By Silvia Holgado (Consecrated Woman of Regnum Christi)
November 4th 2024 - Notre Dame of Jerusalem Center
November begins with the Feast of All Saints. But what is the purpose of remembering the saints, or honoring them on a special feast? These questions might arise today, just as they did for St. Bernard of Clairvaux more than nine centuries ago. He began one of his homilies by asking, “What is the point of our praise of the saints, our tribute of glory, and this solemnity of ours?”
In his heartfelt response, he offered a beautiful insight into the meaning of friendship with the saints: “The saints,” he said, “do not need our honors and gain nothing from our worship. For my part, I confess that when I think of the saints, I feel a burning desire within me.” This desire, he explained, is to follow their example. The saints are not distant figures but friends and companions on our journey. God invites us to holiness and plants it in our souls, leaving us free to respond.
How, then, should we respond? In a world that, as the Holy Father says, “seems to have lost its heart,” the saints stand as imperfect people who believed, hoped, and loved God deeply. St. Ignatius of Loyola reminds us that “accepting the friendship of the Lord is a matter of the heart,” while St. John Henry Newman says, “the Lord saves us by speaking to our hearts from his Sacred Heart.”
How beautiful it is to begin November by celebrating the friends of the Heart of Jesus, and to end it with the solemnity of Christ the King, when all creation is united under His reign, a reign marked by His love on the Cross.
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