“For me to be a saint means to be myself,” Thomas Merton
I came across a company a few years ago that took well-known celebrities and, in a way, sainted them by putting their visages on candles. I bought an Ariana Grande candle for my daughter and have noticed that more and more artists are creating these candles (here are some examples from an Etsy page called “The Altar Egos”).
I find them mostly humorous, but I also confess there’s a small rule-follower part of me that wonders, “Is this sacrilegious?” I’ve read a couple quotes recently about sainthood, however, that makes me realize that perhaps I should be rethinking what being a saint is all about.
When you hear the word “saint,” visions of religious figures memorialized in stained glass often come to mind. Or maybe you think of modern-day individuals who seem to do herculean religious tasks that no “normal” person could aspire to. I wonder, though, if by putting these people on pedestals or (officially or unofficially) conferring sainthood upon them, we conveniently let ourselves off the hook. For me, I think about people like Bryan Stevenson of the Equal Justice Initiative or Sister Helen Prejean and think, “Oh, wow, what they do is amazing. I could never do anything like that. But they’re basically saints and I am not a saint so, therefore, I’ll just admire them from afar (maybe buy a candle with their visage on them!) and go on with my life.”
But sainthood is much broader than that. I recently reread the short, but rich book, “Becoming Who You Are,” by Fr. James Martin. There were several quotes in the book about sainthood (like the one mentioned above) and also this one from Mother Teresa: “Holiness is not the luxury of the few. It is everyone’s duty: yours and mine.” And then I read this quote yesterday from James C. Howell, “Saints are flesh and blood, just like you and me, no stronger, no more intelligent. And that is the point. They simply offer themselves to God, knowing they are not the elite, fully cognizant that they are inadequate to the task, that their abilities are limited and fallible…Being a saint is simply being the person God made me to be.”
So I wrote a little note to myself and put it on my desk: Be a saint today. Be yourself. When we offer ourselves–our fallible, tired, humble selves–to the work of God, the Spirit does some pretty remarkable things with that.
If you go to the Altar Egos Etsy page, you may notice that there’s a “Request Custom Order” button. I take that to mean that I can be sainted with a candle, too. So can you.