Saints, Souls, and Remnants...

A tridium of sorts appears to us these very days and nights. Which is another way of saying that if one keeps with traditional christian calendars one is about to enter into an experiential learning event. The hope is that one day will be spent, with a bit of frivolity, contemplating fear of death, ghouls, ghosts, devils, demons, and other such things that go bump in the night. Then a day will be spent honoring and recognizing the paradigms of faith, the Saints. Finally we will take a moment to pray for, mourn, and remember those who we are no longer with us. Thus Halloween, All Saints Day, and All Souls Day come and go each year. What are we to make, however, of Saints, Souls, and those who may not fall into either category...

Saints are perhaps the easiest to name. They are those whose lives as Christians so stand apart that we can say that if any one shows forth the life of Christ then they do. In the Episcopal Church we primarily use the term Saint to refer to those major individuals in Christian history marked as "Saints" before we split from Rome in the 1500s. We do have our own list of saints, exemplars of faith, prophets and judges of their time. All of these we recognize throughout the year and on All Saints Day. A day in part set aside for all the Saints who we do not know and cannot name. It is thought that as Christians we join with them in our prayers and celebrations and that in some way they are still in community with us.

Souls are generally departed love ones that we name, remember, and mourn. All Souls Day is a yearly point of remembrance. A chance to reflect on our lives and our transitions since those we mourn have left us. It is a bittersweet day of remembering past joys but also our faith in the resurrection of all believers. Some churches have solemn services while other Christians simply say a few simple prayers. This is still a day, however, where we live in faith and hope of the resurrection.

Who then remains. When we have covered the Saints and Souls what are the Remnants. Are there those who, in the end, are neither Saint nor Soul and where are they in the midst of the Resurrection? I am not a universalist, and I do not think that the Christian message is well served by such theology. I think it is possible for humans to remove themselves from the Grace of God. I think naming that capacity is inherently important and is essential to understanding the human condition. It is the possible cost of the manifold gifts we have been given.

That being said I truly do not believe in damnation either, especially eternal damnation. If one has some how gotten oneself outside of the Grace of God then one has meandered outside of things eternal. Things eternal can only exist in the midst of God's Grace. It is simply not possible to be eternally damned, eternally outside of God's grace. What I do believe in is the refiners fire, or the bringing of ourselves out of disharmony and into harmony.

The question for me then is if there is something there to refine. Is there enough basic seeking of harmony with oneself, one's community, and God in the midst of someones life that there is the capacity for a person to come into full harmony with those things. One does not have to have consciously named these things in a Christian context but are such things part of the persons overall existence, even if not understood by the person. If such is there then such will be refined, caught up in Grace, and manifested for what in fact they are.

I am not sure exactly what it takes to not have those things, and to not have those things in such a way that they are, in the end, absent from the whole of one's existence. I think, however, that such is potentially possible and thus needs to be named. I think, therefor, that the work of the church is over and again to ensure such does not come to pass.