All Saints

Be kind. Everyone you meet is fighting a great battle. –Plato

Today is All Saints Day on the traditional Christian calendar. I tend to like these minor holidays, appreciating how they celebrate some deep, human part of ourselves - but without all the commercial hoopla attached.

This one sets aside a time to honor “all saints, known and unknown.” In Catholic churches, the holy day kicks off a month-long remembrance of family, friends, and famous folk who have died, and their names are read off solemnly from the “Book of the Dead” at each mass. I have always found this practice hopeful. Naming the names, recognizing some you have known and loved among the long list that goes on and on throughout the month, embodies a sense of continuity between life and death. The “official saints” are in there too – the ones canonized because they did something extraordinary, like die for their beliefs or create something outstanding that witnessed to them. Also included in some lists (Robert Elsberg’s book All Saints is an inspiration) are those we may not have known personally and have not been “canonized” by the Catholic hierarchy but whom we generally acknowledge as saints for our time – a diverse group that includes people like Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Caesar Chavez, Dorothy Day, Stephen Biko…  The list as a whole reflects the “cloud of witnesses,” folks who  put their particular talents and experiences to work toward the betterment of the world and time they lived in, and who still inspire us.

Most of them had fairly ordinary lives up to a point; many had some pretty spectacular falls from grace as well. Scratch the surface, and I’m sure even the most revered and “holy” saints venerated by the church racked up their share of mistakes, failures, and “sins.” What we often remember them for is that they got up again - and for what they did with their broken lives afterwards, in service to others.

There was a 12-hour period earlier this week when I felt I got an overwhelming glimpse of how this all might work, why we need to remember, how important it is to see that hint of greatness and the reality of true courage in the ordinary lives of people – even at their most broken.  It was a “graced” moment for me, one of those times when it seems as though a veil is lifted and you see the goodness right in the midst of the messiness of the present moment.

On Thursday night, we hosted some young women from a local “maternity home,” a shelter which offers food and housing and emotional support for mothers and their young children while the moms go to school and get situated into life as a family. Many come from violent backgrounds, all from some level of poverty. One of the young mothers we spoke to –  a former runaway a recovering addict, a welfare mom  - talked about some of the specifics of her violent and abusive childhood (to make even this stereotypical phrase more clear: her mother, to support her drug habit, prostituted her from the time she was 8 – which made for a very confused, angry and rebellious adolescent a few years later). She expressed the strong desire she has to provide better for her child despite the obstacles. She described the hard work she is doing to get there.

Right after dinner, I had to dash off to the local prison to visit a recent guest at our house who had been picked up after a few days of disappearing from the house to go on a crack binge. A former New York gang member with a rap sheet many pages long, all of his arrests have been drug–related. And he is headed to prison for five to ten years. He tells me it’s not really him that does these things - that he's not that person, or doesn't want to be. And, cynical as I have become when listening to an addict trying to explain, I detect that he is telling the truth. He wants to be the man who planted bean seeds with little Riley, was teaching Johnny Spanish, who made a mean tomato and cucumber salad, who befriended international students and helped them learn English. He is that person at one level, and we have seen that reality shining; But it is being  buried under the heap of bad choices and addiction.  

The next morning, I woke up to a letter from an acquaintance, a yuppie in appearance and profession - powerful, politically-astute, dressed for success - who described some of the unconscionable acts of physical abuse he had undergone as a child by a member of the clergy, some recent personal losses, and the ongoing stress he feels sometimes affects his work in the community. “Welfare mom,” “crack addict,” “yuppie” – all labels that tell such a tiny part of the story but by which we base our decisions as to their character and their future.

The people I want to celebrate this day and this month, are those “unknown saints" for whom great courage is required to keep going on in the face of the odds against them.  From whatever walk of life, and at whatever stage of the journey they’re in – the falling down, the on-the-ground, the getting up again - they deserve our respect, and often our help. At the very least, they merit a true listening ear by which we can hear their stories and begin to understand.

To be re-membered, put back together again so as to honor the big picture of who it is we are underneath it all, and who we might be.  This is something we all long for, and something to celebrate.

Comments

[your rafiki]

Kelli, I love the "re-membered" insight.

Hmmmm... English majors always notice the most subliminal parts of our language... I like it.

And I like this. Thanks for witing. :-)

[www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1160314074]

We all, in one way or another , are the unknown saints of which you speak ! And to your ever expanding CW family, you & Johnny are saints for all you do ! Hope to see you two @ the SOA !

[Bern Crawford]

You remind me of how powerful community is; none of us are saints alone. Lord, don't let me label my siblings. Connect me!

[Tim Lozier]

Great All Saints homily, Kelli!!!

[Sheila B.]

Kelli,
Beautiful thoughts...beautiful words. Thank you for sharing them with us!

Sheila B.

[Laia]

Wow, I really loved this one.
Some of these things seem so much more real to me this year. I appreciate your insight.