This is my parents’ feast day. Or at least one of them. The two feasts together, All Saints and All Souls are for them. My parents have each gone to God and I trust in the hope that there is a place prepared for them. All Souls reminds me that I have a responsibility to pray for them, to support them in the time of purification that we call Purgatory.
And All Saints reminds me that there are countless souls who have been called to the sainthood of the everyday disciple. Some of these, like my parents, are known to me; some of them are known to you. But all of them are known to God.
The Feast does not name them all, or in fact any of them, but they are not a nameless crowd of unknowns. Each was loved into existence by God, was called by name and was called to be a saint, just as surely as a St Francis, a St Therese or a St Carlo. And they give us the everyday example to follow, to understand that sainthood is not a reward for some kind of spiritual-elite, but the calling of all the children of God.
As I pray for my parents, I will also pray to them, asking their intercession for me and my family that we will all answer the call to be disciples, to be saints.