{"id":2637,"date":"2008-10-31T10:15:00","date_gmt":"2008-10-31T10:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/deaconsbench\/2008\/10\/be-a-saint-all-saints-day-homily-from-2007.html"},"modified":"2008-10-31T10:15:00","modified_gmt":"2008-10-31T10:15:00","slug":"be-a-saint-all-saints-day-homily-from-2007","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/10\/be-a-saint-all-saints-day-homily-from-2007.html","title":{"rendered":"Be a saint: All Saints Day homily from 2007"},"content":{"rendered":"

From last October, here’s part of my homily for All Saints Day 2007<\/a>: <\/p>\n

<\/a>Shortly after he converted to Catholicism in the late 1930s, Thomas Merton was walking the streets of New York with his friend, Robert Lax. Lax was Jewish, and he asked Merton what he wanted to be, now that he was Catholic. <\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d Merton replied, adding simply that he wanted to be a good Catholic. <\/p>\n

Lax stopped him in his tracks. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhat you should say,\u201d he told him, \u201cis that you want to be a saint!\u201d <\/p>\n

Merton was dumbfounded. <\/p>\n

\u201cHow do you expect me to become a saint?,\u201d Merton asked him. <\/p>\n

Lax said: \u201cAll that is necessary to be a saint is to want to be one. Don\u2019t you believe that God will make you what He created you to be, if you will consent to let him do it? All you have to do is desire it.\u201d <\/p>\n

Thomas Merton knew his friend was right. Merton, of course, would go on to become one of the great spiritual thinkers and writers of the last century. His friend Bob Lax would later convert to Catholicism himself — and begin his own journey to try and be a saint. <\/p>\n

But the words Lax spoke ring down through the decades to all of us today. Because they speak so simply and profoundly to our calling as Catholic Christians. <\/p>\n

You should want to be a saint. And to be one, all you need is to wan<\/i>t to be one. <\/p>\n

Of course, if you only want to be a run-of-the-mill, average Christian, that\u2019s probably all you\u2019ll ever be. Every one can do just enough to get by. It\u2019s not hard. <\/p>\n

But the message Christ sends to all of us is an invitation to be something more. In the words of the old Army recruiting ad: be all that you can be. <\/p>\n

Be a saint. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Visit this link<\/a> for the rest.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From last October, here’s part of my homily for All Saints Day 2007: Shortly after he converted to Catholicism in the late 1930s, Thomas Merton was walking the streets of New York with his friend, Robert Lax. 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Prior to that, Deacon Greg worked for 26 years as a writer and producer for CBS News, where he contributed to \"The CBS Evening News with Katie Couric,\" \"60 Minutes II,\" \"48 Hours,\" (Emmy Award, Writers Guild of America Award) and \"Sunday Morning.\" He was co-writer for the acclaimed documentary \"9\/11,\" hosted by Robert DeNiro. (Emmy Award, Christopher Award, Peabody Award, Writers Guild of America Award.) His radio essays were featured in the bestselling book \"Deadlines and Datelines\" by Dan Rather. He's also a two-time winner of the Catholic Press Association Award. Other places you may find him: AMERICA, U.S. CATHOLIC, CATHOLIC DIGEST, REALITY (Redemptorist Communications) and THE BROOKLYN TABLET. He also contributes homiletic reflections to the parish resource CONNECT!, published by Liturgical Publications. In November 2009, he began serving a three-year term as a consultant to the Communications Committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). Deacon Greg grew up in Maryland (Go Terps!) but he and his wife today live in the beautiful borough of Queens, New York. You can contact Deacon Greg at dcngreg@gmail.com.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/author\/gkandra"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/204"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2637\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}