Walking with the Saints

Aaron Tindall-Schlicht, Elder

As you heard at the beginning of worship this morning, this Lent the Worship Committee has decided to embrace a theme of “Walking with the Saints.” I will admit that, as one of our few cradle Presbyterians, I don’t know a lot about sainthood. In my mind, they are the pretty statues in the big Ukrainian cathedral in the Strip District in Pittsburgh—you know, the church that makes the really good pierogi. I always sort of assumed that saints were one of those cultural things that Christianity collected as it moved across the globe, like Christmas trees, holly, and the Easter bunny. (None of those are in the Bible!)

Our first hymn this morning was about rest. And so was out Call to Worship. But, honestly, for me, it hasn’t been a terribly restful week. It’s been a hard week. I was solo parenting, which is stressful, if joyful, work. But it’s the news that has been dragging me down. It’s hard to filter out. And I don’t know that I want to filter it out. Turning a blind eye to the disembowelment of the American experiment seems like hiding one’s head in the sand—and that doesn’t feel good either. I can’t do anything to stop it—the forces moving seem insurmountable and I’m just, well, me. The whole situation just makes me incredibly sad and angry.

So, I was excited to do a deep dive this week, and find out what the deal is with these Saints! Maybe it would take my mind off the fact that the world seems to be actively catching fire around us. Maybe it would bring me some inspiration.

I started with us, the Protestants. As one article succinctly put it: “Protestant denominations generally reject the idea of saints as mediators between God and humans. This is because the Bible does not teach that certain individuals have the power to intercede for others before God. … [Protestant denominations are] rooted in the teachings of the Reformation, which sought to recover a more direct, personal connection to God and to reject the idea of a hierarchical religious system dominated by a wealthy and powerful clergy.”

That lines up with what I knew. So I decided to slide over to the Catholics, and see what they have to say about sainthood.

Catholic scientist, teacher, historian, and blogger, Joseph T. Richardson says on his blog, The Lonely Pilgrim, “It occurred to me… that many Protestants might be troubled by the concept of saints and sainthood. I have heard Protestants say, ‘We don’t believe in saints.’ I assure you that you do. Do you believe that there are people in Heaven? Then you believe in saints.

A saint, very simply—in the sense that the Roman Catholic Church (and the Eastern Orthodox Church) declares one a saint, and grants ‘Saint’ as a title—is someone whom we believe, with certainty, is in Heaven with God. That’s all.”

Huh. Interesting. There has to be more to it than that! Otherwise my pierogi-loving Catholic grandmother would absolutely have one of those statues dedicated to her!

So how does one become a capital-S saint, according to the Catholic church? I found that the process reads a little more like a legal document than what I am used to from theology. Here my paraphrasing of what www.catholic.org has to say about it: God calls all people to be saints—that is, worthy of veneration and imitation. There are two pathways to get there: living a life of exceptional holiness and virtue, or dying for the faith—and all are subject to a process of canonization: a formal investigation by the Catholic Church. If you are martyred, you get right in. If you are just really holy, there’s more to it, and after your death several miracles must be attributed to you before you attain sainthood.

It sounds like an exhaustive process.

I want to state that I am not trying to make light of the beliefs of Catholics and others who embrace the belief in saints. It’s honestly a lovely idea, that we have these universal holy elders who we can look to for guidance and help—who we are absolutely certain are with God in heaven. I am not an authority on all this, after all. I’ve stated many times from this very pulpit that the central tenet of my personal faith is that we, as humans, don’t understand everything God is or God does. We can’t. But as a Presbyterian, I was raised with the belief that all Christians are saints and that the power to connect with God is available to all believers through their faith in Jesus Christ.

Before I started my research, the one thing I really knew about saints was that they are often considered patrons of certain things. And that turned out to be true!

Blogger Joseph T. Richardson continues: “[J]ust as the saints had particular interests and causes and affinities when they were here on earth, they do in Heaven too. A saint is held to be the patron … of the profession, activity, nation, cause, or place with which they were associated in earthly life. … Saints don’t have magical powers. Saints don’t, in themselves, produce effects on this earth. But by where they are and whom they’re with, they have immense spiritual power to intercede on our behalf.”

I remember my Catholic grandmother casually mentioning praying to St. Anthony to find something lost. My mom informed me that St. Anthony was the patron saint of lost things, and like many children, I shrugged, accepted it, and moved on with my day.

