Images of a Communion

I don’t think I really began to understand the concept of the communion of saints until second semester of sophomore year. I knew saints were models of faith, and they have lived at various points throughout history, and we could ask them to pray for us. But they often seemed obscure, distant, and inaccessible to me. Until last year.

During the second semester of sophomore year, I took a class called The Christian Imagination that served as educational background for my role as a Mentor-In-Faith at a summer conference for high school students called Notre Dame Vision. The professors of my class led a tour of the Basilica of the Sacred Heart about halfway through the semester. They gave us forty-five minutes to wander and explore the overwhelmingly stunning artwork that adorns the windows, walls, and ceiling of that sacred space. I studied the prayerful facial expressions and bodily postures of the men and women depicted all over the building, and noticed stories I recognized. Saint Bernadette’s vision of Mary (a scene similarly depicted at the Grotto). The death of Saint Joseph (what better way to die than in Mary and Jesus’ arms?). Moses receiving the Ten Commandments.

Image from an upload on wikimedia.org.

Our time of wandering amidst these images in the Basilica prompted my mind to wander back to my own summer participating in Notre Dame Vision as a high school student, during which our college-aged mentors (now my upcoming role) had challenged us with the question: “Their gifts changed the world. How will yours?” Their, meaning the saints’, gifts had certainly changed the world. That’s why their images were all over the Basilica of the Sacred Heart. But how could my life and my gifts be compared to people whose lives were remembered in such a way that they had been turned into art in my primary worship space? I wanted so badly to understand. 

I snapped out of my reverie when our professors called us to gather as a class near the gleaming golden tabernacle at the front of the Basilica. We took turns sharing our various observations about the sacred artwork we had been reflecting upon, knowing that our professors probably had a bigger point to make that was about to be revealed. They did.

They had us turn and face the entirety of the main worship space in the Basilica. Look at the walls. The windows. The towering ceiling. All covered in images of holy men and women who have gone before us. Look at the pews, where we are invited to sit upon and kneel and stand near while celebrating the Eucharist. Look at the huge empty space in between the pews and those walls, windows, and ceilings. Waiting to be filled with song and praise.

When we celebrate Mass, our professors explained, we join up our prayers with those of holy men and women, not the other way around. We do not ask the communion of saints to join us in our prayers, but rather enter into the communion of saints ourselves when we celebrate the Mass. It's a taste of heaven. The Basilica of the Sacred Heart (and other similar holy spaces) is a gift that invites us to more fully enter into this reality by visualizing the communion which we enter into: the sound waves of our song and praise literally expand as they fill up the physical space in the Basilica, while our prayers join up with the prayer of the communion of saints above and beyond the walls and ceilings of the church itself.

Image from blogs.nd.edu.

This image of my prayers being joined up with those of the communion of saints has become a primary one for me in my worship and prayer, both when I celebrate Mass at the Basilica on campus and when I am in other worship spaces.

For example, while at home this past week for fall break I had the privilege of attending Mass at my high school. We were certainly not in the Basilica of the Sacred Heart: a high school gymnasium is a bit of a drastic shift. But the imagery stays the same; I was seated on the ground floor, with bleachers packed full of students rising up on either side of me. Throughout Mass, I realized another image of the communion of saints was being presented here, as we are all called to use our gifts in the world as the saints who came before us did.

Yes, we are all called to be saints. Today. And Mass at Jesuit High School, with packed bleachers reaching toward the expansive ceiling, and prayers lifted up far beyond, presented me with yet another image of that call.

  

Asking saints to pray for us outside of Mass connects us to these holy men and women, too, and utilizes their special holy capacity for prayer and closeness to Our Father. This practice is a fantastic one to learn how to follow the call to be the saints we were created to be, too. One of my favorite images of the act of asking for the intercession of saints came from a friend at the conclusion of the summer at Notre Dame Vision. “This might be sacreligious,” he laughed, “but sometimes when I ask a saint to pray for me, I imagine them up there saying, ‘Duh…what do you think we’re doing?!’” 

As we lift our prayers up, they enter into a community of constant prayer and praise. This community is called the communion of saints, imaged on the walls and ceiling of the Basilica of the Sacred Heart. Imaged by the people making up the Body of Christ at Mass at my high school. Imaged when we live our lives as the walking, breathing, dynamic saints we are called to be.

Image from dailydomer.nd.edu.

We celebrate All Saints' Day on November 1^st. Read more here.