Revelation 7:9-17
Matthew 5:1-12
“Let the Light Shine Through”
Preached Sunday, November 1, 2026
Last month I got to go on a pilgrimage to Ireland where we explored female archetypes - including learning about those we would call saints. And that’s how I found myself at a Faithful Companions of Jesus Spirituality Retreat Center on the West Coast of Ireland, listening to a Catholic lay woman, Noreen, share about saints. And her definition of saints may be my favorite I’ve ever heard. She said, “Saints are those who let the light shine through.”
We spent some time that day talking about saints.
We talked about St. Brigid, the matron saint of Ireland, who bridged the Celtic pagan world to that of Christianity. Teaching, speaking, and living in such a way that her very existence created a bridge to help all people draw closer to Christ.
We talked about St. Ita, a woman who managed 4 acres of land - quite small when you compare it to the 5,000 acres Brigid oversaw - and used those four acres to foster children and love them well.
We talked more about saints - and as many of you know, saints - especially female saints and mystics - is a niche interest of mine. I find that learning about the lives of those who the Church and Christians across time have recognized as uniquely and faithfully living as Christ called them to live - is very eye opening. So allow me to share some more saint snippets with you -
There is St. Catherine of Sienna who bathed lepers and cared for the last, the lost, and the least. When no priest would go to the gallows with a condemned man - she did. This was in the 1300s. She acted as his Spiritual advisor, up until the moment of his death.
There is St. Hildegard - born in the early 1000s who was the only woman granted permission from the pope to speak in front of men and women. She said she was a mouthpiece for God - and God did speak to her and through her - not just through her words but through visions, art, music, and even herbology and medicine - she saw all of the earth as sacred and some 1000s years later many are turning to her and her writings as we navigate care for our planet and bodies.
There is Julian of Norwich who was an anchoress and she lived in a cell with just a window to the outside world. While she devoted her life to prayer and she wrote about God’s love - she also guided a community through The Black Death, and a peasant revolt - people would come to her, to speak to her through that small window, for guidance and wise conversation.
There are also more modern day saints that we may know - Like St. Theresa of Calcutta who cared for the sick and the poor in India. And while not officially canonized there is Dorothy Day who fought for the rights of workers and fair labor conditions. And so many more. And no - saints aren’t only women!
There is Moses the Ethiopian. He is a desert father known for his wise sayings and forgiving ways. He was martyred while trying to convert a gang of robbers. But here’s the thing, he himself was a gang leader. He first became a Christian when he was hiding from the police with a monk!
And while not cannonized, I view Henry Nouwen as a saint, who gave up his prestigious position as a professor to be a caretaker for those with profound physical and mental disabilities.
And there are so, so, so many more people I could talk about today. Because today we are looking at the question we look at every year on All Saints Day - and that is, what is a saint? Saints are not only for Catholic or Orthodox Christians. Saints are not only those who have been canonized - recognized by a religious institution. Saints are, as that wise Irish woman, a saint herself, put it: those who let the light shine through.
Ordinary people. People like you and me and our neighbors next to us in the pews. Who lived their lives in such a way - that the light of God inside of them shone through. The love of God inside of them was shared. So that when those around them in their lives and even after their death looked back at their life - they didn’t just see the person, but saw God at work through them. They were people with faults, too. Not without sin or blemish - Catherine suffered from what we would probably call an eating disorder today and she died prematurely because of it. Hildegard butted heads with others in her order from time to time. Moses was a former gangster. The one woman I mentioned - Dorothy Day - there is a push in the current Catholic church to canonize her but she talked openly about how before she became a Christian, she had had an abortion - and so the Catholic church gets conflicted about that. Even Theresa of Calcutta comes under scrutiny for the ways she sometimes acted and how she received medical care.
We can go all the way back to disciples and see that saints are not perfect human beings. Matthew was a tax collector, an instrument of oppression against his people. Simon the Zealot was a political agitator, an insurrectionist. Paul is very open that he persecuted and had Christians killed. No, saints aren’t perfect human beings...they’re just human beings, like you and me.
Because they were just….people. Not holier-than-thou. Not placed up on some un-reachable pedestal but people…who simply loved God and loved neighbor - and let the light shine through. Paul used the word saint to refer to all who professed Christ. And on All Saints day, we look to those in the life of our church, and our individual lives, who let the shine through, who loved well and showed us God.
