大象传媒

From Father Brian D鈥橝rcy, a Catholic Passionist priest:

November is when Christian churches remind us that all of us are supposed to live saintly lives. We鈥檙e ALL Saints they say.

I must admit Saints fascinate me because they are so ordinary. To be a canonised saint is not just the privilege of a few but a calling for everyone. Even so becoming a saint seems like another planet as we struggle through life.

Perhaps one reason is that those who wrote the lives of the saints in the past had fertile imaginations; they never failed to over-egg the pudding.聽 But some saints really did live outrageous lives.

聽St Philip Neri (16th Century) used to dress as a clown and shave one side of his face if anyone called him a saint. He had a weird sense of humour. One day a woman confessed to him that she was spreading gossip. Philip asked her to go into the village, buy a chicken and as she walked back, she should pluck the bird and toss the feathers to the wind.

When she returned with her naked chicken, Philip then told her to go back to the village and gather up the feathers she had scattered. She said it was impossible to gather the same feathers.

鈥淎nd once you spread malicious gossip,鈥� the saint told her, 鈥淵ou can never undo the damage either.鈥� Point made.

Real saints live in the real world.聽 Pope Francis got it right when he told an audience of young people that we need worldly saints. 鈥淲e need saints who drink beer, eat hot dogs; saints who surf the internet, listen to their i-pods and share a pizza with their friends,鈥� Francis insisted.

He encouraged his audience to keep up to date with movies, sports and theatre. Saints need to be open, sociable, normal, happy people. We need saints who enjoy the best things of this world. Too many saints belong in a museum rather than a living church. A genuine saint is just a sinner who tries harder.

St Teresa got it right when she prayed: 鈥淔rom sour-faced saints and silly devotions, O Lord deliver us.鈥澛