Who is your favorite saint? It might be someone you are named after, someone whose heroic virtue inspires you, or someone you personally relate to for one reason or another. Last week we celebrated All Saints Day, but the reality is that the saints are always with us, showing us the way to happiness in heaven.
Fr. Edward Looney, a regular Morning Air® contributor, recently stopped by to discuss the lives of the saints, and how following in their footsteps can help us become saints ourselves.
Fr. Looney pointed out that saints are the best role models, saying, “If we put our faith in an earthly person – in the clergy, in a star, an athlete, or whoever, they might disappoint us. They might do something that discourages us. But the saints always sought to love God. And even in their life on earth, when they strayed a little bit they always came back to God. They always sought His mercy. They returned to that fountain of God’s mercy.”
“So if we put our hope in heaven, and in all of those surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses (as the Letter to the Hebrews says) – they won’t fail us. Their stories truly will be our inspiration.”
The stories of the saints can inspire us in our own journey of holiness. Whether it was a saint’s heroic charity, the way they prayed for others, the forgiveness they showed their persecutors, or how they served God, the lives of the saints is a deep well from which we can be inspired.
“I think of the saints, the wisdom of these holy men and women,” Fr. Looney said. “When we learn it, when we hear it, when we begin to practice it, it changes us and our attitude. It makes us into the saints of today.”
The greatest hope for our lives should be to be a saint. So what will your saint story be? How can your life inspire others to holiness – now and for generations in the future?
Fr. Looney recognized, “I’m writing my own sainthood story. I’m not to the gates of heaven yet, I have life left to live. How am I going to write that story?”
“This pandemic that we’re in right now really presents us with the opportunity to respond to God’s grace,” he noted. “We realize that God is still at work, God is still calling, He is still inviting. And maybe we have to respond in a different way than we used to respond, but we just have to believe that God is still calling and inviting us right now.”
Listen to the full conversation below:
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