All Saint's Day and Jean Noel's funeral: What does it mean to be a saint?

I was a friend/acquaintance of Jean Noel for over 30 years before I found out that she died unexpectedly this week.

Only a few weeks ago I was at Mass with Jean, helping her a little bit to stand up so that she could go to receive the Body of Christ from the priest. It was something she did almost every day.

Fr. Chas Canoy, the parochial vicar of St. Thomas the Apostle Church in Ann Arbor, gave the sermon at her funeral. He began by explaining that before Jean started to suffer crippling arthritis as a child, she had wanted to be a ballerina. She told Fr. Canoy about this ambition. In conversations with him and her friends, like Barb Brown who shared about her at her funeral, she confirmed that she believed she would "dance in heaven."

Her funeral was unbelievable.

A lot of people were there, friends and family, and members of the Word of God, the Sword of the Spirit, the Servants of the Word and the Servants of God's Love. Health care workers from St. Joseph Mercy Hospital and private care workers, who said that she lifted their spirits more than they lifted hers. Also present were a Washtenaw County Circuit Court judge and a former UM Medical School professor whom I met for the first time at the luncheon afterwards. There many more people I knew from St. Thomas, Christ the King, U of M Hospital and other associations.

This is the first funeral I've ever been at where I've sensed in any way that the person involved should be advanced in candidacy for sainthood. As you know, this kind of process has to start with a grassroots discernment of the faithful in the community where the candidate practiced her faith.

If you are reading this blog entry and knew Jean--it doesn't really matter if you missed the funeral. You saw Jean's example yourselves--she showed us how to live so that we can turn our suffering into something unimaginably precious. The readings were about the "weight of glory" that is earned when those who bear a burden of suffering can look past it and learn to live in joy and hope. Such people pass that joy and hope on to others. The bask in God's love, offered to all but preferentially given to those who need it most, who seek it most, who are open to receiving it.

It seems like she died unexpectedly, I only heard vague details. Barb Brown said she and Jean went out to dinner at Bob Evans a week before Jean started on the path towards death. I heard Jean went in for a procedure and the person who told me this thought they heard that something went wrong. Suddenly, Jean was in a fight for her life. The incident happened on Monday and she died on Wednesday, Oct. 29. Her life and death was gloriously celebrated at St. Thomas Church -- where she was a daily communicant though a member of both St. Thomas and Christ the King.

All of us who knew her are greatly enriched by her life and death.

In the Catholic Church there has always been something called "white martyrdom," referring to people who live the suffering of martyrs and testify to their faith by relying on God's grace every day of their lifes. Recently deceased Pope John Paul II was such a white martyr.

Certainly Jean also lived a white martyrdom that commends her to God and to us as an example of holiness--suffering with joy, living close to God, relying on His mercy and His saving grace. We are all amazed at the power of that witness. Certainly it is a gift and a grace to us, the Church militant, as we try to live a life that involves suffering (though nothing like what she experienced), and as we try to rely on God's daily grace and endless mercy (though nothing like how she did this),

I prayed to Jean for one thing already. It's something I can share with close friends, but probably not publicly on my blog site. Nevertheless, it is a small miracle, and the prayer I prayed at her funeral was answered before the end of the day.

Great to have Jean, who interceded all her life, now available to us down here living in the valley of tears, the Church militant but also suffering. People like her give us hope, and that's what All Saints Day is all about.

As for advancing her cause for sainthood, that is the job of all of us in the Body of Christ who knew her. Regarding such a cause for her, I mostly think I should pray to Jean and her friend God and see what God wants.