Family stories

This weekend marks a turning of the year in many ways. Halloween, or All Hallows Eve, was in the old understanding a night when the veil was thinner between the living and the dead. That idea was incorporated into the feast of All Saints and the accompanying All Souls (or All Faithful Departed), making three days when we remember those who have died, both our loved ones and the great saints and martyrs of the church. To cap it off, we will shift back off of Daylight Savings Time, and it will be raining. All of that makes for a sharp tilt toward the waning of the year.

We have friends who host an Ancestors Dinner each year at this time, inviting guests to prepare and bring a dish from their ancestors or cultural ancestry and share the story of that dish. (I made my great-grandmother's currant tarts last year; this year we'll make the French butter lettuce salad Jim's mother always made, following her years in Paris.) Last year it took nearly an hour to hear everyone's stories, our mouths watering as we waited to eat. But it was well worth it, a beautiful ritual of remembering and connecting with one another. It is rare we share these stories outside of our own families, so hearing them from others, friends and strangers, is precious. Our families make us, warts and all. It's important we remember them together.

On Sunday we'll name aloud in our prayers those who have died. I invite you to share their stories with one another after the service and in the week to come, and to give thanks to God for the good -- and even not-so-good -- stories that make you who you are. God uses all of it, and we are precious in his eyes.