Gaudeamus in Domino, we sang as we came into Mass today. Let us rejoice in the Lord! Today’s feast is a holyday of obligation, a solemnity taking precedence even over Sunday, and it’s a day of joy for the whole Church, and for all of us. Today, as our Introit sang, we’re invited to participate in the pure and heavenly joy of the Angels. Our praise of the Son of God is specially enhanced today as we consciously unite it with the praise sung ceaselessly by all the Saints in heaven. Today’s feast is a celebration of Christ’s victory; a feast of the Triumph of the Holy Spirit; a festival of the Lord’s harvest from his Church. And this harvest, now safely stored, is incapable of loss or corruption. It’s abundant, and enriching for us, and sheer gratuitous gift, and in it we are invited to take delight.
Today’s Gospel gave us once again the Beatitudes according to St. Matthew. These brief sayings of our Lord are all structured in two parts. The first part gives us a little portrait of Jesus himself, and of all the Saints who belong to him. The second part holds up the Promise, which we believe all the Saints in heaven have now inherited. We have complete confidence in this promise, because the one who made it is faithful and trustworthy. He himself has now entered into his inheritance, and taken full possession of his Kingdom. And so even now he is fulfilling his word, and heaping his rewards on those who are ready to receive them.
Poor in Spirit, meek, hungry for righteousness, merciful, pure in heart, peacemakers, patient in suffering… You might ask: do such people actually exist? Who are they? Where are they? We respond: they are those on whom, by the power of the Holy Spirit, the image of Jesus has truly been stamped, with transforming effect. And the Catholic Church triumphantly boasts that they have existed, in superabundant variety, never lacking, from the earliest days of the Church and all the way up to the present day, and then on to the end of the world. They are our pride, our glory, our inspiration, our example. All of us without exception are called to become Saints. And the witness of those who have answered that call to the full is a proof that true holiness is possible, and a most convincing sign of the truth of the Gospel, and also a mark of the perennial fecundity of the Church.
We tend to think of the Saints – really canonisable Saints - as few. Of course by definition really outstanding people are a minority, compared to the general population. But according to St. John in the Apocalypse, they are indeed many. In our reading today we heard John speak of 144,000. But that number is obviously symbolic, and not at all restrictive, as the Jehovah’s Witnesses imagine. Immediately afterwards, John goes on to speak of a vast multitude, impossible to number. These are people from every nation and language who have belonged to Jesus, followed Jesus, been conformed to Jesus, lived with Jesus, died with Jesus, and now reign in eternal beatitude with Jesus. Many among them were martyrs who laid down their life for love of Christ. Unfortunately the ranks of the martyrs continue to be swelled in our own day, in large numbers, in quite a few countries around the world. Others were holy virgins or monks or hermits who lived for God alone; others great teachers or preachers of the faith; others were outstanding for charitable works, or for heroic generosity in self-gift, or in patient suffering. Many many among them all worked miracles, became famous for their way of life, and attracted numerous disciples. But also surely even more numerous are those who lived all their life in humility and obscurity: unrecognised, unacknowledged, their deep goodness and holiness unknown maybe to all but God. These too we celebrate today.
Someone might object: is not the Catholic celebration of Saints a distraction from a more proper focus on Jesus alone? Certainly that’s what the 16th century Reformers commonly thought. Their doctrine is enshrined among the 39 Articles of Religion of the Anglican Church. We read in Article 22: “The Romish doctrine concerning … the invocation of Saints is a fond thing vainly invented, and grounded upon no warranty of scripture, but rather repugnant to the Word of God.”
We Catholics freely concede that no text of scripture explicitly commands us to venerate Saints. But far from being contrary to Scripture, the Saints are its living fulfilment, and the convincing proof of its veracity. Far from distracting us from Jesus, the Saints precisely proclaim him, point us towards him, help us come to him, encourage us to be united with him, and inspire us to love him, above and beyond all other things, as they did. Far from being a late or mediaeval aberration, devotion to the Saints became established in the Church from very early times, and has remained so, consistently, and universally. The Apostles’ Creed ends by affirming “the Communion of Saints”. So we hold that this doctrine is both ancient, and an essential part of our faith. When challenged, it has always been defended and further encouraged by Church authority. So this is an example of an authentic development of doctrine, whose freedom from error is certainly guaranteed by Christ’s promise to his Church.
In our own day the Second Vatican Council spoke of devotion to the Saints in light of its focus on the mystery of the Church. We know that the Church exists now in three states: on earth, in purgatory and in heaven. Even so, she remains one body, mystically one with Christ. She is also, in all three states, one communion, bonded together in one love. So the Council said of those now in heaven: “Being more intimately united to Christ, they fix the whole Church more firmly in holiness, they add to the nobility of the worship offered to God here on earth, and in many ways they help in a broader building up of the whole Church” (cf. LG 49).
The Chant we sing at communion today echoes the last 3 beatitudes. “Blessed are they… they shall see God… theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.” The life of holiness, and the reward for holiness, flows from union with Jesus. In Holy Communion that union is communicated, and made concrete, and nourished, and renewed. Here, in the Blessed Sacrament, Jesus is present. Here he offers himself without reserve to whoever will receive him. Happy, blessed are those who do so. Even more happy and blessed will they be when at last they enter the promised reward.