1 Peter 1. 3 – 9
John 6. 37 – 40
All Souls
Fr Alex
In the last year or two my wife and I have really got into birdwatching. We’ve got the binoculars, the RSPB membership – even a fairly decent camera so we can get close-ups of the little song birds.
Apparently we’re not alone, and others are surprised to find themselves start twitching as they approach their middle-30s. In fact a friend sent me a link to an article all about it; unfortunately it seemed to think it was a bit of a tragic thing to do, a sign of one’s diminishing vitality, as the title was “Your slow and sad descent into birdwatching.”
But to me there’s nothing sad or tragic about it; as with I suppose discovering any new passion, it is life-changing, and in a way, life-giving. It’s changed the way we spend our free time; where we go on holiday; what our priorities are.
And it’s given me a new appreciation of the beauty and wonder and complexity of the created world around me; and also how small and insignificant my own place is within it.
Because although my new-found love of birds has been life-changing for me; of course for the birds, it’s just business as usual. They’ve been breeding and feeding and singing for centuries, millennia, before I ever thought to take notice of them; and they’ll be doing it long after I’m gone (unless, of course, we humans mess it all up for them).
And it occurred to me that this is an image of what our experience of life is like. We come into the world for only the briefest of spans, and although it seems like the world revolves around us; of course it was revolving long before we were born, and will do so long after we’re gone.
I got a sense of this most strongly on our holiday last week up the Northumberland coast. We were staying on the edge of Budle Bay, which at this time of year is a temporary home to huge numbers of migrating birds.
One morning as we were leaving the house we heard an unearthly noise, something like a thousand rusty squeaking bicycles getting closer and closer. Looking up, we saw hundreds and hundreds of barnacle geese flying over us, all honking happily on the wing as they leave the approaching winter behind.
For a brief moment they were with us; then they were gone. Where they came from, or where they were going, we didn’t know, we couldn’t tell; we just enjoyed them for the time they were present to us.
And in a sense, that’s an image of what we’re commemorating tonight in this feast of All Souls, as we remember our loved ones before God.
We’re giving thanks for what has been: that time, perhaps all too brief, when they were present to us. But we’re not marking something that is ended, something over and finished. This Mass tonight is not a sacrament of death.
This is a sacrament of life. And we are rejoicing in the new experience of life that we pray they have entered into with God. And although, like those geese flying over my head last week, fleeing the cold and dark of winter, we cannot see where they have gone; we are promised that there is a destination for them: a place of peace and safety, where fear and pain and suffering are no more.
And we have this hope, because Christ has gone there before us, to show us the way. As St Peter said in our first reading, by his mercy he has given us “a new birth into a living hope” through his resurrection from the dead. “An inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for [us].”
It is not something we can see, something we can describe; but as St Peter says, “although you have not seen [Jesus], you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy.”
This is the hope that we have for all those who have gone before us: although we do not see them, they are not gone, because they are still loved; and even though we do not see them now, we may still rejoice in the new experience of life that we pray they have begun.
But of course, it can be difficult to hold on to that hope, as the years go on; and perhaps memories begin to fade. And that is why Christ gave his Church this sacrament that we celebrate this night: this sacrament of life.
Because in this Mass we proclaim not just Christ’s death but his resurrection; not marking the end of his life, but rejoicing in the life that he lives with God: a life that is promised to us too, our inheritance as his brothers and sisters, children of God.
And for a moment, in the bread and the wine, Christ makes himself present to us again, and we catch a glimpse of that destination: the place of peace and safety and joy where he lives, with all those he has already gathered to himself: our loved ones included.
So although this is undoubtedly an emotional night for us all; a night of sadness, even perhaps of regret for things left unsaid or undone; may it also be a night of joy for you, as you celebrate the promise that life is not bounded by what we can see or describe; that God’s idea of life is eternal, and that there is a place for us within it, if we choose to receive our inheritance. Amen.