Homily for the Solemnity of All Saints

“How do you expect me to be a saint?” Merton asks. “By wanting to,” Lax answers. “All that is necessary to be a saint is to want to be one. All you have to do is desire it. We are meant to be holy, all of us. We’re all called to be saints.” (From "The Seven Story Mountain" by Thomas Merton)

I have Mass on November 1st at St. Kieran Catholic Church @ 7:00 pm

Image: "The Communion of Saints," Tapestry by John Nava, Los Angelos Cathedral.

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Transcript

Today, for the Solemnity of All Saints, I am reflecting on the second reading from the first letter of John. 
Beloved, see what love the Father has bestowed on us, that we may be called the children of God? Yet so we are. The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know Him. Beloved, we are God's children now. What we shall be has not yet been revealed. We do know that when it is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. Everyone who has this hope based on Him makes himself pure as He is pure. 
The word of the Lord. 
In a memorable scene in Thomas Merton's book, The Seven-Story Mountain, Merton and his close college buddy Robert Lacks were walking when Lacks asks, "What do you want to be anyway?" Merton hesitates and says, "I guess I want to be a good Catholic." What you should say, Lacks declares, is that you want to be a saint. How do you expect me to be a saint? Merton asks. By wanting to, Lacks answers. All that is necessary to be a saint is to want to be one. All you have to do is desire it. We are meant to be holy, all of us. We are all called to be saints. 
The French Catholic essayist Leon Bloy echoed this truth. The only real sadness, the only real failure, the only great tragedy in life is not to become a saint. 
Fr. Ron Rauheiser gets to the heart of why this understanding might seem foreign to us. The early church was strongly influenced by Greek thought, which is very different from the Hebrew worldview. For the Greeks, to be perfect is to have no deficiencies, no faults, no flaws. Perfection to the Greek mind means to measure up to some ideal standard. To be completely whole, true, good, and beautiful, to be perfect, then, is never to sin. 
The Hebrew ideal of perfection is quite different. In this mindset, to be perfect simply means to walk with God despite our flaws. Perfection here means being in the Divine Presence, in spite of the fact that we are not perfectly whole, good, true, and beautiful. 
In the words of the prophet Micah, "All that is required is to do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God." 
There's a wonderful example of this that played out in the third century in Carthage, North Africa. I only learned this history in September on the Feast of St. Cyprian, the bishop of Carthage. I suspect I should have learned this in graduate school if I'd been paying attention. Some Christians in Carthage had been baptized by priests who were considered heretics. Cyprian insisted that they must be re-baptized if they want to return to the Church, "because" (and this is a quote for which Cyprian is well known) "outside the Church there is no salvation." 
The bishop of Rome, Pope Stephen, disagreed. He basically said, "A baptism is a baptism. It can be conferred by heretics, even atheists." 
Another bishop in Africa, St. Augustine, would famously proclaim, "When Peter baptizes, it is Christ who baptizes. When Paul baptizes, it is Christ who baptizes. When Judas baptizes, still it is Christ who baptizes." 
The Church teaches an important truth. Christ is not limited by the Church he himself established. The Catechism of the Church makes the same point. Grace exists outside of the Church. So even though St. Cyprian was wrong about this, he was still right in other ways, and we celebrate his saintliness. 
The writer of 1 John reminds us, "God looks at us and always sees Christ, and God thus finds us always and entirely lovable." 
In his new encyclical, "Dilexit nos," he loved us, Pope Francis reflects on the image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, who first loved us. Because of Jesus, we've come to know and believe in the love that God has for us. Everything finds its unity in the heart, which can be the dwelling place of love. 
Pope Francis continues, "In a word, if love reigns in our heart, we become in a complete and luminous way the persons we are meant to be. For every human being is created above all else for love. In the deepest fiber of our being, we are made to love and to be love." 
The late Fr. Michael Himes pointed out that the first commandment of the Decalogue strictly forbids making images of God and worshipping them. A profound reason is given for the prohibition. It is redundant. Only God can make an image of God, and God has. Indeed in the very first chapter of Genesis we read that God has fashioned an image of God's self. Let us make the human being in our image and likeness. Therefore any other image is rendered unnecessary. 
Later in his book, New Seeds of Contemplation, Merton wrote, "For me to be a saint means to be myself." Therefore the problem of sanctity and salvation is in fact the problem of finding out who I am and of discovering my true self."
Who I am, who I was always meant to be, is no secret to the one who made me. I simply have to want it as well. If this is his wish, we can be assured, we can ask for it as well, and it will happen. There is nothing more required to become a saint than your own desire and to be who you were always meant to be. 
This is a great relief to me and gives to me the freedom to continue to unfold into my life as it is given me. 
This is what saints do.