According to Wikipedia, it is said that the traditional practice of praying for St. Anthony’s help in finding lost things is traced to an incident during his lifetime that occurred in Bologna. According to the story, Anthony had a book of psalms that was important to him, as it contained his notes and comments for use in teaching his students. A novice who had chosen to leave the faith had taken the psalter with him. Now, this was prior to the invention of the printing press, so any book was hand-copied, and thus really valuable. And St. Anthony was a Franciscan friar, who take a vow of poverty, so he would have found it really hard to replace. When St. Anthony realized his psalter was missing, he prayed it would be found or returned, after which the thief was moved to not only return the book to Anthony, but also return to the order, and the faith.

It’s a strangely ordinary story. And yet, after the process of canonization, we get the result that the official St. Anthony website states, that St. Anthony is famous throughout the world as the saint who helps to find lost objects: everyday items, important documents, even the faith itself.

Well, as I mentioned earlier, I’ve been feeling rather like a lost thing recently.

Or maybe it’s more of a feeling of displacement, like… I’m going about my day, walking my dog, feeding my kid, sending emails, cleaning, working, reading. And then suddenly I remember that people in this country are being actively disappeared. Legal residents are being put on planes and sent to countries that they have never been to. With no recourse, no judge, and no way to get home. It is a profound sense of disturbance. How can I stand here slicing onions and listening to a podcast in my kitchen when someone’s life as they know it is ending?

And my life is untouched.

As Jesus says in our passage from Luke, “Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans?” Or, rephrased, “Do you think these who are being persecuted are worse sinners, worse people, than all others?”

There’s an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer in which Buffy’s friends confront her about her leadership. She pulls rank, saying that because she is the Chosen One, her way goes. And her friend Anya says this: “You really do think you’re better than we are. But we don’t know. …I mean, you came into the world with certain advantages, sure. …But you didn’t earn it. …You’ve never had anybody come up to you and say you deserve these things more than anyone else. They were just handed to you. So that doesn’t make you better than us. It makes you luckier than us.”

I worry that that’s me. That I consider myself to be somehow different, set apart. By nationality, by language, by skin color. I am full of the inertia of inaction. And that, to me, is unacceptable.

I’m sure I’m not alone in feeling that way. This is a roomful of compassionate, empathetic people. Saints, one might say. (You know, if one were Protestant.) Saints, existing as best they can in a harsh and cruel world.

So how do we square that circle? How can I throw up my hands in helplessness—whether learned or real—and yet still expect the love of God? And yet still expect sainthood?

But I think back to that fig tree. You know, the one we’ve heard about for two weeks in a row now. The fig tree is barren, dormant, inactive. Helpless. Lost. But the servant asks for mercy, for one more year for the fig tree to bear fruit. And in that year, the soil will be prepared around it.

Well, we have the opportunity to prepare the soil around us, around each other, around this community, so that we can bear fruit, now and in the future. We are not condemned for our past actions, or inactions. We have at least one more growing season of mercy.

So what can we do? As the Psalmist suggests, we can seek God while God may be found, where God may be found. In those around us who are doing good work, and in those around us who need help, support, a kind word, a hand to hold. Here in this room, and out there in the world around us.

We can be a witness to the people, as David was. We may not be the leader that he was, able to alter the world’s course, but we can witness—and an essential part of witnessing is speaking what we witness, fearlessly and loudly.

We can stop trying to feed ourselves with things that are not bread. We can stop pointless labor that does not satisfy, so we can dedicate ourselves to that which truly matters: being God’s hands in the world.

I don’t have an easy answer here. Like I said, I’m struggling. We are making an effort to be apolitical when we lead worship, as we want to be sure Calvary is a place that is welcoming to all. And yet, I cannot be silent. Silence feels like collaboration. I’m lost—one of St. Anthony’s lost things.

Remember those WWJD bracelets from the 90s?

Well, what would Jesus do?

Directly before his arrest, in John 17:20-23, Jesus says, “My prayer is not for [my followers] alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”

May we be one. May we—all of us—be brought to complete unity, recognizing the humanity and spark of God in all others. Those who we love, venerate, and respect—and even those who we disagree with. Who might be inconvenient to us. Who we might not understand. May we all be one.

So when people spew hate, we can respond with assertions of one-ness, through God. After all, as Presbyterians, we are the priesthood of all believers, and we hold that all believers have direct access to God through faith in Jesus Christ, without the need for intercession by saints.

Still, I think in this case, I’d like to make an exception. St. Anthony, please help us to find our humanity.

Amen.