The Feast of All Saints, Monday, November 1, 2021

Revelation 7:2–4, 9–14

I, John, saw another angel come up from the East, holding the seal of the living God. He cried out in a loud voice to the four angels who were given power to damage the land and the sea, “Do not damage the land or the sea or the trees until we put the seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God.” I heard the number of those who had been marked with the seal, one hundred and forty-four thousand marked from every tribe of the children if Israel.  After this I had a vision of a great multitude, which no one could count, from every nation, race, people, and tongue. They stood before the throne and before the Lamb, wearing white robes and holding palm branches in their hands. They cried out in a loud voice: “Salvation comes from our God, who is seated on the throne, and from the Lamb.”  All the angels stood around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. They prostrated themselves before the throne, worshiped God, and exclaimed:  “Amen. Blessing and glory, wisdom and thanksgiving, honor, power, and might be to our God forever and ever. Amen.”  Then one of the elders spoke up and said to me, “Who are these wearing white robes, and where did they come from?” I said to him, “My lord, you are the one who knows.” He said to me, “These are the ones who have survived the time of great distress; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.”

Here is the Zoom kink and the other information to attend tonight’s Bible Study on the Gospel of Matthew, 8:00 PM eastern time, 7:00 PM central time:

https://us05web.zoom.us/j/3806645258?pwd=MUNuU0ZxNFM3NnpiclZCcFF6SFhyQT09

Meeting ID: 380 664 5258

Passcode: 140026

Feast days in honor of all the saints of God have been celebrated since ancient times.  In 837,  Pope Gregory IV ordered its general observance on November 1.  

The Book of Revelation offers various descriptions of the crowd of saints.  In chapter seven, used here as the First Reading for today’s Feast, John the Apostle, who received the seven visions recorded in this book, tells how he saw an angel that had “come up from the East”.  The Venerable Bede explains that this “angel” is the Son of God, the Angel of Great Counsel.  At the end of the final persecution, he holds back with a command the four angels who have fought against the wicked nations of the world.  He orders them, “Do not damage the land or the sea or the trees until we put the seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God.”  That is, now that the terrible persecution is over — “There shall be then great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be” (Matthew 24, 21) — the Faithful, who have hidden, will be revealed to all.  The “seal” on their foreheads is the Sign of the Cross, the sign of Christ’s victory.  There are two bodies of the Faithful united in their belief and perseverance in the Lord.  The first group is that of the “children of Israel”, the Jewish Christians, of which there are many, but which are still a small part of the whole, for the second group, that of the Gentile Christians, is said to be “a great multitude, which no one could count, from every nation, race, people, and tongue.”  All “stood before the throne and before the Lamb, wearing white robes and holding palm branches in their hands.”  That is, they stood before the throne of God the Father and before his Son, who appears as the Lamb that was slain.  The Lamb stands between the saints and the Father in intercession for them, and also as though introducing them into the Kingdom of heaven.  They wear their baptismal robes, which they have washed white in the Blood of the Lamb through their perseverance in the Faith.  The “palm branches” signify their victories in Christ through martyrdom and against the temptations of this world.

“Salvation comes from our God, who is seated on the throne, and from the Lamb!”  The saints cry out in exultation that they have been saved by God and that they could not have been saved due to their own efforts alone.  It is a cry of great gladness and of thanksgiving after their sufferings on the earth.  “All the angels stood around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. They prostrated themselves before the throne, worshiped God, and exclaimed.”  The court of heaven — the angels and the Church already present in heaven (the elders and the four living creatures), throw themselves before the throne at the sight of their brothers and sisters who are brought safely home.  They exclaim: “Amen. Blessing and glory, wisdom and thanksgiving, honor, power, and might be to our God forever and ever. Amen.”  Almighty God, in his marvelous Providence and with his great wisdom and power has brought honor and glory upon himself in the salvation of the saints.  

“Then one of the elders spoke up and said to me, ‘Who are these wearing white robes, and where did they come from?’ ”  The elders are the Prophets and Apostles.  John is perhaps seeing a vision of himself in the future, at the end of time.  The elder seeks an answer to his question, but John is too overwhelmed to offer one.  This foretells the awe which will fill us when we look upon the choirs of the saints at that time.  “These are the ones who have survived the time of great distress; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.”  Of that great distress at the end, the Lord says, “And unless those days had been shortened, no flesh should be saved: but for the sake of the elect those days shall be shortened” (Matthew 24, 22).  The present time and, indeed, all of time since the first coming of the Lord, has been one of great tribulation, for the devil knows his time is short.  Each day of our life we are washing our robes and making them white in the Blood of the Lamb through our constant faith and our good works.  One day, we shall put on those robes, and they will shine as no fuller on earth could make them (cf. Mark 9, 2).  At that time, we will join the saints in heaven, whose prayers assisted us during our earthly lives.