The celebration of specific days attributed to holy people
As we prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus, and as we celebrate his mother and other saints, I often get asked what do Episcopalians believe about St. Mary and other people we call holy women and men or “saints”? In our liturgies, scriptures and worship we acknowledge those, who being alive or dead, have significantly contributed to the greater Christian Church of Jesus Christ. Often people are confused and have misconceptions that when we raise statues and votives, or icons and paintings of the saints, that we are essentially worshiping them as forms of deities. That is not at all the case. When people call on the name of God and the cloud of witnesses to pray on our behalf, those clouds of witnesses are all the saints who have gone before us. Remember, each of us are saints of God as we profess our Christian faith, and when our dear friends and family pass on before us, they are a part of that cloud of witnesses.
The Most Reverend Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold in the preface to the text: “Holy Women and Holy Men” shares with us: In one of the prayers in the Book of Common Prayer we pray: “Almighty God, by your Holy Spirit you have made us one with your saints in heaven and on earth: Grant that in our earthly pilgrimage we may always be supported by this fellowship of love and prayer.” This fellowship of love and prayer is the communion of saints affirmed in the Apostles’ Creed. The men and women commemorated in the Liturgical Calendar are not simply examples of faithfulness to inspire us: they are active in their love and prayer. They are companions in the Spirit able to support and encourage us as we seek to be faithful in our own day.
Again, the Prayer Book invites us to pray, “O God, the King of saints, we praise and glorify your holy Name for all your servants who have finished their course in your faith and fear: for the blessed Virgin Mary; for the holy patriarchs, prophets, apostles, and martyrs; and for all your other righteous servants, known to us and unknown; and we pray that, encouraged by their example, aided by their prayers, and strengthened by their fellowship, we also may be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light.”
Blessed feasts of blessed martyrs, holy women, holy men, with affection’s recollections greet we your return again. Worthy deeds they wrought, and wonders, worthy of the Name they bore; we, with meetest praise and sweetest, honor them for evermore.
Twelfth century Latin text, translated John Mason Neale #238, The Hymnal 1982
