Jesus Suspending Reality on All Saints Sunday
This past Monday evening on Halloween I went out with the kids trick or treating. There is something magical and weird about Halloween. It’s one time in the year that people put all manner of spooky and scary things on their homes and in their yards. For a limited window there is a suspension of everyday life. It’s okay to pretend you’re a superhero, a monster, a knight. As some of you know I dressed up as a banana which surprisingly was a hit with small kids. Mostly they shouted, “Banana!” And one kid said, “I know who you really are!”
And some homes take imagination to the next level. There is one home we visited in the Fernwood neighbourhood in Victoria that had the front yard covered with spooky dolls and a fog machine. There was one actor dressed as the character Harlequin with full face paint. There was someone with a creepy mask who sat in a chair in the middle of the lawn and he beckoned kids to come forward to get candy from him. Not all children dared to do so and a parent would have to go get the candy. In one corner of the yard was another adult dressed as the horror character Jason who would slowly walk towards kids when they came to get candy. Some of the teenagers would dare each other to approach Jason and then they all would laugh and run away. It was a bit scary and funny but again it is a suspension of reality for a brief time.
Another aspect of Halloween is the spirit of radical generosity. It’s the one time of the year that anyone is welcome to walk up to neighbours’ houses uninvited. Not even during the Christmas season do we do this. It’s just Halloween where we walk up to strangers and ask for candy and exchange a few words. It is an expression of community. And I realize that not all neighbourhoods have houses close enough for this to work well or there aren’t enough kids on the street.
It’s also no coincidence that Halloween and All Saints fall on the same week. These celebrations have evolved together over centuries and at times had shared celebrations between All Saints and All Hallows Eve. There were Celtic traditions that blended Christian and Pagan rituals injecting some levity into All Saints. There were pantomimes and short plays in the Middle Ages which is where wearing costumes on Halloween may have originated. In Latin America there are traditions around Los Muertes or Day of the Dead, which celebrate and remember those who have died, honouring their travel into the afterlife. The hit movie Coco has brought these traditions to a wider audience. And for example Anglicans often celebrate All Souls Day in addition to All Saints, so there are a variety of expressions and traditions that fall along the same week. Perhaps your family grew up with a particular expression of these celebrations that you hold dear. So many of these traditions are wrapped up in family and cultural traditions, remembering loved ones, bringing communities together.
In today’s gospel reading from Luke, Jesus challenges us to suspend disbelief in a different way. While not the world of monsters and zombies of Halloween, Jesus challenges his listeners to suspend disbelief that the political and cultural reality we see around us will be transformed. That in the fullness of time for God all things are possible. The very people who are suffering the most right now: those who are poor, those who are hungry, those who are weeping, are the very ones who are blessed in the fullness of God’s time which is already unfolding today. It may be easier for us to suspend reality for one evening for Halloween. And yet on All Saints Sunday Jesus invites us to suspend our disbelief that the world around us can be structured differently on a cosmic level. That the world can change.
Even though we are the ones at times least likely to believe this. We look at political landscapes unfolding in Canada and beyond our borders and wonder what might be coming our way. We hear renunciations of proto-fascism around the world. We hear increasing urgency around the climate crisis as we see storms worsen. We see increasing economic divides in our neighbourhoods and beyond. It can be hard to imagine the cosmic upheaval Jesus is calling us towards.
We wonder where God is at in the midst of so much upheaval. And yet as church we continue gathering faithfully together singing songs, praying prayers in defiance of the forces that threaten to undo things we hold dear. Gathering here together is a testimony to Jesus calling us to suspend disbelief, that God is structuring the world in better ways.
It takes a community to gather together as the body of Christ.
It takes a community to build hope.
It takes a community to build trust.
It takes a community to keep the faith.
It takes a community to live out the radical generosity Jesus calls us into.
And that is what we are doing at Church of the Cross. So if you are feeling anxious. If you are weeping. If you are doubting what the future holds, you don’t have to possess the strength and courage on your own. Take heart that we are gathering, doing this together. It’s about trusting that the Holy Spirit can infuse institutions, structures, neighbourhoods with love and compassion through us.
All Saints is also about remembering those who have gone before us, as we gathered on Tuesday to light candles and read aloud names of the faithfully departed. There is both a sadness and a comfort knowing that we remember those who we miss. Remembering their names, remembering their stories, remembering they are still with us through the celebration of the festival.
Maybe there is a loved one whose faith buoys your spirits. Someone who remains meaningful in your connection to church. Someone you are sad is gone but whose memory stays with you. The faith of those who have gone before us continues to shine in our midst.
As we’ve discovered during the pandemic, mourning the loss of others, mourning the loss of worlds is also meaningful. We continue mourning people and traditions that have not returned or are no longer the same.
On Halloween I found myself missing a bonfire that was normally lit at the Fernwood Community Centre. I expected this would be the year it would return. However due to a previous fire ban and then too little time to obtain a fire permit after the rain came, it didn’t happen this year. And so we walked by the park where they might be a hundred people gathered around the fire. There were just a few teens lighting off random fireworks. Another reminder that our neighbourhoods haven’t fully returned to what they have been. And maybe some things simply won’t return or they’ll be different.
I think about that for Church of the Cross. Many things have returned but not all things. And some things will return and be different. Because different people will be organizing them, different emphases and energy will be put into things. Sometimes new things are rich and exciting. Sometimes we mourn things we have lost, which is understandable, and so we lift these up on All Saints as well.
Wherever you find yourself this All Saints Sunday, in this time of grey skies and much needed rain, I encourage you to take heart. Because it’s not all up to you just as it’s not all up to me or Pr. Lyle. We’re in this together and it’s through the Spirit present in us as a faith community, that all things are possible.
Wrapping up trust that all things are possible in Christ. Just as Halloween surprises us, suspending our disbelief, so too Jesus surprises us with a world turned upside down, in which God’s love is reigning in unexpected ways. Trust that this world is for people on the margins and for you. A world built upon love that we’re living into together. Amen.
