Solemnity of All Saints
All Saints’ Day catches all the saints left aside by the calendar. It’s not the calendar’s fault that it only has 365 slots. It was God, Himself, who chose to raise up so many saints. Even if the calendar-makers tried to double-pack the saints, two per day, like they did last week for Saints Simon and Jude, there still wouldn’t be enough room. Even if they packed in three saints per day, or four per day, or five per day, they would never succeed. There are many saints whose fame has already been lost in the fog of history, and there are the countless other saints who never became famous to begin with. This is our day to remember them all, as best we can, and try to imitate them, and ask for their prayers for us.
Think of a holy person who is not a canonized saint. Maybe it was someone you knew personally, or heard about, or read about. Maybe it was a priest or a monk or a nun or a layperson. Whoever that person was, ask yourself what it was about that person that made him or her truly holy.
Christian holiness does have distinctive characteristics. It is not a mere matter of detaching oneself from this world and drawing near to the divine world. It is not achieved simply by filling one’s day with sacred rituals. Christian holiness is taught in today’s Gospel at Mass, so please go to Church if you have not done so already. There you will hear Christ teaching his disciples how to be truly holy. “Blessed are the poor in spirit,” He says, and so forth. It’s the beatitudes that are our guide to true holiness. May the saints be our intercessors as we strive to be truly holy ourselves.