The Vigil of All Saints

October 31 is a date with many names. Halloween is, of course, the most well-known. Some Protestants (especially those of the Lutheran persuasion) will know today as Reformation Day. Fewer of us will remember the first name given to this date, the name that led ultimately to both Halloween and the posting of the 95 Theses. Today is All Hallow's Eve -- the Eve of All Saint's Day.

Tomorrow, November 1, the Church will remember the saints who have died. We Lutherans hold fast to the certainty that we are all both sinners (absolutely!) and saints (in Christ, completely!) and so we, along with many others, use the day to remember all those from our faith communities who have passed in the last year.

Tonight at Calvary Lutheran Church there will be a Vigil of All Saint's (you can tune in online at Calvary's webcam). Letters have been sent to the families of those people who have had their funerals at Calvary this past year. These families will gather together in the sanctuary -- some with grief as fresh as the dirt on the new grave of their loved ones, some with grief that is almost a year into healing -- and they will remember. Candles will be lit as each name is read and they will remember the one they have lost. Scripture will be read and words will be spoken and silence will be kept and they will remember the One who has promised to go with them. Bread and wine will be blessed and shared and they will remember the love of God poured out in Christ. Each person will take their turn to light one of the over 100 candles and they will remember -- they will remember the promise of resurrection that is a light shining in the darkness. On this night when haunted houses and scary movies focus on dismembered bodies, the Church will be a remembered body, a body of saints re-membered, gathered together again with their loved ones and their God.

The Vigil of All Saints is perhaps the most tender hour of our church year. This evening while little ghosts and goblins and Elmos go door to door asking for candy, as I settle into my tight coach seat for a trans-Atlantic flight, as many of the rest of us sit down to dinner, the Church will gather and it will remember; and as they do, we, too, will be remembered into the body of God's saints. This night, may we all remember.