A homily for the Solemnity of All Saints, November 1, 2026
Revelation 7:2-4, 9-14, 1 John 3:1-3, Matthew 5:1-12a
Most of us are familiar with IKEA, and we’re probably more familiar with the blisters we get when we’re assembling the furniture than we are with IKEA’s Swedish meatballs.
What’s the secret to bolting a dresser together successfully? We follow the instructions.
Carefully.
Precisely.
We Read the Manual.
In this tech-filled 21st-century world of ours, when an app on our phones doesn’t work, we read the manual.
When a yellow triangle with an exclamation point flashes on our car dashboards, we read the manual.
When we want to be sure we’re living lives that will lead us to a heavenly reward, we read the manual.
Which we just did.
Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount, as recorded by Matthew the evangelist, and its companion version, the Sermon on the Plain, as recorded in Luke’s Gospel, are as close to manuals for a saintly life as we humans can understand.
We know the Two Great Commandments — Love God and love our neighbors as ourselves, for the love of God — but sometimes their elegant simplicity turns them into head-scratchers. We want to obey the commandments, but we’re not sure how.
In his divine wisdom, Jesus gives us a step-by-step manual, complete with 3D illustrations.
The Beatitudes.
The “Blessed are…”
The list that fills our hearts with joy and warmth.
Now, a quick note about the Beatitudes and many similar Scripture passages we take to heart:
Jesus preached to, and the Apostles recorded for, a spiritually immature first-century crowd that was highly transactional. If we do this, what do we get in return?
And the Beatitudes do use that structure: “… they will inherit the land.” Sweet deal.
At his Last Supper, Jesus promised his followers sainthood if they stay true to his Word, as the Gospel according to John tells us:
In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If there were not, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back again and take you to myself, so that where I am you also may be.
That’s about as clear as anything Jesus ever said. We have a home in Heaven if we follow The Way, The Truth, and The Life.
And so, we celebrate sainthood and the Communion of Saints this weekend, and pray on Monday for all our loved ones who have passed into eternal life.
We aim for our promised sainthood, with or without cathedrals named after us someday.
But in the two millennia since the Last Supper, our individual and collective faith has matured. We don’t embrace our Father Creator with our hands out the way we greeted Dad after a business trip: “What did you bring me and, oh yeah, welcome home I love you I missed you.”
We recognize the pure goodness of God’s peace, of Christ’s humility, of selfless acts of mercy and forgiveness and justice and kindness.
We welcome the Holy Spirit and wisdom and grace to follow the manual precisely.
We see the infinite value of saintliness in itself.
We welcome divine blessings without grubbing for them.
We live the right way and we do the right things because they are right.
We live the right way and we do the right things because many things in our world are wrong. Unfair. Unjust. Destructive. Deadly. And we can fix them. We must fix them.
We live the right way and we do the right things because this world that God created out of love needs more peacemakers and fewer braggarts.
Those among us who read and follow Christ’s manual, who live the Beatitudes — however difficult the task may be in this divided, angry world — we call them saints.
Saints read and live the manual.
When things could be better, we need to read — and live — the manual.
