Three friends to motivate you in your spiritual journey  

Wherever you are in your spiritual journey, remember God is with you! This caring Father always calls us to a better and more fulfilled life. As the catholic church approaches the celebration of all the saints, let me introduce you to three friends who will help us to look ahead with hope. 

1. My first fiend is an African gentleman whom I met in the seminary. When he was young, he fathered a child out of wedlock. He was a curious man who experimented with every possible philosophy and religion, and for a while, he had faith in nothing but himself.  

2. The second is a clever woman born into a Jewish family. She was an activist involved in the feminist movement and welcomed in philosophical circles. Brilliant, yes! But arrogant! She didn’t believe in God either.  

3. The third was a real playboy. When he was very young, he lost his parents, but even more tragic, he lost his faith. With the inheritance he received from his parents, he experienced a life of dissipation and barely graduated from the military academy, due to laziness and lack of discipline.  

Why do I tell you this?  You agree how nobody would have given a penny for their lives or their faith. But this is the mystery of the Grace of God. My first friend is one of the Doctors and Fathers of the Church, his name is St. Augustine of Hippo. The Second was a Martyr of the XX century, St. Edith Stein, better known by her religious name St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross. And the third friend became one of the most beloved and simple monks of the desert, St. Charles de Foucault (just canonized a couple months ago). It was Augustine himself who said: “there is no saint without a past, no sinner without a future.”  

As we celebrate all the saints, we are placed before the question of our own destiny. Each one of us is called to be a saint, to be holy, just as our Father is holy (Mt. 5:48). We aren’t born saints; we become saints. All of us are but saint in the making.  

May they help us so one day we may join them in heaven. Amen. 

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