So, I have this memory. I'm not sure it really happened – it may have kinda sorta happened and then my imagination just made it better as time went by. My mom was there, and she's here now, so I guess she can let me know if it really happened. And I suppose that I can just respond that, if she says no, well, I can just accuse her of being forgetful. So there's that.
Anyway, here it is: I remember taking a long, looonnnng, car trip out West from Chattanooga. I was in my teens. I remember that for sure. And my mom was there, along with my Grandma and Granddaddy. We drove all the way to California, and ended up in San Francisco. And we ended up at Fisherman's Wharf. And we ended up in a fancy-schmancy seafood restaurant. We were all seated and looking at the menu. The snooty waiter eventually sauntered up and began to rattle off the specials and catches of the day. And my granddaddy piped up and interrupted the poor man with, “Ain't y'all got anything fried?” With his East Tennessee twang.
I was mortified. I bet my mom was mortified. But my grandma just sat there with a slight smile. She might have just been curious to see if, indeed, they actually did have something fried. But she might have actually been smiling at my granddaddy because, now, looking back at it, I think he said it just to get a rise out of one or all of use.
Now whether it happed that way or not, what's important is that I've carried that memory of my granddaddy with me all this time. And Fr. Brooks can attest that whenever we find ourselves in some fancy diocesan setting with food, I will frequently grumble to him, “Ain't they got anything fried?” And he laughs. He knows the score.
My grandparents are dead, of course. That's how life rolls. But those memories are more than memories. Oh, sometimes they are just memories. But so often, there is part of that other person that just becomes part of us, that so affects us that it IS us.
Today is the Feast Day of All Saints. A day when we remember all those Christians who have gone before us, whether we knew them or not, and how they affected our lives and affect them, still.
And this year, this has been harder on us than usual I think, because those we've lost recently, well, we've had to delay remembering them, mourning our loss, and gathering with joy to celebrate their sure and certain reward of paradise.
And yet, we still carry them with us.
Whenever I drive by the Veterans Home in Oxford, I remember George Dickinson's reaction to first meeting me three years ago. He was already slipping away, and he surprised me by taking my hand and kissing it.
He was somewhere in the past where you did that to bishops and cardinals. He saw that when he saw me. And he did that the very last time I saw him at the home. I'll carry that joy with me.
And I remember visiting Al Chapin in the hospital a couple of years ago. We had just met, and when I visited him, the conversation was stilted, and I was about to leave when suddenly he burst into tears and started talking about how much he missed his wife.
I turned around, and we spent a good long time sharing those memories. I'll carry that deep, abiding love with me.
And I remember interviewing with folks up here on the phone when we were deciding if we wanted to begin our relationship in our parishes.
And Dick Gestwick was on the phone and said, “I just want to make sure you know that going to Stewart's for coffee is probably going to be the highlight of your week. That's how rural we are.”
And I remember telling him that I spent the first couple of years living in a trailer off to the side of my granddaddy's farm. And Dick reckoned that I'd do ok. And I'll hear his cackle every time I go to Stewart's.
And I remember Michelle Joanis. So thin and frail. With eyes that sparkled all the time. And I remember the last time she was in church after having developed ALS, and how I kept thinking, if nothing else, I'm glad we redid the walkways so people in wheel chairs could get into the service.
I think it was last Christmas. It's so long ago. But there she sat, stubbornly among her friends, and when I went up to her, the look on her face at being with all y'all was absolutely angelic. I'll see that gentle soul's eyes the rest of my life.
And I remember Joan Axtell. Oh, Joan. She had my back. If I ever needed something, I just had to wonder out loud, and she'd be there. She was that was for all of us. Just one teeny-tiny bundle of cranky love.
She was the first of us to pass away during Coronatide. And I still catch myself thinking of her. When I see the chapel eucharist vessels I have sequestered in my office, I think of her.
When I think of how we can start up Bible Study again, I see her sitting in the class in my imagination. When we started doing in-person services again, more than any other person, her absence was the thing I noticed most.
That spot were she sat paled in comparison to the spot she took up in our hearts. I'll remember her caring every time I walk into St. Andrew's.
All Saints Day is for all of this and more. It is, of course, for remembering those who have gone before --- whose memories still enliven our dreams from time to time.
But it's not only for that. All Saints Day is for celebrating all those saints around us now. All those people, sitting right here on Zoom and on Facebook and in our churches who do those day to day things to keep the world from crumbling in around us. Those people we see every day.
The druggists, the doctors, the police officers. The people working at the post office. The truckers that keep me up at night going down Main Street. And the folks who keep our churches running during all this. All those you don't even see because they remain blurry and in the background.
Fixing the plumbing, caring for the graveyard, arranging food for receptions, leading others in our prayers. Keeping me on the straight and narrow. All those things they do that if we said “thank you” to them every time, then “thank you” would be all we'd ever get a chance to say. And maybe that's not such a bad thing.
And All Saints Day is also for celebrating what is yet to come. It is for all those yet to come and all those who are yet to join in the body of Christ. It is for all those who are going to be baptized on this day anywhere in the church, anywhere in the world.
Because if the promise of Christ is anything, it is hope in a better world, and the belief that we, each of us have a part in it.
And between now and when that hope is realized, we still remember those who meant so much to us – gifts of God in a way – to remind us of the promise of life and love, safety and joy, wonder and hope that, by God's grace, belongs to us all.
Amen.