The beauty of worshipping in a faith tradition that observes a set liturgical calendar is that each day in the prayer and life of the church becomes a milestone in commemorating either an event in the birth, life and death of Christ or in remembering those Saints whose lives reflected Christ in our world or the Angels who direct us to God. These liturgical milestones in turn dove tail with the many milestones — some happy, some sad, some joyful, some heart breaking, some awe inspiring — within our own daily lives. Liturgical worship does not take away the grief and sorrow from the milestones in our daily lives, but it does help redeem those sad events in our lives and see them with a transcending view of how they relate to a greater Life and Love we are called to know in Christ and God.
Today is one of those days in the liturgical calendar where the feast observed has helped heal and console the grief I once knew on this calendar day of October 2. Today in the liturgical calendar of the church is the feast day of the Holy Guardian Angels. We each have our own guardian angel. Jesus referred to this in Matthew 18:10 and there are many references in the Hebrew Scriptures to the angels. Rudolf Steiner taught that not only do individuals have guardian angels, but so do families, villages, churches and cities. The Jewish mystics in ancient times beleived that all of creation had guardian angels down to each blade of grass having it’s own angel guiding it to reach to the Light.
I remember 37 years ago like it was yesterday. It was long before I became Catholic and long before I worshipped in a faith tradition that observed a liturgical calendar. I woke up on October 2, 1977 as a ten year old whose house was full of uncles and aunts and family friends. It was a Sunday morning. My brothers and mother and I were all still in shock from the unexpected sudden death of my father the day before. We were kind of walking zombies dealing with the sudden grief of coming to terms with something none of us could have imagined, nor desired.
I remember walking through our living room, bypassing the many family members and family friends sitting and talking there and having a moment of solitude leaning on the stereo cabinet facing the wall pinching my arm and my 10 year old self asking myself in my thoughts, “Is this really real? Or is it just a dream? a bad dream I will wake up from? Is Dad really dead?” Pinching myself didn’t wake me up. I continued in my solitary moment, “God is it real? Can’t I just go back to sleep and wake up to Friday morning when we all were a happy family? Or even Saturday morning? I’ll stay home from the football game in Stillwater and stay with Dad and keep him from dying. Just let me wake from this.”
Somewhere in those first few moments of ever experiencing grief, that 10 year old boy heard a voice say in his thoughts, “Don’t be afraid. You’ll be ok. Your family will be ok. Your Dad is ok. Trust me. I am here right beside you. God loves you and your family and your Dad. It will be ok. We’ll take it one step at a time. Ok?”
Thus, began my awareness of the presence of a force within and around me guiding and directing me and helping me to realise I had nothing to fear but that things would be ok. On that day, I began to know and learn about my own guardian angel. I may not have been able to put it into those words to describe it then, but I knew I had somehow tapped into a personal presence that always assured me of God’s presence in my life.
Dad’s funeral was the next morning and at his funeral I would hear those same words I heard in my mind the day before. Only this time, they were spoken differently as my Uncle Larry, a Baptist Minister, preached at my Dad’s funeral with the words from Isaiah 41:10 “Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you; yes, I will help you. Yes, I will uphold you…”
Everyone deals with grief in a their own way. My 10 year old self dealt with it by first wanting to barter with God on how to go back and wake up before my Dad died. In time, this initial sudden loss in my life served to awaken me to the presence of my guardian angel and the awareness of God’s grace unfolding in my life. I can’t say that I ever “got over” the death of my Dad and I would give anything to have him physically present in my life. Just as I would the subsequent loved ones — family and friends — that would die as my life continued on. But I know that it sparked a deeper awareness and experience of the Divine in my life.
The grief is still there in many ways. But it shaped me and formed me into the person of faith that I am today.
The pain and sorrow of losing my Dad has in time been healed and consoled by the memories of the joy I shared with my family and my Dad and no doubt by the ministering of my own guardian angel and my family’s guardian angel.
Many times throughout my life since then I have come to know first hand the presence of my guardian angel.
The blessing of worshiping in tradition that observes a liturgical calendar is that the date October 2nd has been redeemed in my spiritual journey from not just being the day after that sad and sorrowful day when I was 10 years old and my Dad died, but being that day that the church remembers all the Holy Guardian Angels each and every one of us has and calling to mind that day in 1977 when I first came to know first hand my own guardian angel.
So today thank God for your guardian angel, for your family’s guardian angel, and all the guardian angels. The closing prayer from today’s Office of Readings is a beautiful way to do so:
Almighty God, in your all-wise providence you send angels to guard and protect us. Surround us with their watchful care on earth, and give us the joy of their company forever in heaven.
We ask this through Christ your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. AMEN.
Originally Published 10/2/2014