"I will give thanks unto thee, O Lord, with my whole heart; even before the gods will I sing praise unto thee." (Ps. 138:1)
Today, aside from being the 23rd Sunday after Trinity, is also the Octave Day of All Saints. You will notice that the Book of Common Prayer directs that the Collect and Preface of All Saints are "to be used daily throughout the Octave." Certain Feast Days throughout the Christian year are considered so important that their celebration was extended over a period of eight days. There is indeed Biblical precedent for such a practice. From the 1913 edition of the Catholic Encyclopedia: "The eighth day was the day of circumcision. The feast of the Tabernacles, which as we have said lasted seven days, was followed on the eighth by a solemnity which may be considered as an octave; the eighth day was the day of certain sacrifices. It was on the eighth day, too, that the feast of the dedication of the Temple under Soloman, and of its purifications under Ezechias, concluded."
Today is also, for the western rite Orthodox, the Feast of the Patriarchs and Prophets of the Old Law. The Collect given for this day is as follows: "O God, who didst show forth the divine wisdom in ancient times through thy Patriarchs and Prophets; grant that we may imitate their example on earth and enjoy their intercession in heaven." Now, whether you believe that the saints in heaven are able to intercede for those of us here on earth or not, this prayer makes clear something very important, that the Old Testament and its portrayal of God, far from being rendered useless and of lesser divine status by the Incarnation and the Resurrection of Christ (a heresy known as Marcionism), is in fact the fertile ground out of which these earth and sin-shattering events occured. Those that participated in the preparatory events of the Old Covenant are indeed worthily honoured by us as they laid the foundation of right belief and relationship to God in their considered obedience to His commands. So it seems clear that the life and witness of the saints is something pretty significant within the life of the Church.
Which then begs the question, just who are "the saints"? Romans 1:7 and I Corinthians 1:2 give us an answer. Hopefully it won't be surprising to you. "To all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ." and "Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord."
Rather than just being limited to a list of those formally enrolled ( or "canonised") by the Church, all faithful Christian believers everywhere are, and are called to be, saints. To this great dignity, we can only respond with the Apostle John: "See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are." (1 John 3:1a)
The first verse of Psalm 138, which I quoted above, gives us a good idea of what the parameters of our sainthood ought to be. There are two things specified in this verse: the giving of genuine thanks in all circumstances and the witness of our resistance to the various 'gods' of this world.
Firstly, the psalmist says that he (and we in turn) will give thanks with the whole heart. It can be easy for this to sound awfully off-putting, for there are days when we simply cannot conjure up feelings of thankfulness, no matter how much effort is expended in the process. And yet, I don't think this is really the kind of thankfulness that is being presented here. Anything that requires that much mental effort to dig up out of the psyche and try to sustain in being seems to loose at least something of its authenticity.
Rather, I believe that the thankfulness we pray for here has a more universal, wholistic or catholic, quality to it. It is the kind of thankfulness that comes from persistence through things that we suffer (be they physical, emotional, or what have you). It is the kind of thankfulness that appears on the other side of our victories over bad habits and besetting sins. And, it is the kind of thankfulness which can even manifest as gratitude that we sinners are sometimes allowed to persist in our sinfulness for a time. There are indeed personal insights into our spiritual and psychological health that sinful habits and the process by which they are overcome can provide – which helps to make sense of St. Paul's writing in Romans 5, where he says: "But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound: That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord."
Not just a disjointed, once-in-a-while phenomenon, thankfulness from the heart is an on-going, perpetual project for us who are among those "called to be saints".
Secondly, the psalmist mentions the praise he gives "before the gods." Osiris, Zeus, Saturn, Apollo and Diana may have been dethroned along with the other occupants of the ancient pagan pantheon, but we have certainly established plenty of replacements for them ever since. Just about anything that consumes our desires and demands our total attention is indeed a god of the modern age: the desire for great wealth and influence, addictions of all sorts (whose devotees over time pay the price of having even their free-will taken away from them), violence and war-mongering (whether in the name of politics, religion, or other causes).
And so are we called by the psalmist to give thanks and praise before all these things that will vie for our affection. Indeed, they are all forms of violence inasmuch as they seek to forcibly remove the great gifts of faith, hope and charity that the one God, living and true, has placed in our hearts.
The place in which these gods are rejected and where these things will suffer defeat is very near and dear to us. In the words of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, the 20th century Russian historian and philosopher: "The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between political parties either – but right through every human heart."
Everything within us that is still on the opposite side of the line, and our desire and prayer to bring it over to where it belongs and is intended to be, is the process of conversion, that great work of a Christian lifetime. It requires courage and fortitude, and yet these things will not be lacking in one who sincerely asks for them, who "even before the gods" sings praise and gives thanks.
The Gospel appointed today makes clear the need for living an unencumbered life. In a homily commenting on this selection, St. Hilary of Poitiers has the following to say: [Jesus] said to [the Pharisees], They were to render unto Caesar the things which were Caesar's; and unto God the things that were God's. What a wonderful answer and perfect fulfilment of the divine commandment! He adjusts the balance between contempt of the world and the affront of offending Caesar; he frees souls devoted to God from all worldly cares and burdens, in decreeing that the things which are Caesar's are to be given to Caesar. For if nothing of his remains with us, then we are no longer in the position of having to render unto him the things which are his."
Thus it is that the saints are able to be free and unencumbered both in this life by our praise, thanksgiving and perfected liberty in the use of this world's goods and social structures and in the next, as wonderfully described by Dante in his Divine Comedy:
Hence must we ever win to more of sight,
And by more sight more fervour still acquire,
And by more fervour radiance still more bright.
But, as the living coal which shoots forth fire
Outgoes it in candescence, and is found
Whole at the heart of it which shape entire,
The lustre which already swathes us round
Shall be outlustred by the flesh, which long
Day after day now moulders underground;
Nor shall that light have power to do us wrong.
Since for all joys that shall delight us then
The body's organs will be rendered strong.
-Paradiso, Canto XIV: 49-60
(Translation by Dorothy Sayers)
(Translation by Dorothy Sayers)
