[SB] Sabbath Blessing

[Molly Wolf]

All Saints'

I'm delighted to report that we got to sing "For All the Saints" this 
morning in church. I have to admit that I took the organist aside 
last Sunday and the Sunday before and specially requested the hymn, 
but I don't feel in the least guilty. Dammit, All Saints' Day isn't 
what it should be without Vaughan Williams's magnificent rumbly bass 
and the saints triumphant rising in bright array. The hymn is a 
glorious promise, and one of which I need to be periodically 
reminded, especially when life is being Like That.

But the hymn also carries a small packet of the past for me, a 
memory: I had a dear friend whom I greatly loved but who, for various 
reasons, one All Saints' Day years and years ago, decided to rip a 
strip off me for misdeeds both real and imagined. Some time before 
this memorable event, I had mentioned in his hearing that "For All 
the Saints" was my favourite hymn and I wanted it played at my 
future. In the course of the strip-ripping, he observed that my love 
for the hymn proved that I thought I was some sort of saint and 
therefore that I believed I was superior to other people. This was 
one of the sins that needed his not-so-tender attention.

I remember thinking "Huh?" at the time, before the tide of deep hurt 
closed over and silenced me. I wasn't much into theology in those 
long-ago days, but I knew that "saints" in this context simply means 
those who follow the Christ, and that even the capital-S Saints 
weren't particularly superior people. Anyone who thinks of saints as 
being saintly needs to spend some time with St. Jerome.

But perhaps because there was so much damage at the time, it took me 
a surprisingly long time to realize that I am not responsible if 
someone chooses to misinterpret something I've said and done. I can 
only be responsible for my own words and deeds. I can't be 
responsible for what other people choose to make of them, especially 
when the other people haven't bothered to check with me first.

It's not a minor point. Perhaps one reason why we're still so far 
away from the victory sung in "For All the Saints" is because we've 
chosen to warp Christianity around to our own ends, often abusing 
others in the process. Christ is not answerable for Christendom -- 
Christ wasn't even a Christian, after all! -- but Christendom has a 
lot to answer for. The simple message of God's all-redeeming 
all-saving love that Jesus took from village to city to town, two 
millenia ago, got given a quarter-twist and used to pound our enemies 
into applesauce, with deep resultant damage to our relationships with 
each other. It is, after all, still a fallen world.

All we can do with this sort of ... err ... stuff is to make the best 
use of it that we can. As Wolf's First Law of Editing says, "You 
can't make a silk purse out of a pig's ear, but there's nothing wrong 
with suede." I could eventually -- it took a while -- figure out that 
business about what is and is not my responsibility, and I could 
learn to correct my own behaviour. Before I leap to a conclusion, I 
should do a reality check, because like everyone else, I have 
repeatedly failed Mindreading 101. Tempting as it often is, I should 
not ascribe neuroses to others because I am not equipped to do so, 
and because psychopathologizing is really, *really* rude. Besides, as 
the program says, taking another's personal inventory is a way to 
evade taking your own.

So that's how I redeemed that long-ago All Saints' Day. I redeemed 
this one by disposing of a failed stained-glass project that had 
blocked me from moving on and getting going on something simpler and 
more manageable. So I come to dusk with a bit of writing done and 
with an iridescent opal-glass cross quietly cooling down on my work 
table, waiting to get its soldering tidied. I'll finish it after 
supper, singing.

 From earth's wide bounds, from ocean's farthest coast,
Through gates of pearl streams in the countless host,
Singing to Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
Alleluia!





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A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in 
no other way. -- Mark Twain