homily notes: Solemnity of All Saints

When I was growing up, I attended elementary school at All Saints School in downtown Steubenville. It was called All Saints because it was formed by the consolidation of several parish schools with various saints' names.

Our mascot at All Saints was the Knights. Because of that, some of the jackets that the cheerleaders wore and shirts for sports had on the back, in big letters, "A.S.K." Of course that would lead people to come up and say, "Ask what?"

That, I think is part of what a saint does as well. Saint point to something greater than themselves. They make us ask the question, "What am I doing here? What is my purpose? What is the meaning of my life?"

Our feast today provides the answer to that question. We celebrate the feast of All Saints - and we are all called to be saints. Although I think we tend to put saints on a different level than the rest of humanity, they are us. They are people who now live in face to face union with God.

Our first reading from the Book of Revelation shows us John's vision of the saints in heaven, gathered around the throne of God. That's our destiny as well. If that's all we achieve in life, then we've succeeded.

The saints are just people who loved God with everything they were in their unique circumstances of life - everyone from St. Francis or St. Therese to the anonymous saint whose name we won't know until heaven.

They made loving God the motivation behind their lives - behind every choice they made and every word they said. We can do the same thing!

We do it by living the spirit Jesus describes in the Beatitudes.

We can embrace a spirit of poverty - being willing to give up everything for God.
We can mourn the sin in the world and in our own lives.
We can show mercy, we can fight to keep our hearts clean, we can cultivate peace in our homes and jobs and schools.

All these things, every little decision we make, can draw us along the path to the happiness for which we were made. God created us to live forever with him.

Let's follow the example of the saints the Church has put forward as models of how to live a life in love with God and let's ask for their help to reach our goal. They are our brothers and sisters, our family who are already with the Lord.

With their help and guidance, we can be with them, and with God, forever.