Nov 9, 2010
November is heaven’s month. It begins with back-to-back feasts to remind us that no matter how alone we may be or feel, we are in fact part of the biggest, happiest family imaginable: the communion of saints.
The saints proper are those already enjoying eternity with God, and from that blessed state bestowing blessings on us—their friends still on the journey.
The holy souls, whom we’ve been praying for all week and will continue to remember all month, are so close to heaven their joy is all but complete. A little boost from us and they’re in!
Towards the end of the month we close out the liturgical year by celebrating Christ the King. That beautiful feast is both a witness here and now that we reject all gods but the True one, and an anticipation of the joyful day when the Lord will gather us all to himself in the perfect happiness of heaven.
So November offers us an entire month to meditate on heaven, the help we have to get there, and who we will bring along with us.
Almost since the beginning of his pontificate, Pope Benedict XVI has been showing us the path to heaven by re-introducing us to the saints. In his weekly audiences, after completing his predecessor’s walk through the Psalms, the Pope has taught us about the Fathers of the Church, St. Paul and great theologians, and now he’s walking us through the great women saints.
This is no mere academic exercise. Benedict’s project as Pope is to help us rediscover the joy and beauty of Christianity so that we will in turn spread the Good News to others.
Have you ever known someone so joyful it makes you happy to be around her? Or so kind he makes you want to do good as well? That’s the power of holiness to attract.
Christianity spreads not so much by scolding what is immoral (though clear teaching on right and wrong is essential) as by inspiring people with goodness they see and experience. As Benedict noted in a recent audience on Hildegard of Bingen, “The style with which she exercised the ministry of authority… inspired a holy emulation in the practice of goodness, so much so that, as we see from testimonies of the time, the mother and the daughters competed in their reciprocal esteem and service.”
In a recent Q & A session with young people, the pope explained that prayer and holiness don’t separate us from real life, they anchor us to it. Beware a prayer which alienates you from life; that wouldn’t be true prayer, he tells them. True prayer will help you engage real life, because it will protect you from pride and presumption and help you to be truly free.
Did the saints then have it easy? Does prayer melt all problems away?
Not at all. Prayer is not magic. Rather, the Pope says: “Faith and prayer do not solve problems but… enable us to face them with fresh enlightenment and strength, in a way that is worthy of the human being.”
Which brings us back to the saints whose friendship we celebrate all month. In a phrase I love, the Pope shows that the life of grace is not boring, and does not turn us into cookie-cutter copies of each other.
“If we look at the history of the Church we see that it is peopled by a wealth of Saints and Blesseds who, precisely by starting from an intense and constant dialogue with God, illumined by faith, were able to find creative, ever new solutions to respond to practical human needs in all the centuries: health, education, work, etc. Their entrepreneurial character was motivated by the Holy Spirit and by a strong and generous love for their brethren….”
We are called to be “entrepreneurs of grace,” energetic in spreading God’s love to others so that Christ’s love conquers the hearts of everyone around us.