The recent observance of All Saints’ Day and the Commemoration of All Faithful Departed, and (in my experience) the frequent conflation of the two, often with a Requiem sung as part of the occasion, invite fresh reflection on the Church’s understanding of the saints and ‘the’ Saints.
I have written before that the Prayer Book does not, any more than does Holy Scripture, make an absolute distinction between ‘the’ Saints and ‘the [communion of] saints’. All those joined to Christ constitute the communion of saints, which is the Church. Nor does the Prayer Book, any more than does Holy Scripture, spell out unequivocally or in any detail the nature of an intermediate state, and indeed the xxii. Article of Religion still found in the Prayer Book explicitly condemns the ‘Romish Doctrine concerning Purgatory, Pardons, Worshipping and Adoration, as well of Images as of Relics, and also Invocation of Saints’ as ‘a fond thing, vainly invented, and grounded upon no warranty of Scripture, but rather repugnant to the Word of God’.*
But a repudiation of the ‘Romish Doctrine’ of the sixteenth century need not deter us from observing the ancient custom and belief of the Church that there are those – among whom were first recognized Our Lady and the Apostles; the martyrs (literally, ‘witnesses’, but especially those who witnessed with their faith unwavering even unto death); then also confessors (those who suffered but were not killed for their faith); monastics, consecrated virgins, and other religious (who gave up ordinary life for the sake of Christ); leaders of the Church; as well as those without particular office or status – who have so fully joined themselves to Christ that they can see Him clearly in the people and the world around them, and Christ can be seen clearly in them, and thus at their deaths are already prepared to see Him not as He became for our sake, but as He truly is, and to experience His presence as light and life: as St John of Damascus said, those who mastered their passions, united themselves to God, received him into their hearts, and became like his nature.
Nor does the public, official recognition or canonization of Saints preclude the possibility that there are many others unknown to the Church at large, or even to many (or any) individuals, who display the same sanctity: thus the appointment of the hymn in honor of the ancestors, Ecclesiasticus 44, at First Evensong of All Saints [bcp1928] and then at Mass [bcp1979] for this feast. The popular children’s song ‘I sing a song of the saints of God’ is not far wrong in this regard, nor in its urging that the singer ‘mean to be one too’. The acknowledgement of the existence and presence of these largely unknown Saints is part of the very reason for the celebration of a Feast of All Saints, and whether or not the active invocation of their prayers is a part of our personal or parochial piety, these blessed ones at the very least are held up as examples worthy of our emulation, their lives as ‘choice vessels of grace’, and their triumph in Christ as beacons of hope for our own eventual union with God.
But some distinction between the Church Triumphant (those who lived or died as heroes of the faith and thus may be believed already to be able to see God as God is) and the Church Expectant (the rest of the faithful who may be yet resting, and/or growing in faith until they are able to bear the full, unveiled presence of the Lord) is implicit in the Prayer Book:
The Prayers of the People at Rite I of the Holy Eucharist, and Forms II and III of the Prayers, each offer a petition for the departed followed by a separate petition that we might follow the Saints into the nearer presence of God –
and...grant us grace so to follow the good examples of [N. and of ] all thy saints, that with them we may be partakers of thy heavenly kingdom.
Prayers of the People, Rite I [bcp 330]
Praise God for those in every generation in whom Christ has been honored [especially N. whom we remember today]. Pray that we may have grace to glorify Christ in our own day.
Prayers of the People, Form II [bcp 386]
We praise you for your saints who have entered into joy.
May we also come to share in your heavenly kingdom.
Prayers of the People, Form III [bcp 387]
Prayers of the People, Rite I [bcp 330]
Praise God for those in every generation in whom Christ has been honored [especially N. whom we remember today]. Pray that we may have grace to glorify Christ in our own day.
Prayers of the People, Form II [bcp 386]
We praise you for your saints who have entered into joy.
May we also come to share in your heavenly kingdom.
Prayers of the People, Form III [bcp 387]
– a distinction echoed in the differences between these two Prefaces –
...who in the obedience of thy saints hast given us an example of righteousness, and in their eternal joy a glorious pledge of the hope of our calling.
of a Saint II [bcp 348]
...when our mortal body doth lie in death, there is prepared for us a dwelling place eternal in the heavens.
Commemoration of the Dead [bcp 349]
of a Saint II [bcp 348]
...when our mortal body doth lie in death, there is prepared for us a dwelling place eternal in the heavens.
Commemoration of the Dead [bcp 349]
– and also implicit in many of the prayers for the departed in the funeral rites, e.g.
Let us pray with confidence to God, the Giver of life, that he will raise him to perfection in the company of the saints.
Reception of the Body [bcp 466]
Grant that, increasing in knowledge and love of thee, he may go from strength to strength in the life of perfect service in thy heavenly kingdom.
Grant us, with all who have died in the hope of the resurrection, to have our consummation and bliss in thy eternal and everlasting glory, and, with [blessed N. and] all thy saints, to receive the crown of life which thou dost promise to all who share in the victory of thy Son Jesus Christ...
Prayers of the People, Burial Rite I [bcp 481]
...Multiply, we beseech thee, to those who rest in Jesus the manifold blessings of thy love, that the good work which thou didst begin in them may be made perfect unto the day of Jesus Christ. And of thy mercy, O heavenly Father, grant that we, who now serve thee on earth, may at last, together with them, be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light; for the sake of thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
Concluding prayer at the Committal [bcp 486]
Almighty and everlasting God, we yield unto thee most high praise and hearty thanks for the wonderful grace and virtue declared in all thy saints, who have been the choice vessels of thy grace, and the lights of the world in their several generations; most humbly beseeching thee to give us grace so to follow the example of their steadfastness in thy faith, and obedience to thy holy commandments, that at the day of the general resurrection, we, with all those who are of the mystical body of thy Son, may be set on his right hand, and hear that his most joyful voice: ‘Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.’...
