So Great a Cloud of Witnesses

The reality of the Communion of Saints

One of the greatest doctrines of Catholic-Orthodox Christianity is the Communion of Saints. Basically, the doctrine of the Communion of Saints is the same reality as the Body of Christ, the Church. Just as, because of our common human nature, we all share corporately in the first man and woman, so too do we share the identity of Christ through then Mystery of Baptism. We are incorporated into His Body, the Church, and thus, because Christ has entered into His glorious Kingdom, we have confidence that we, the members of His Body will enter into the same glory.

Thus, because we are all members of the same Body, we have communication and friendship among all the parts. We are joined with the part of the Body, which is in Heaven, the Church Triumphant. We are equally joined with that part of the Body, which is undergoing the purification that is necessary to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, the Church Suffering. Lastly, we have a strong communion among all the members of the Body, who are still in this world, "working out their salvation with fear and trembling" as the Holy Apostle Paul describes us. We, who are struggling against spiritual enemies are connected inextricably from those who are undergoing physical persecution for the name of Christ throughout the world. This is the reality of the Church Militant.

Belonging to the Family of God

Basically, another analogy, which could be used for our status in the Church, is that of a family. In Christ, we are members of a close knit family– the closest family possible– which has God as it Father and Head. Furthermore, there are no degrees of distance in the relationships in this family. God has only sons and daughters in Christ, never grandchildren and great grandchildren.

Being a member of the family of God means that we have a Father, Whom we can always trust to act in our best interest with compassion and determination. We may not always understand His actions. Some of His actions may not seem good to us from our worldly point of view. Nevertheless, we can be confident that He does nothing, except what is for our true good. We can rest in that assurance. As the expression goes, we can take that to the bank. Being a member of the family of God means that we always have ample reasons to love the Father. It would be good for us to think each and every day about some of these motives, seeking these reasons out with gratitude.

Being members of the family of God also means that we have brothers and sisters, those who live in this world, true, but also those who have departed this world, who have entered the Kingdom of Heaven, or who are preparing to enter the Kingdom, undergoing purification. We should rely on these strong familial relationships to help us grow closer to God. It goes without saying that we should rely especially on the prayers of those, whom we know are closest to God, those who already dwell in Heaven. We should study and imitate their virtues, because they are the virtues of Christ Himself.

The Great Social Medium

Today there is much attention to and concern about social media of all kinds. Many of our contemporaries find that social media is a massive drain on their time and resources, since platforms like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are designed to draw us in and keep us occupied. Before we know it, we have spent hours that we should have spent in some other way.

In this environment, we should reflect on this, that the Communion of Saints is the ultimate form of social media, because it not only dissolves differences in space as contemporary social media do, but it always dissolves differences, barriers and obstacles of time and dimension. Prayer in the Communion of Saints is social media that reaches from the physical to the spiritual world and that unites us closely, familiarly, with our brothers and sisters, who lived in previous centuries, all the way back to the beginning of the world. Prayer unites us really, truly, not in the sense that I can have multitudes of "friends" whom I barely know. Prayer strengthens relationships that we can count on no matter what, because these are the friends, the brothers and sisters, who are with us in every and all circumstance.

We should strive to deepen these relationships through our interior life: speaking, listening and simply being present. A short reading from the Bible and a short reading from the lives of the saints is a great help to our spiritual life, because in these things we have the basis of shared experience, which we need to converse with God and His friends. Through quiet and thoughtful reading, we can listen to the voice of God, not in our minds, but in our hearts, and we should converse with God about these things in the same environment of attentive silence.