Feast of All Saints
November 1, 2009
Revelation 7:2-4, 9-14
1 John 3:1-3
Matthew 5:1-12
As you fly over Europe toward Africa or Asia, in a few hours you cross over oceans and countries that have been a crucible of human history. In minutes you trace the migration of humankind over thousands of years; in seconds you pass battlefields on which literally millions of men once struggled and survived.
You see no national boundaries, no vast gulf or high walls dividing people from people. Only nature and the works of human hands—homes, factories, and tilled fields.
Senator Robert Kennedy spoke this vision about the unity of the human family fourteen years before the Apollo spacecraft would head out to the moon and give us the picture of the blue-green with white swirls marble floating in a sea of black. That photograph has taken root in our consciousness and stretches us even closer to the vision of unity Kennedy was suggesting. Nearly everyone here has “goggled earth” and seen pictures of Africa, South America and Asia as if we were flying over it. Never again can we truly see ourselves as alone, isolated or separated from our fellow travelers on this spaceship we call planet Earth.
But that vision Senator Kennedy articulated is old. As old as the Book of Revelation we just heard. For in it and in the letter from John we hear described that same vision that in Jesus Christ all are one. Indeed that is the vision of this feast of All Saints. It is the vision of a human family limited neither by space, time, or even by death itself. We are a family that stretches beyond any boundary, any division, any wall. Truly, we are one in Jesus Christ.
Today’s feast is a day fitting for such a vision, a feast of All Saints. For if our vision is large enough, we can begin to see fewer of the differences and more of the unity of humankind. And yet, such a view is difficult for at every step we seem to be confronted with division and separateness, and it is easy to believe that is how things really are. It is all too easy to give in and believe less than more. But that is what we struggle to free ourselves from each time we come into this space to celebrate Eucharist.
Each time we come to this table we are reminded it is large enough to seat the world. Each time we break this bread and drink this cup, we are called to remember there is enough to feed the world. Each time we assemble, we are asked to expand our vision beyond the four walls, and let the world come flooding in. For the world is our family. We belong to it. They are part of us.
And only here can we see this. No plane flies far enough, no space shuttle flies high enough to see what we see at this altar. For even the Space Schuttle can only see one half at any given time, could only see one half of the human family.
It is only HERE that we come to know a father who makes all people into one family. Only HERE do we come to know a brother who makes each of us sister and brother to one another. Only HERE are we touched by the spirit who makes each of us into saints.
Rev. Everett Hemann