1 November 2020
Solemnity of All Saints
Beati qui habitant and Beata gens are both St. Thomas Aquinas’ sermon that he preached on the occasions of the solemnity of All Saints. Beata gens is a university sermon, as it was most likely preached during Aquinas’s second regency in Paris from 1268 to 1272. The sermon Beati qui habitant seems to have been given in Italy when Aquinas was teaching in Orvieto between 1261 and 1264. In a nutshell, the sermon Beata gens takes up the celebration of All Saints as an incentive to the believers. By honoring the saints the Church ‘focuses her attention on challenging her children to desire heavenly things. The sermon Beati qui habitant does also begin with a clear outline of the feast of the day and its relevance to the audience. Aquinas began with a discussion of what true happiness consists. Since it is found in full with the saints in heaven it is most certainly not found fully on earth. But true happiness consists in the enjoyment of God, the happiness of the saints is that ‘they praise You’.
Enough about Thomistic theology, I would like to reflect on my life journey with saints and hopefully by sharing my experience, some people can see the incentive of honoring saints like St. Thomas advised. I was not born as a Catholic, but my parents sent me to Catholic elementary school. So, the first saint that I knew was St. Terese of Lisieux, who is the patron saint of my elementary School. In the fifth grade, I got to know St. Francis Xavier as the first person who brought Catholicism in my home country, Indonesia. In the fifth grade, I joined the Catechumens program and was baptized. I believe that these two patron saints and missionaries have been praying for me since before my baptism and they continue to pray for me in my life. In High School, I must thank St. Joseph, the patron saint of my high school. Without his prayers I would not be able to survive the turbulent years of my life as a teenager.
Fast forward to college. I did not attend a Jesuit college, but I attended Sunday masses at the Jesuit Chapel in Sanatha Dharma University in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. Little did I know that the chapel was named after St. Robert Bellarmine. In this chapel began to know Jesuits for the first time and this great saint has been praying for me since then. But, near the end of my college, I drifted away from my Catholic faith and slowly abandoned my Catholic faith. After five years in the wilderness of faith, I came back to the Church because my then girlfriend invited me to mass. We went to the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption in Jakarta. Thanks to the Blessed Mother who constantly prays for me, I began my journey back to Catholicism.
To make a long story short, I left my home country and then began my journey overseas. During my sojourn in Europe, I lived in Utrecht, Netherlands, the city under the patronage of St. Martin de Tour. Without his prayer, I would not have been able to survive the difficult life in Europe. After traveling Europe, I moved to the United States and settled in Seattle, Washington. There, I worshipped at the University of Washington Newman Center. With the prayer of St. John Henry Cardinal Newman, I experienced a deep conversion and decided to join the religious life after completing my graduate studies. During my time as a graduate student, I also got to know a great Jesuit saint, St. Joseph Pignatelli. Finishing dissertations are extremely hard, but St. Joseph Pignatelli helped me to get through this difficult task.
I entered the Jesuit Novitiate on October 11, which is the canonization day of St. Damien of Molokai. In the Novitiate, I began to grow in my devotion to St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Society of Jesus. St. Ignatius continued to pray for me when I found how hard it was to study philosophy with undergraduate students. He understood my experience as he himself had to study Latin with school children. In regency, I had so many difficulties teaching in a Jesuit sponsored University. In these difficult moments, I prayed a lot to St. Claire, St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, and St. Thomas More. In my theological studies, I lived in the St. Peter Faber Jesuit community in Boston and I believed that this great saint was constantly praying for me and helped me in my journey to priesthood.
Looking at my life with the saints, I can understand what St. Thomas Aquinas said in a reference to what the beata vita, the truly happy life, is. Reflecting on the perfect happiness of the saints will help us, the wayfarers, to direct our efforts to striving toward happiness.