Additional prayer at the Burial of the Dead [bcp 487]
(part of the 1549 Canon)
Reception of the Body [bcp 466]
Grant that, increasing in knowledge and love of thee, he may go from strength to strength in the life of perfect service in thy heavenly kingdom.
Grant us, with all who have died in the hope of the resurrection, to have our consummation and bliss in thy eternal and everlasting glory, and, with [blessed N. and] all thy saints, to receive the crown of life which thou dost promise to all who share in the victory of thy Son Jesus Christ...
Prayers of the People, Burial Rite I [bcp 481]
...Multiply, we beseech thee, to those who rest in Jesus the manifold blessings of thy love, that the good work which thou didst begin in them may be made perfect unto the day of Jesus Christ. And of thy mercy, O heavenly Father, grant that we, who now serve thee on earth, may at last, together with them, be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light; for the sake of thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
Concluding prayer at the Committal [bcp 486]
Almighty and everlasting God, we yield unto thee most high praise and hearty thanks for the wonderful grace and virtue declared in all thy saints, who have been the choice vessels of thy grace, and the lights of the world in their several generations; most humbly beseeching thee to give us grace so to follow the example of their steadfastness in thy faith, and obedience to thy holy commandments, that at the day of the general resurrection, we, with all those who are of the mystical body of thy Son, may be set on his right hand, and hear that his most joyful voice: ‘Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.’...
Additional prayer at the Burial of the Dead [bcp 487]
(part of the 1549 Canon)
In sum, the Saints do not need our prayers; if anything, insofar as we believe them to be not only departed heroes of the past but living members of the present, we seek theirs, and so it is nonsensical to offer a Requiem for All Saints. Nor is anything served by conflating All Saints and All Souls, or by claiming that every good person, mentor, or positive influence in one’s life is ‘a Saint’ (which is not to deny the good in them, nor to say that any Saint ever lived a blameless life); to do so is to give up on a life of virtue and holiness, and ultimately upon theosis, as an ideal and a real possibility. It is a failure of imagination and of faith.
Rather, All Souls offers us an opportunity to pray for those who no longer (or never did) have immediate family or friends or even chantry priests on earth to pray for them specifically, to heighten our awareness of the communion of saints, and to examine our own lives and our preparedness for death in the light of the hope set forth and the prayers offered in the liturgies of the day. It is by doing so, and then by acting upon our conviction with ‘true repentance and amendment of life’ to become more and more Christlike, that we may dare to hope that, in God’s time and through divine grace, we and all the faithful departed (and indeed ‘those whose faith is known to [God] alone’) may yet become Saints, cleansed, purified, strengthened, and through Christ made worthy to behold God’s glory face to face.
* Though the final form of the Thirty-nine Articles legally superseded previous Articles of Religion, the last of the Ten Articles of 1536 can be seen to set forth an understanding of prayers for and the place of the departed that repudiates ‘Romish doctrine’ but upholds ancient custom:
Forasmuch as due order of charity requireth, and the Book of Maccabees and divers ancient doctors plainly shewen, that it is a very good and charitable deed to pray for souls departed; and forasmuch also as such usage hath continued in the church so many years, even from the beginning; we will...that no man ought to be grieved with the continuance of the same; and, that it standeth with the very due order of charity, a Christian man to pray for souls departed, and to commit them in our prayers to God’s mercy, and also to cause other to pray for them in masses and exequies, and to give alms to other to pray for them, whereby they may be relieved and holpen of some part of their pain. But, forasmuch as the place where they be, the name thereof, and kind of pains there also, be to us uncertain by scripture, therefore this, with all other things, we remit to God Almighty, unto whose mercy it is meet and convenient for us to commend them; trusting that God accepteth our prayers for them, referring the rest wholly to God, to whom is known their state and condition. Wherefore it is much necessary that such abuses be clearly put away which under the name of purgatory hath been advanced, as, to make men believe that through the bishop of Rome’s pardons souls might clearly be delivered out of purgatory and all the pains of it; or, that masses said at scala cœli, or otherwise in any place, or before any image, might likewise deliver them from all their pain, and send them straight to heaven. And other like abuses.
Forasmuch as due order of charity requireth, and the Book of Maccabees and divers ancient doctors plainly shewen, that it is a very good and charitable deed to pray for souls departed; and forasmuch also as such usage hath continued in the church so many years, even from the beginning; we will...that no man ought to be grieved with the continuance of the same; and, that it standeth with the very due order of charity, a Christian man to pray for souls departed, and to commit them in our prayers to God’s mercy, and also to cause other to pray for them in masses and exequies, and to give alms to other to pray for them, whereby they may be relieved and holpen of some part of their pain. But, forasmuch as the place where they be, the name thereof, and kind of pains there also, be to us uncertain by scripture, therefore this, with all other things, we remit to God Almighty, unto whose mercy it is meet and convenient for us to commend them; trusting that God accepteth our prayers for them, referring the rest wholly to God, to whom is known their state and condition. Wherefore it is much necessary that such abuses be clearly put away which under the name of purgatory hath been advanced, as, to make men believe that through the bishop of Rome’s pardons souls might clearly be delivered out of purgatory and all the pains of it; or, that masses said at scala cœli, or otherwise in any place, or before any image, might likewise deliver them from all their pain, and send them straight to heaven. And other like abuses.