Becoming Saints

The WORD in other words by Fr. Jose Bagadiong, SVD –University of San Carlos, Cebu City

Solemnity of All Saints – November 1

Today, as we celebrate All Saints’ Day, we honor and revere the known and Church-declared saints, as well as, and most especially the unknown, undeclared saints, but saints nevertheless – known only to God Himself.  The feast of All Saints comes from the Christian belief in the unity of the living and the dead, of the communion of those in heaven and on earth.

Saints are there as examples, models for emulation and imitation. Saints may intercede for us sinners who are still on our way towards God’s defined and hoped-for destiny for his people – his Kingdom.

God wants everybody to become a saint.  But how does one become a saint?

The Beatitudes of the Gospel set the standard, the criteria, the benchmark. St. John, in today’s second reading, hints at the thought or idea that God, having bestowed his love on us, has called us to be his children. God chose everyone to be saints, to be his children, to be with him in his Kingdom.

Let our prayer then be: that all the saints intercede on us sinners that we measure up to the standard of the beatitudes and thus merit the grace to be called children of God – saints of God.