Saints and relics: connecting us with God and our past 

My Nicolas was confirmed in the spring. As a gift, his uncle and godfather gave him a pretty special item – a pocket watch that belonged to my grandfather.

My grandfather died when I was a baby, only months after my father died. In fact, all but one of my grandparents died before I could meet them. The grandmother who lived passed away when I was still very young. So, in a way, these people who are responsible for my life seem almost mythological.

There are pictures, of course, that prove they existed. There are even a precious two that show them with me. I’ve written before of the one photo I have of my father holding me as a baby. There is also one of my grandfather holding me at my baptism. But somehow the photos don’t complete what is mostly just an abstract familiarity. I look at the photos with a fondness, and an ache, but it’s hard for me to give myself permission to feel a real loss. They were never really mine, I tell myself. I have no memory of them; did they truly exist and love me?

So, when I see and touch something real, something that belonged to these people, it fascinates me. My grandfather held that watch. He set it, and wound it, and put it on his dresser at night. I am touching something that this longed-for stranger once actually held in his hand.

I had the same feeling once when I stood at my father’s grave. I looked down and realized that not that far beneath my feet were the bones of the one man I’ve never met, but missed the most. I thought, “You are right there. There is real proof, right under my feet, that you really existed.” It hurt to think he was so close but so unattainable, but it also took away some of that abstract mythology.

When I hold Nicolas’ new pocket watch, I have a connection to my past that I didn’t have before. I have a sense of relationship; something that was his is now my son’s. This watch is a relic of my grandfather, and it feels like one little puzzle piece making its way into the picture of who I am.

I have a great love for the saints. I read their stories to my children and I wonder and delight in the variety of their lives, educations, talents, callings, cultures. I have never met these people and never see a photo of most of them. But the Church asks us to connect with them, to make a reality of what can too easily become an irrelevant history. 

I know there are some who have a “All I need is Jesus,” point of view. How can someone argue with that, except to say that Christ gave us the saints, so they truly are a part of him. They are something that he has passed down for us to touch, and look at, and reflect upon.

Pope Benedict wrote that we see God’s glory in the lives of righteous and holy men and women, that the lives of the saints are the greatest apologetics for our faith. The proof of God’s goodness and faithfulness is seen in the souls of these who succeeded in conquering the world.

There is no argument that can stand in the face of this. These men and women are our family, our brothers, and sisters. They reach out to us to share an inheritance, another piece of the puzzle to tell us who we are made to be. They were created by him, touched and formed by him. They are, then, a type of relic of God himself.

In drawing closer to the saints we can only succeed in drawing closer to God. The ache within that longs to know him as Father, can be soothed in our connection with those who are now held within his hand.