I've never thought about "celebrating" All Saint's Day! How would one start?

Answer:

All Saints Day is a Saturday this year, so we actually have time to do something special over and above the secular All Hallow's Eve celebrations. I enjoy making a visit with the girls to the little heritage cemetary down by the Stampede grounds, taking flowers to the graves of long-ago and largely forgotten little child saints who are so sadly common in graveyards more than 100 years old.

Of course, most of the day will be rehearsals at the ballet studio; the demands of Art recognize few holidays. Sara's pew-work for the last couple weeks have been recommending Saints stories in preparation for the holiday. I seem to have lost the big flat rubbermaid box where the All-Saints periphernalia -- long-ago home-made icons, and candle-holders dedicated to different saints (not to mention the pumpkin carvers) -- have their home for the rest of the year. It's odd: I can find all the other neatly labelled boxes for Michaelmas, Advent, Christmas, Valentine's, Easter, Roodmas; but not All Saints. I'll have to start anew, I guess.

All Saints often gets complicated because Rachel's Birthday is two days before, and needs to be shunted onto the weekend if she's to have a children's party. That will happen again this year. Fortunately, she's at a point where her rehearsal schedule doesn't get heavy until later in November, so I should be able to carry that off.

We actually celebrate All Saints when we celebrate Hallowe'en: that's what Hallowe'en means: All Saints (Hallow's) Even. The Hallowe'en theme ghosties and dead spirits is a common-man, but sadly uninformed, recognition of the presence of the dearly departed -- "all saints" -- with us in the same communion of saints. The custom of dressing up (whatever you may have read on reactionary Christian websites about Satanists and druids and drinking blood, or whatever unhistorical clap-trap they've come up with this year) comes from the medaeival custom of "guising", or dressing up as saints and biblical characters to travel from house to house to put on miniature passion plays as a sophisticated form of begging. Kind of like Christian door-to-door busking! It wasn't limited to Hallowe'en, in fact it was more associated with Michaelmas, but with the emphasis on the saints at All Saints it's fairly appropriate.

Of course, I've been trying for years to get my kiddies to choose Saints to dress up as, and you can see how little success I've had LOL!

As Anglicans, we believe that all Christ's baptized persons are "saints" -- either saints militant like me and I presume you, or saints triumphant like Paul and Mother Teresa and my grandma. The Roman Catholics, who of course influence our tradition, distinguish between Saints who have been recognized by the church hierarchy and who are celebrated on November 1; and all the rest who are celebrated on November 2. That's not doctrinally sound from an Anglican perspective. But it's not entirely wrong, either. As the third highest holy-day in the Church year (preceded by Easter and Pentecost, but not Christmas!) All Saints is one of the feasts that has an "Octave" -- that is, it is rightly celebrated for eight days. So there's nothing wrong with continuing the celebration from November 1 to November 2. I do object to distinguishing between Saints recognized by Rome, and those who are not. But in most cases it's more a matter of distinguishing between those we're pretty sure are "triumphant", and those we sure hope are "triumphant". Of course, if you believe in universal salvation even that distinction doesn't hold.

Anything that commemorates the faithful departed -- whether ancient Saints whom you revere, or recent saints who are dear at a more personal level, is a good celebration of All Saints. Sara mentions reading the stories of the Saints to her children, and baking family recipes that were specialties of now-dead relatives. We're going to replace some lost kiri-game (cut paper) saints icons, and have a grave-yard picnic and take some flowers or flowerseeds to tend some of the abandoned graves (unless it snows). Rachel's really keen on doing something for All Saints *Day* this year, to bring it up in importance relative to All Saints *Eve*.

All Saints is also a baptismal festival -- one of the four preferred days for holding baptisms. So if any members of your family were baptized on All Saints, you can celebrate their "re-Birthday" with a cake, reading and reaffirming baptismal vows, and lighting their baptismal candle.