An All Saints Day Devotion Suggestion

An All Saints Day Devotion 

Ljubljana, Slovenia 

Nov 1, 2020 

Friends, 

Today congregations around the world celebrate All Saints Day. While frequently overshadowed in the USA and Canada by the more secular traditions on All Hallows’ Eve (a.k.a Halloween), All Saints Day is a time to pause and honor the saints in the faith that have gone before us. Many families mark the day by visiting the graves of loved ones, their ancestors in the faith. In a number of congregations that I know, the names of members who passed away in the past year are read aloud. Here in Slovenia, lighting candles of remembrance plays a major part of this annual ritual. 

2020 has been a hard year. It has been full of losses—loss of loved ones, health, employment, much-wanted trips and gatherings, etc.—as well as losses than can be hard to articulate, such the loss of a sense of confidence of what our next month or even week will bring. This past week, I found myself on a video call with friend from seminary talking about how it is with our souls these days. She helped me name some of the losses I had not fully allowed myself to grieve, and we discussed that perhaps this year it would be cathartic for me to light or paint candles for those things as well. It was indeed. 

Sisters and brothers, it is good and right for us to name, honor, and grieve our losses, and it is good and right to remind ourselves that we are a people of hope—a hope that for over two millennia has often been symbolized with a lit candle, a light to guide our path and warm our hearts. 

This week I encourage you set aside time—either just yourself or with others in your house or on your screen—to light, sculpt, draw, or paint candles representing both named losses and hope in your life. Pray for the sorrow and fear in the world, give thanks for the lives of the saints who passed before you, and invite the Light of Christ to shine brightly in your life.

All my Love,

Taylor