At one point or another, we all reach the moment where we say, “I just can’t do this alone!” What a blessed moment that is! It is a moment of truth and enlightenment. Truly, we cannot do life alone. That is the central message of the celebrations of All Saints and All Souls Days. In fact, that is the central message of Christianity. We cannot do life alone and neither does God want us to try. So deeply does God not want us to try to do life alone, that our Creator sent the Only Begotten One as Christ Jesus to proclaim by word and deed that we are not left alone to our own devices in this life or the next. We are always in the company of God’s Spirit. And, the Holy Spirit always whispers the presence of the entire Body of Christ in all that she does.
We are connected with all of created humanity in ways we can only begin to guess at. Time and space pale in the face of the great Body of Christ. All the noble heroes, all the unsung unknowns, and all those in between are connected to us by the love of God. And that connection is more than just a relatedness, it contains a dynamic energy, care, and concern. For Christians, the dead live on much more than simply in the memories of those left behind. We believe that those who have passed on to the next life are active, creative, caring, and even more dynamic than when they shared this planet with us. The great Cloud of Witnesses does much more than just watch – they witness to the love of God in which they live! Their witness is an active, working furnace of devotion to us, to God, and to all God’s creation.
We are called to be part of this dynamic force of care and devotion. We are invited to communicate with them, to seek their assistance, and to offer our care, prayers, and help to those who may still be in need of us. Until each of us comes to our own day of passage to the next world, we will not know exactly how the after-life operates. Neither should we waste much time trying to speculate about what it’s like in Heaven (or, even Purgatory!). But we can be sure of one thing; we are not alone. We are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses because God does not want us to be alone. God does not want us to try to do life alone. God does not want us to leave the dead alone. We are meant to be together, to live and breath the life of God’s Spirit through all of creation, praising the magnificence of all of which we are a part.
This Saturday, Nov. 5 at 5:00pm we will gather to celebrate liturgically all the members of the Body of Christ: those past, present, and yet to come. Would you please consider celebrating with us?
