All Saints' Day

In this past Sunday's liturgy, the Father mentioned the All Saints'Day mass that would be held, and it got me to thinking about the importance of remeberance and memorial--of both saints that have declared so officially by the Catholic Church, as well as those saints whose recognition may not be official, but whose effect on others has still been profound. (I was also thinking of this day as a precursor to the Transgender Day of Rememberance later this month.)

In any case, moved to pay tribute today, I decided to check out the Catholic mass held on my campus today. I was actually surprised at how many students made time in the middle of the day to hear mass--revealing just how much I underestimate the importance of religion to college students.

In this regard, it's been an interesting week, actually. In my "Introduction to LGBT Studies" course this is the week where we discuss religion and sexuality. After a slow start Tuesday's discussion took off--the hesitancy with which we approached the topic was clear, but then just as clear was how close and personal so many of us are connected to the issues at hand. Can't wait to see how tomorrow's discussion goes...

Oh, but back to today's mass...it went well enough...the Father was rather fast--the whole service only took 33 minutes! I did like the point in his liturgy when he stressed that what will be important when we face God after our deaths was how well we treated those around us (not our best friends, to whom being kind comes easy), but to those that we don't know. A nice message indeed, especially since I was feeling very conspicuously queer during mass. (In fact, when I went up to receive communion, I could have sworn that the eucharistic minister looked me up and down and hesitated before offering me the body of Christ, to the point where I wasn't sure she'd offer it at all. She did, though, so hopefully it was all just a figment of my internalized homophobic imagination. Not that internalized homophobia is good, but at least it is something I can work to change.)

Also wanted to share an excerpt from James Martin's article, "Saints That Weren't" in today's New York Times:

The church’s long history of “faithful dissent” offers both hope and perspective to Catholics in our time. It echoes the call of the Second Vatican Council, which, in 1964, declared that expressing opinions “on matters concerning the good of the church” is sometimes an obligation for the faithful. ...

All Saints’ Day is a good time to remember that while most saints led lives of quiet service, some led the life of the noisy prophet, speaking the truth to power — even when that power was within the church.