Communion of Saints, now and forever

By Jason A. Baguia
(first published August 24, 2008 in Cebu Daily News - Faith)

It is to some extent reasonable to suppose that the character of a person can be gauged by the kind of the company that he or she keeps. Sacred Scripture says "Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend." (Proverbs 27:17) Cases in point are the subjects of recent news coming out of the Vatican's Congregation for the Causes of Saints or sourced from that church department's observers.

It has been announced that French couple Louis and Marie Zelie Guerin Martin, respectively a watchmaker and a lacemaker will be declared "blessed" in the last step before official recognition as saints this October 19. Around three weeks prior to their beatification, on September 28, Poland's Father Michal Sopocko will be beatified. Sometime next year, England's John Henry Cardinal Newman will also be declared "blessed."

The awaited beatifications mean that miracles have been wrought by God for people who asked for his favors through the intercession of these venerable faithful departed. But that is beside the point here. The light of these people's Christian testimonies shined strong and clear long before they died.

Part of the beauty common to the lives of Louis and Marie, Father Michal and Cardinal Newman, apart from their personal strivings to keep God remembered in this world by their active love for fellow men and women, is their relationship with people who shared their passion to be faithful to God.

Obviously Louis and Marie as husband and wife looked to each other for encouragement and inspiration in their walk with God. They also had nine children who grew up to be luminaries of faith.Five Martin daughters entered religious communities. The most famous one we know as the patroness of missions and doctor of the church, the "Little Flower," Saint Therese of Lisieux, whose pilgrim relics have been brought to Cebu for veneration twice over this decade.

Father Michal was the spiritual director of Saint Faustina of Kowalska, the Blessed Sister Faustina of yore to whom our Lord Jesus himself spoke words that have become familiar to many Filipinos by being broadcast daily on television after the 3:00 p.m. devotion to the Divine Mercy.It is understood in the spiritual life that one does not succeed without a mentor, and good mentors learn even from their protégées. We can be certain that Saint of Kowalska's devotion to our Lord had a profound effect on Father Michal, who became a leading promoter of the Divine Mercy devotion.

Cardinal Newman (not to be confused with Saint John Neumann whose statue is venerated at the Our Lady of Perpetual Help – Redemptorist Church in uptown Cebu City), converted to the Catholic Faith after being prodded by the Holy Spirit to be intellectually honest.The cardinal used to be a Church of England minister at Oxford, earth's oldest and most prestigious university. Together with some of the leading scholars of his time he led the Oxford Movement, which sought to reconcile Anglicanism and Catholicism by clarifying the compatibilities of the differing confessions.

Eventually Newman realized in his studies of history that the full deposit of Christianity resides in Catholicism, and so he converted. He would not have reached that crucial step of entering the Church without the support of his Anglican friends, a network of people—many of whom, heartened by Newman's lead took just a bit more time before embracing Catholicism—who made him not alone in his quest for the truth.

Louis and Marie, Father Michal and Cardinal Newman's message for us today is that we can help one another to be faithful to God and devoted to his people in loving, active service. Part of Balanga Bishop Socrates Villegas' homily on the 25th death anniversary of Filipino hero Benigno Aquino Jr., an exhortation to service of God and neighbor, brings home the point: "The friend serves. The friend brings out the best in us. The friend tells us the bare and painful truth because he wants us to be better. Friends do not use friends. Friends do not bribe and pay off. There are no friends for an evil cause... Do we still bring out the best in one another because we give one another equal opportunities-- which is what democracy is all about?"

Let us pray that we may inspire each other in godliness just as the blessed ones mentioned in this space did. Sanctity is not impossible, nor reserved to the elite. Take it from Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard: "God creates out of nothing. Wonderful you say. Yes, to be sure, but he does what is still more wonderful: he makes saints out of sinners." Iron sharpeneth iron, so God sharpeneth the countenance of men and women who enter into his friendship.