At this All Hallows/All Saints/All Souls time, I cannot help but remember the rousing, wonderful hymn to the music of Vaughan Williams, "For All the Saints". Back when I was in the girls' choir at St. George's, Schenectady, we got a morning off from school to sing the All Saints Day service; strange that it was our choir (not the men and boys) who got to sing these odd mid-week services and play hooky. I won't go too far down that road (!)...but this morning just for fun, I just opened my 1940 hymnal to look at the words to hymn 126. I guess I had forgotten (or was numb to, as in so many other areas) just how martial this hymn is. People were considered saints had fought "the well-fought fight". Saints were "soldiers, faithful, true and bold", who earned rest at the end of their long life of strife. They confessed the name of Jesus, even at the risk, presumably, of death. At the end of it all, they won "the victor's crown of gold".
Ugh.
Ugh, ugh, ugh.
As ever, I find myself re-framing, re-articulating everything. What, for me, is "sainthood" in my post-Christian, Goddess-oriented meadow beyond these warlike structures? Here are just some off-the-top-of-the-head thoughts. First of all, I wouldn't make such a distinction between the three days and kinds of energy. Every soul who has some connection to divine love and acts out of that place is a saint in my book. Every woman or man who "does no harm", who adds beauty, honesty, love, harmony and truth to the world without fighting others, is a saint...and honoring the mystical, eerie, other-worldly, mysterious aspect of living such a life is great too, especially on the cusp of winter. I'm not a fan of how dark, menacing, and consumerist modern Halloween can be; on Halloween, I prefer to focus more on joyous mystery, earth energies, and our connection to the divine.
This year, it is hard to feel a sense of the onrush of cold, dark winter, because Duluth is freakishly warm. We've had several weeks of clear, dry, nearly hot weather, no doubt adding to the challenging low water levels further south on the Mississippi. It's practice living in paradox, when the sun is low, the day starts late and ends early, and the leaves have almost all dropped from the trees but the air is warm and the lake is calm. Something is "wrong with this picture" -- or is it? Nature is responding as she must to all the environmental challenges around the world...if I can give her only one gift today, it is thanks for the break from Duluth's norm, and enjoyment of what is. And thanks for all those whose lives illustrate a pure, non-conflict-driven, love.
