Skip to main content

Litany for the Feast of All Saints

...based on Isaiah 25:6-9; Wisdom 3:1-9; Psalm 24


The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it,
All that surrounds it and all who dwell therein have a home in God.
The Lord has taken chaos and brought forth beauty, creativity, and community.

The bounds of creation extend beyond our imagination.
Science and mathematics spiral out in response to God’s omnipresent expanse.

Who may ascend into the Lord’s presence and who dares to seek God’s holy face?
We believe in rest and peace in God’s light for all who died in the faith.

We dare to claim the same comfort and mercy for those who died in fear, pain or without clarity of heart or mind.
Because grace and mercy are upon God’s holy ones, and God watches over those who have been saved.

Our grief is not in vain because God is faithful and has promised to destroy death- our final enemy.
Our grief is also not false because we do miss those we love, who loved us, and with whom we look forward to reuniting.

Those who have not been named are not forgotten.
They shall receive blessing from the Lord and righteousness from the God of their salvation.

Those who rest in the Lord will understand truth.
Those with whom the Lord abides will perceive his loving presence.

God will wipe away all tears, bring healing to the nations, and console those who mourn.
This is most certainly true.

The communion of saints is around us, within us, ahead of us, and beside us. It exists outside of time and place.
This is most certainly true.

We give thanks for those whose faithfulness and love brought light and life to us and to all around them. We are glad to continue their work through the help of the Spirit.
This is most certainly true. Amen.


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Religious Holidays in Anchorage

You may have read in the Anchorage Daily News about a new policy regarding certain religious holidays and the scheduling of school activities. If not, a link to the article is here . The new rules do not mean that school will be out on these new holiday inclusions, but that the Anchorage School District will avoid scheduling activities, like sporting events, on these days. The new list includes Passover, Rosh Hashanah , Yom Kippur , Eid al - Fitr and Eid al - Adha . They are added to a list which includes New Year's, Orthodox Christmas and Easter, Good Friday, Easter, Thanksgiving Day and Christmas. The new holidays may be unfamiliar to some: Passover is a Jewish celebration, in the springtime, that commemorates the events in Egypt that led up to the Exodus. The name of the holiday comes specifically from the fact that the angel of death "passed over" the houses of the Israelites during the plague which killed the eldest sons of the Egyptians. Passover is a holiday ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Latibule

I like words and I recently discovered Save the Words , a website which allows you to adopt words that have faded from the English lexicon and are endanger of being dropped from the Oxford English Dictionary. When you adopt a word, you agree to use it in conversation and writing in an attempt to re-introduce said word back into regular usage. It is exactly as geeky as it sounds. And I love it. A latibule is a hiding place. Use it in a sentence, please. After my son goes to bed, I pull out the good chocolate from my latibule and have a "mommy moment". The perfect latibule was just behind the northwest corner of the barn, where one had a clear view during "Kick the Can". She tucked the movie stub into an old chocolate box, her latibule for sentimental souvenirs. I like the sound of latibule, though I think I would spend more time defining it and defending myself than actually using it. Come to think of it, I'm not really sure how often I use the ...
2 comments
Read more

Would I Do?

Palm Sunday Mark 11:1-11 One of my core memories is of a parishioner who said, "I don't think I would have been as brave as the three in the fiery furnace. I think I would have just bowed to the king. I would have bowed and known in my heart that I still loved God. I admire them, but I can tell the truth that I wouldn't have done it." (Daniel 3) To me, this man's honesty was just as brave. In front of his fellow Christians, in front of his pastor, he owned up to his own facts: he did not believe he would have had the courage to resist the pressures of the king. He would have rather continued to live, being faithful in secret, than risk dying painfully and prematurely for open obedience to God.  I can respect that kind of truth-telling. None of us want to be weighed in the balance and found wanting. For some of us, that's our greatest fear. The truth is, however, that I suspect most of us are not as brave as we think we are. The right side of history seems cle...
Post a Comment
Read more