world which is above and set our mind on the things of heaven

Let us long for those who are longing for us, hasten to those who are waiting for us, and ask those who look for our coming to intercede for us

We should not only want to be with the saints, we should also hope to possess their happiness

While we desire to be in their company, we must also earnestly seek to share in their glory

Do not imagine that there is anything harmful in such an ambition as this; there is no danger in setting our hearts on such glory.

When we commemorate the saints we are inflamed with another yearning: that Christ our life may also appear to us as he appeared to them and that we may one day share in his glory

Until then we see him, not as he is, but as he became for our sake

He is our head, crowned, not with glory, but with the thorns of our sins

As members of that head, crowned with thorns, we should be ashamed to live in luxury; his purple robes are a mockery rather than an honor

When Christ comes again, his death shall no longer be proclaimed, and we shall know that we also have died, and that our life is hidden with him

The glorious head of the Church will appear and his glorified members will shine in splendor with him, when he forms this lowly body anew into such glory as belongs to himself, its head.

Therefore, we should aim at attaining this glory with a wholehearted and prudent desire

That we may rightly hope and strive for such blessedness, we must above all seek the prayers of the saints

Thus, what is beyond our own powers to obtain will be granted through their intercession.

RESPONSORY

Revelation 19:5, 6; Psalm 33:1

Solemnity of All Saints 

http://rcspiritualdirection.com/blog/2013/11/01/solemnity-all-saints?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+CatholicSpiritualDirection+(Catholic+Spiritual+Direction)

Today, November 1st, the Church celebrates the Solemnity of All Saints.  Who are these “Icons of Human Love,” as Father Thomas Dubay, S.M. called them in Saints: A Closer Look?  They are those “who have lived upon earth as we have, who have known our miseries, our difficulties, our struggles,” writes Father Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalene, O.C.D. in Divine Intimacy.  Some are easy to recognize, “for the Church has raised them to the honor of the Altar, but the great majority are entirely unknown to us.  They are humble people who lived obscurely in the accomplishment of duty, without display; without renown, whom no one here below remembers, but whom the heavenly Father looked upon, knew in secret, and, having proved their fidelity, called to His glory.”
St. Bernard, the Abbott, tells us that it doesn’t serve them at all for us to venerate them…but it serves us:  “Calling the saints to mind inspires, or rather arouses in us, above all else, a longing to enjoy their company…[and a desire] that Christ our life may also appear to us as he appeared to them and that we may one day share in his glory” (from Sermo 2, Opera omnia, Edit. Cisterc. 5 [1968] 364-368; Second Reading, Liturgy of the Hours).
So, today, let us honor all the Saints and ask for their prayers and intercession.  We look to them as examples of conversion, self-giving, sacrifice and piety, as examples of how to love as Christ loved…through the narrow gate of the Cross, so as to be happy with Him forever in heaven, sharing in that eternal joy of praising and of glorifying God.
Art:  Icon of All Saints, Siemeon Khromoy, ca 1616; PD-US; copyright expired; Wikimedia Commons.

Read more: http://rcspiritualdirection.com/blog/2013/11/01/solemnity-all-saints#ixzz2jOtOm5vW