Encore Post: During Martin Luther’s lifetime, the Church Year was filled with Saints’ Days. Thousands of Saints were remembered — and venerated. Some of the pressure on time was controlled by celebrating All Saints’ Day, so the ones without a day could be remembered. The day after was remembered as All Souls’ Day, to pray for the rest of us!
The Lutheran Reformers solved the crowding of the calendar by removing almost all of the non-Biblical saints. A few like St. Valentine, St. Nicholas — and curiously St. Lawrence remain to this day. Local congregations are, of course, free to celebrate others.
Some church bodies, like the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod have recognized the desire to remember figures from church history. The provide a list of Commemorations for figures like Wilhelm Löhe, C. F. W. Walther, Martin Luther and so on. Commemorations, unlike saints’ days, do not have their own propers — special readings, a prayer of the day, psalms, etc.
The point of both kinds of days is to thank God for these faithful men and women. We remember their lives, the way they lived their lives in faith and to pray that we, too, may be faithful. After all, their suffering is over, their tears are gone and their sorrows turned to joy. And it will not be very long before our Lord comes to bring us home, too. With them numbered may we be here and in eternity.
Rev. Robert E. Smith
Concordia Theological Seminary
Fort Wayne, Indiana
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