Today during Holy Communion we will say the names of those in the life of our church who have passed in the last year. Say their name, toll a bell, light a candle. And then we will all have the chance to light a candle in memory of those who shined light in our lives.
Each of us has saints in our heart, living or deceased. For me, one I think of is Saint Marjorie Streets, my great-grandmother who was a woman before her time - a leader, an activist, a Methodist. And there are many more in our lives, people who will never be canonized, people who will never be recognized, people we may have even forgotten - saints of the ages.
When we know people, when we see them in the day to day, we often think of them as anything but saints. We’ve seen them get angry or irritated. We’ve seen them curse under their breath. We’ve seen them when they wake up in the morning and are rubbing the crusties out of their eyes. How can anything, anyone so human be saintly? But we are. We are all called to lives of sanctity.
Today’s Scripture in Revelation says “Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne and to the Lamb.”
Salvation. All that is holy, sanctity, belongs to God. But how often do we think it belongs to us? The official canonization process could be an example of this. In order to be named a saint in the Roman Catholic church there is a lengthy process - it involves miracles needing to happen in your name and all sorts of things - and it can often take decades or even centuries to complete - often long enough for our short memories to forget the faults, to forget the human-ness of the saints.
But also, we so often judge what is holy and what is not. The divide between sacred and secular is not one God created - it is one we created. God created all and declared it was good. We are the ones who relegate the holy to stained glass windows, to Sunday mornings, to food only when it is served on brass platters. We often judge people as good-Christians, Christmas and Easter only Christians, and then, well, all others. We judge in our own minds who is in and who is out. And really - what is sacred, what is holy, what is salvific, all belongs to God - and that all expands to more than we can even imagine. Including us.
We are called to live lives of sanctity, to live as if we and all around us are counted in the numbers of the saints. I think that the Gospel text this morning, the Beatitudes, gives us some insight on how to live this way.
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, Blessed are those who mourn, "Blessed are the meek. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Blessed are the merciful. Blessed are the pure in heart. Blessed are the peacemakers. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake. Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.”
All of these groups of people, the poor, the merciful, the peacemakers, the hungry, the thirsty, the reviled -- these are not the ones that our world considers blessed. These are not the ones that the world considers saints. We may even consider these things as faults, limitations that would keep them from living lives of sanctity. But when we open our eyes to see God’s blessedness, God’s holiness, God’s sanctity in ALL people, and especially those the world despises - we open ourselves up to being receptive to that holiness. When we see sanctity all around us, we are drawn toward it in praise, thanksgiving, and worship to God - just as the saints before God worship night and day within God’s temple where there is no hunger, no scorching heat, no thirst, and no more tears.
The text this morning reflects on the day that all shall worship God. It reads, “and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb…” The great multitude is meant to be unmeasurable, something we can’t even wrap our minds around. How great and how vast are the sanctified, the saints before God - including those who will name today. And including you and me, each of us.
I started this sermon talking a little bit about my Ireland experience and I’d like to end it by just sharing a little more. On one particularly windy day, I found myself standing in the standing ruins of a castle of Grace O’Malley - known as the pirate queen. We weren’t talking about saints yet on the trip but we were talking about women who were trailblazers, who shaped us, who led the way for us, who inspired us to be all we could be - so while we weren’t specifically talking about saints - yes - we were. And so we were in this castle - more of a tower, hollowed out but still standing and into it we were asked to echo the names of those women who had gone before. I said my great grandmother’s name. And then, the leader of our group ended with a blessing, “One day, someone will say your name.”
That blessing hit me right in my core - to hope, to dream - that my children, and my children’s children, and perhaps even their children - would know me - would know of me. That the light would shine so brightly through me - that it would change the lives of those who are in my life now - and those who will come after me. What a blessing.
So today, as you light candles for those whom the light of God shone through them - those in your lives who are saints - who shared God’s love with you - as you light candles for the saints, give thanks to God for their lives. And live your life in such a way - let the light shine through you - that one day, someone will light a candle for you and say your name because you let the light shine through.
Let your light shine. May it be so.
Amen.
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