Called To Be Saints

Today’s blog post is a reflection I wrote last year for a communion service on All Saints Day. I thought it was worth sharing again:

What does it mean to be called to holiness? Indeed, today’s Feast of All Saints reminds us that we are ALL called to be saints.

It can be daunting to think of pursuing sainthood. I think we often equate it with perfection, and then of course, we give up on sainthood because we know we’ll never be perfect.

But it was Saint Teresa of Calcutta who said, ‘We cannot do great things. We can only do small things with great love.” My mom has had a coffee cup with that quote on it ever since I was a kid, and it’s still the first one I reach for when I’m having coffee with her at her house in St. Louis.

My mom is the personification of that quote. She has done small things with great love her whole life long. She cooks our favorite meals when we come to visit. She sends a card for every milestone in the lives of the people she loves. She texts her four grandchildren every single Friday, always starting with “Happy Friday to my four loves”.

There is a passage from the book of Revelation that paints a vivid image of heaven. John describes the saints as the ones in white robes who “are the ones who have survived the time of great distress.”

DOES THAT RESONATE WITH ANYONE THESE DAYS?!? I wonder how those saints survived the time of great distress. Perhaps it was because they did small things with great love.

These last several months have been a golden opportunity to do just that. We have all been on edge, we are all mourning something, and we are all looking for the light at the end of the tunnel.

Perhaps BEING the light at the end of the tunnel for someone else is the secret to getting through a worldwide pandemic. I have found that to be repeatedly be true in my interactions with others these days.

At the beginning of the school year, my son went to the nurse for an ibuprofen for a headache, and was consequently sent home from school because a headache is a symptom of COVID. When I got the call from the nurse telling me to come pick him up, my impulse was to say, “Really?!? It’s a headache! This is crazy.”

Then I imagined what it must be like to have her job: calling parent after parent, probably getting chewed out by a good majority of them, and being hung up on. I decided not to add to the multitude of complainers and respond kindly instead, thanking her for doing a job that not many others would want.

She actually emailed me later that day to thank me for being so understanding. It was such a simple way to make someone’s day better.

A couple weeks later, my daughter had to go for a COVID test, and the staff at the site we went to couldn’t have been more pleasant and helpful in their full gowns, caps and face shields. I stopped by Walmart later that day to pick up some bakery cookies for them as a thank you.

When I dropped the cookies off, you would have thought I’d given them a million dollars! They were in tears as they thanked me over and over again. Again, such a small thing, but when it’s done with great love, the result is remarkable!

Both these situations could have gone in a much different direction. The truth is, it’s just EASIER to react, complain and be short tempered with others than it is to slow down, choose how to respond, be patient and find something to be grateful for.

My dear, wise mom shared another quote with me a few years back that I asked her to write down and have kept on the front of my fridge ever since. It says, “It is always possible to be thankful for what is given rather than to complain about what is not given. One or the other becomes a habit of life.”

Isn’t that the truth? Mom will often hold up the example of a sink full of dirty dishes and instead of thinking, “Seriously? Dishes again?!?” she chooses instead to think, “Wow! How lucky am I that I have a full belly and running water in my house to clean the plates the food was served on?”

Our attitude is EVERYTHING! Choosing gratitude and finding the good in every situation propels us on the path to holiness.

May that be an inspiration on your journey toward sainthood: a journey that we are ALL called to.