Saint Andrew’s Episcopal Church

Rev. Daniel E. Somers, Dcn+

Saint Andrew's Church

Sermon

November 4, 2018

That Great Cloud of Witnesses

            All good theology is poetic.  Here is a magnificent exemplar:

                     No man is an island, entire of itself,

                     every man is a piece of the continent,

a part of the main.

If a clod be washed away by the sea,

Europe is the less…

any man's death diminishes me,

because I am involved in mankind,

and therefore never send to know

for whom the bell tolls,

it tolls for thee.

            This famous passage by John Donne, a seventeenth century English poet and Anglican priest,  I have reflected on this All Saints'-All Souls' Day.  In 1623, during a dangerous illness, Donne, then Dean of St. Paul's Cathedral in London and already famous for his poems and sermons and considered King Charles I's favorite preacher, wrote this piece as part of a collection of meditations.  These were published in his book entitled Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions.  They were his reflections on his physical and spiritual condition at the time.

            The allusion to the tolling of the bell referred to the tradition of ringing the church bell when someone dies or is near death,  The striking theme that runs through this particular meditation, of which the above poem is just an excerpt, is that we are all connected with each other.  This connection is especially true by virtue of our baptism.  As a result, we are connected to both the living and those who have died. 

            Although we have no baptism today, this All Saints'-All Souls' Day is one of the four occasions during the church year when baptisms according to the Book of Common Prayer are particularly apposite: the first Sunday after the Epiphany, at the Easter Vigil, on the day of Pentecost, and on All Saints' Day or the first Sunday thereafter.

            You may be asking yourselves, “Connected with the dead?  What does that mean?  How can that be?”  That's the entire point of All Saints' Day.  On All Saints' Day, we remember the “named” saints who have gone before us.  By “named” we mean St. Paul, St. Peter, St. Teresa of Avila, St. Bernard and St. Francis, for example, and of course our patron saint, St. Andrew.

            The day after All Saints' Day is All Souls' Day, now known as the Day of the Faithful Departed.  This is the occasion when we remember and honor the lesser-known saints: Mom, Dad, Uncle Ernie, Berlin Granny, Maggie, Father Townley, just to name a few.  They are known to us as those who have passed on to the next life.  On the Sunday after All Saints' Day, which occurred this year this past Thursday, the two days are combined and the occasion is formally observed.

            Why are these saints remembered?  First, as John Donne believed, they are a part of each of us through our baptisms.  Also, we are inextricably with anyone and everyone who was or has been a part of our lives.  And finally, we remember them because they are still with us.  We cannot do what Jesus did with Lazarus in today's gospel, however, but we can by calling them bring them back into our lives.

            In fact, truth be told, I communicate with some of my saints fairly regularly.  No doubt you do, too.  Whether it is my mother assuring me that all is well in the life eternal, or my father encouraging me to continue on the path to ordination, or my grandfather from the bowels of a Nazi prison urging his children and his children's children to persevere in doing the work of God, or my wife's grandfather recounting the horrors of the First World War.  They do this through their voices, their photographs, and the letters that they leave behind.  Others do it through their books.  Jesus does it through his Gospels.

            Actually, the saints, the people who love God and who love us too, are all around us right this very moment, that great cloud of witnesses.  As a result, the reign of God is around and about you, too.  They are in addition to the saints who have died and remain with us.  

            We will shortly call upon those who have departed us while tolling our bell by name to come, rejoice with us and enjoy their victory lap with us.  We want to remind ourselves what the whole family of God looks like and to think about those children yearning to be born who will too become part of that family.

            Past, present and future – what was, what is and what is to come.  We all share our communion meal at one enormous table that stretches through time and space from this altar to every other table around which God's family is gathered today.  From there it stretches to all those who will gather at this and other tables in days to come.  It stretches too to all those who have gathered to share this holy meal in the past, all the way back to the night when Jesus himself instituted this sacrament at a table where he ate and drank with his friends at his last supper.  All of these tables are really one table and all who gather there are one family.

            This is a pretty grandiose claim.  Look, however, no further than at page 862 of your Book of Common Prayer in the catechism, the Outline of the Faith.  Question: “What is the communion of the saints?”  The phrase appears throughout the book.  Answer: “The communion of the saints is the whole family of God, the living and the dead, those whom we love and those whom we hurt, bound together in Christ by sacrament, prayer and praise.”

            We are the communion of saints and those who have been among us whom we “love but see no longer” are the communion of saints as well.  Think about those people in your life and give thanks for what they did as saints of God to make a difference in your life.  They could have been a teacher, a policeman, a doctor or a sibling, as well as your parents and grandparents.

            In the preface to the Great Thanksgiving for All Saints' Day at page 362 is the following invocation:

For in the multitude of your saints, you have surrounded us with a great cloud of witnesses, that we might rejoice in their fellowship, and run with endurance the race that is before us, and together with them, receive the crown of glory that never fades away.  Therefore with Angels and Archangels, and with all the company of heaven, who forever   sing this hymn to the glory of your name … .

            As was said in today's reading from the Wisdom of Solomon, “the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch them.”  This is echoed in the reading from the Book of Revelation today:  “There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain for the old order of things has passed away.”  The saint who wrote those words two thousand years ago communicates with us today, as do the authors of Wisdom and the psalm appointed for today, as does Jesus himself in his Gospel according to John.  This communion is ongoing and eternal.

            Again quoting John Donne, “The Church is Catholic universal, so are all her actions; all that she does belongs to all.  When she baptizes a child, that action concerns me, for that child is connected to that body which is my head also, and is grafted into that body whereof I am a member.  No man is an island … and therefore  never send to know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee.”

            So, as you listen to this church's bell toll shortly, remember that it is not just a lament for those in our lives who have passed nor for each of us to mourn what we have lost in their passing.  They created us, shaped us, and molded us, for which we give thanks.  We may be diminished somewhat by the loss, but will be made whole again when we are called to join them in that great communion of saints, that cloud of witnesses, past, present and future.

 In the name of God the Creator, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit.  Amen