All Saints Day
November 1, 2026
I am starting with a confession that All Saints Day was not a day of celebration in the Presbyterian church, in the small Quaker town of Swarthmore where I grew up. I had heard of the day, but it was the Catholic church folks who celebrated not the Protestant churches in this small town. So..I thought that besides myself, maybe there were others here at Seekers that wondered about what All Saints Day was all about.
I want to start with a short story about a little boy and his mother. I found this story on the internet as I was reading and did some simple adapting:
“One day a mother was walking through a beautiful church building with her 4-year-old son.
As they walked, the young boy looked around.
The little boy stopped and was curious about the stained-glass windows that looked so beautiful with their bright colors.
As he looked at the windows, he asked: “Who are all these people in the windows, Mommy?”
“They are the saints,” said the mother.
“What are saints, Mommy?”
The Mother was stuck.
How was she going to explain who saints are to a 4-year-old boy?
As the boy was still looking up at the windows and as the Mother was still wondering how she would explain who saints are, the young boy shouted out:
“I know who saints are. They are people that the light shines through.”
DEFINITION OF SAINTS AND ALL SAINTS DAY
Observed on November 1st or the Sunday thereafter, the FEAST OF ALL SAINTS is how many churches celebrate and honor all known and unknown saints who have been faithful in serving Christ and a Living God throughout history. Saints seem to fall into 5 categories and include:
- Biblical figures: Apostles, prophets, and other individuals from the Old and New Testaments who played significant roles in history such as St Mary, Mother of Jesus, St. Peter, St. Stephan
- Martyrs: Those who suffered and died for their faith in Christ throughout history such as Joan of Arc, & Saint Thomas Becket – Archbishop of Canterbury,
- Canonized saints: Individuals officially recognized by the Catholic and Orthodox Churches for their extraordinary lives of holiness and virtue, often associated with a miracle. Examples include St. Francis of Assisi, St. Teresa of Avila, and St. Teresa of Calcutta (Mother Teresa.)
- Unrecognized or forgotten saints: Countless believers throughout history and now who have lived faithful lives but have not been officially recognized by a canonization process of the Catholic Church. Many of these saints lived quiet lives of faithfulness, hope, suffering, service to others and love. Examples in present day may be Martin Luther King
- Loved ones: Family members and friends who have passed away and whose lives of caring and service should be remembered by their living friends and family.
These Saints are individuals who possessed qualities of courage, faithfulness, love, service, listening, hopefulness, commitment, openness to the sacred, as they lived their lives and in their relationship with God and the Holy Spirit.
In Seekers, we recognize those who have been faithful as part of this community and the special qualities that each person has brought to us. Two individuals that we are recognizing today are: Vincent Shepherd and Mary Clare Powell. Each person will have a tile with their name on it and be placed on our Memorial Wall with the other Saints who have been part of our community over the years.
Let me tell you a little about Vince and Mary Clare:
Vincent Shepherd died in 2023 at the age of 66. Somehow, we didn’t get a tile placed on the memory wall at that time – but it’s there now.
Known to his extended family in Chicago as “Uncle Vinny,” he was always a dapper dresser and a quiet presence here at Seekers. Vince loved classical jazz, professional sports and good food. He cooked at Charley’s Place, a feeding program for the homeless out of St Margaret’s Church in DC and he was willing to learn vegetarian cooking for our School of Christian Growth here at Seekers. Once homeless himself, Vince became a Stewards because his mission group, Mission Support, was in danger of losing its status when another steward moved away.
When Vince developed cancer, Dave Lloyd drove him to many of his appointments at Johns Hopkins and others helped to move his things when he died alone in his beloved new apartment. I do think Vince found a home here with us at Seekers.
Mary Clare Powell died late in 2025 at the age of 83. She was a founding member of Seekers and stayed in touch with various people here when she moved for her Doctorate in Education from UMass. A tall, rangy woman with high energy and a generous soul, she was a poet, writer, photographer and teacher. And she was the very first recipient of a Growing Edge grant from Seekers to publish her first book, The Widow, which was about her mother, Ruth Powell, who was also a member of Seekers.
Mary Clare always focused on the people around her, asking fresh new questions and engaging everyone in new ventures. She led the first women’s retreat for Seekers in the mid-80s and mounted her first photographic exhibit upstairs at 2025 Mass. Avenue. In years after that, she would come for poetry readings at the Potter’s House whenever a new book of her poems was published. According to her partner, Violet Walker, Mary Clare’s life “asks something of us now: to notice, to ask, to accept, and to love more deeply than we think we have time for.”
NAMING OUR SAINTS ACTIVITY (leave 10 minutes for this)
Personally, we have had many “unrecognized and loving” saints throughout our life’s journey. At your seat, you will find a “post-it note tablet” and small pencil. Take a few minutes in silence and try to remember one individual who in your own life was a saint: i.e. they had a certain characteristic, quality of being, or “where the light shined through” that was important for you in your own Life’s spiritual journey. It can be a biblical person, a martyr, a recognized or unrecognized Saint or a loved one.
Write that person’s name AND the quality or characteristic that you saw in that person. Hopefully We will have time to share a few of these. It is up to you as to sharing. You can keep the post-it for yourself or place in offering plate.
TIME TO SHARE A PERSON? MY EXAMPLE (only if time)
As I thought about those individuals who are saints for me, Elizabeth O’Connor comes to mind. Elizabeth was the author of many books about the Church of the Savior and its life as a progressive Christian church. I was very young when I first knew Elizabeth (Betty O as I called her then) and she would visit our apartment in Adams Morgan when my toddler, Jenny, was napping. Elizabeth shared her thoughts and struggles about group life, mental health, and really believing in a living God. I shared the demands of parenthood, being away from a career path, and feeling torn by various life demands. She had qualities of being a good listener, a questioner and deep seeker of truth.
SAINTS AS PART OF A COMMUNITY
However, All Saints Day also should remind us that while they were extraordinary individuals, many of the past saints were also part of a Holy family, a tribe or community—a collection of persons who served as a body of Christ and Holy Spirit. That community held that person by listening, giving hope, and purpose.
All Saints’ Day is a time to honor past Christians and to let their special characteristics influence our lives. This day encouraging us as a community to connect with and support each other as believers. We are all called to live with faithfulness, courage, love, trust, and service, following the saints’ footsteps and to be part of a supportive community who are committed to sharing God’s love. We need to support “the light shining” in others but also to see that it shines in ourselves and nurturing it too. We are ALL saints!