You too can be a saint!

Just think of it: St Bob. St Chuck. St Lucy of Lexington. Or my favorite: St. Stephen the Remarkable, Pious and Humble. I thought of this when I found this website, which is now listed among the bookmarked sites on my “Favorites” list. It’s called the Saints calendar and it lists the daily saints for the Catholic Church. I find it curious, interesting and sometimes amusing all at the same time.

Like today. Today is September 18 and the saint for today is Saint Joseph of Cupertino. The interesting thing about him is that he is the patron saint of astronauts. What makes that also amusing is that he died in 1673, just a century or two or three before manned space flight.

Now we know from Scripture that every believer in Jesus Christ is called a saint. (Romans 1:7 and count 'em, 68 other places in the Bible.) No one person has special spiritual status as a saint above other believers. We are all equal before God.

But I think the Catholic calendar of saints has this real value: they remember people. People who made a difference. People who made great sacrifices for God, many of whom were martyred. People whose lives are really worth remembering.

In the present 21st church, we tend to be preoccupied with the present tense: what’s current, what’s trendy, what’s the latest worship music or what’s the hottest media innovation, what’s the new best seller among Christian books, etc, etc.

And we tend to forget the great men and women of faith in our own tradition who made it possible for us to live for Jesus in this present tense. I wouldn’t want to make them saints. But it would be helpful to all of our faith journeys if we didn’t forget them … if we remembered the great things they did for God and let them inspire us. From the John Wesleys and Jonathon Edwards. From the Savonarolas to the Martin Luthers. And from our old Sunday School teachers and former pastors and courageous missionaries … great saints all. We need to remember them.

What’s the old saying? “The road to tomorrow runs through yesterday.” And if we were better students of yesterday, we’d end up being stronger believers in the present. And braver prophets of the future. Remember that. And remember them.

…just thinkling