By Bishop Jen Nagel
I write this blog in the in-between hours, the anxious times, between All Saints Day and the close of Election Day. Regardless of party or persuasion, our nation is holding its collective breath, waiting, watching, wondering, fearful, hopeful, exhausted.
I recognize that taking a deep breath while at-once holding one’s breath seems counter-intuitive. In a spirit of embodied resistance, I invite you to do just that: take a breath, a deep breath, and slowly let it out. And another. No matter what: You, and all the saints, indeed, all of creation, are beloved of God, wondrously made, fiercely loved, and gently held. No matter what: Morning shall come. No matter what: In Christ, life wins over death, love is stronger than hate, courage conquers fear.
“Take a breath, a deep breath, and slowly let it out. And another.”
Years ago, I fell in love with the words of Trappist monk and mystic Thomas Merton. As we live into these days his words seem all the more poignant. Merton writes, “In Louisville, at the corner of Fourth and Walnut, in the center of the shopping district, I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all these people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. . . . And if only everybody could realize this! But it cannot be explained. There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun.”
ALL SAINTS SUNDAY is one of my favorites. I prefer to think of it as a season (All Saints Season), so to have ample time to savor the witness of the saints, the stories of God at work in mere mortals, the truth of God’s forgiving power and gracious mercy. And don’t we need this witness now more than ever? At a time when the lines of division are so sharp, when it’s too easy to avoid even eye contact, I need Merton’s and the Spirit’s capacity to see those around me “shining like the sun.”
I suspect some of my love for All Saints has to do with that veil that separates the already and the not-yet, the holy and thin places in which we notice our vulnerability and how resilient and fragile this precious life can be.
Two weeks ago, I met with many of the chaplains who serve in or via our synod. All Saints Sunday (er, Season) was on my mind as they shared of their ministry. Chaplains tread regularly in those fragile thin places. In a sometimes unique way, they represent something much more than themselves with people who are at some of the most challenging moments of our lives.
“Chaplains tread regularly in those fragile thin places.”
These chaplains are pastors and deacons called to serve in hospitals, in care centers, for hospice agencies, in psychiatric hospitals, on campuses, at correctional facilities, for the military and law enforcement, and in education as CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) supervisors. What a blessing that they serve on our behalf!
They are deployed to meet the saints — all the saints — with the grace and love of God when and where the need is great, embodying compassion from the deep well of our Savior, traversing ethical conversations, navigating moral injury. I marvel at the many and varied stories they hold in their hearts this season and the names of saints they utter between bell tolls. Join me in praying regularly with and for these chaplains and the faithful, honest, tender ways they follow Jesus.
How will we move through these next days? Of course, we can hunker down. But in this All Saints Season at Fourth and Walnut, and all the intersections in the day, I’m drawing in the Spirit’s breath, and keeping an eye out for the saints — expected and unexpected — shining like the sun.