Dear Friends,
While we were away last week, the tree in our front yard took the opportunity to let go and let all its leaves drop to the ground. A blanket of orange and red covered the sidewalk and garden. It was a magnificent sight. Deeper still, the smell of drying leaves brought old memories to the fore. The sweeping and crunching sound beneath our feet brought us back home. It was lovely. Autumn is my favourite season. The colours, the cooler evenings, the layer of frost in the morning. The changing light summons us to relish creation, to get ready for the inevitability of winter, to cozy up and to reflect.
Autumn whispers to us, each year, about the rhythms of life, our own mortality and fragility. And in this season, scripture also reminds us of the same and about something more permanent. The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God will stand forever. (Isaiah 40.8) The word of God stands forever. That line in Isaiah always makes me think of All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day. It is the time when we celebrate the people who allowed the Word to shape their lives, people like Mary Magdalene and Peter, Thomas and John, Paul and Dorcas, Martha and Theresa, and the list goes on. They were ordinary people with extraordinary faith who channeled their courage and compassion so as to live the Good News for the sake of the world. Some are pictured in stained glass. Our churches are named for some of them. Many are remembered in the calendar of saints in our prayer book. Some of us bear the name of a saint or two: Andrew John. They all have at least two things in common: none of them were perfect, and all of them were faithful to the Word that stands forever.
And there are ordinary people in our lives that have shaped us by their faith. No church will bear their name, no glass will hold their reflection, but they are holy people to us. They have shaped and formed the faith that is in us. Some of them may be clergy, others pew dwellers, others still a neighbour.
Dr. George Black was one such person of many for me. He was my liturgy teacher at Huron College. He was chair of the Common Praise hymn book task force. He was one who helped shaped the BAS. He used to say that going to Sunday liturgy was like visiting with old friends. In part, he was speaking about hanging with pewmates. Mostly, I think, he was talking about the hymns that move us. The lyrics that touch a chord within us. The stories of characters in scripture that reflect us. A turn of a phrase in the psalm that helps us. The touch of bread in the palm of our hands that recreates us. The sip of wine that stirs the soul. And in the end, to be encompassed by a great cloud of witnesses who inspire us to keep going in love.
The Church is built on the testimony of the Saints and the Souls. Yours and mine! The last verse of the hymn “For All the Saints Who’ve Shown Your Love,” with lyrics by John Bell and Graham Maule, expresses the sentiment well:
Bless all whose will or name or love
reflects the grace of heaven above.
Though unacclaimed by earthly powers,
your life through theirs has hallowed ours.
Yours in Christ,
The Right Reverend Andrew Asbil
Bishop of Toronto
