What We Shall Be
All Saints 2027
Fr. Tim Nunez
May my spoken word be true to God’s written Word, and bring us all closer to the living Word, Jesus Christ Our Lord.
J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis are two of the great saints who were giants of English literature. Tolkien is best known for The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and other works detailing the origins of the fictitious world they inhabit. Lewis is best known for his many books that explore and explain our Christian faith in our modern times, including Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters and The Chronicles of Narnia, which he wrote to impart Christian ideas to children so they would more easily recognize and grasp them as adults. After his death, his essays, sermons and personal letters were gathered into other books.
But those famous works were written in their spare time. Both of these men were full-time academics and highly regarded giants in their fields of study. Tolkien was a linguist and philologist, which means he studied words and the roots of modern languages. He taught ancient Anglo-Saxon, Middle English, Medieval Literature and Linguistics at Oxford. Lewis taught English literature from the Middle Ages through the Renaissance and classical philosophy at Oxford and later Cambridge. Each of them wrote foundational textbooks in their respective academic fields.
Their shared interest in stories, the English language and philosophy led them to become close colleagues and friends. They formed a small discussion group called the Inklings that lasted for decades. They would meet usually twice a week, Tuesdays for a lunch meeting at a local pub and Thursday evenings in Lewis’ rooms at Magdalene College, to discuss everything from their academic work and students to university politics, and to share feedback on each others’ writing.
You may know that for about 20 years, Lewis was an atheist. That didn’t sit well with Tolkien, who was a devout Roman Catholic Christian. One night, Lewis, Tolkien and another Inkling named Hugo Dyson got into a deep discussion about faith. Around 2:00 in the morning they were getting sleepy, so they decided to continue the conversation at Addison’s Walk, a nearby path that runs a little less than a mile around an open glade. By about 3:00, they had convinced Lewis to see God as the Truth beneath the truths he acknowledged he saw in scripture.
It’s all true. All of it. The truth may be imparted in histories of various people. It may be imparted in parables, poems and proverbs. It may be imparted in analogies, metaphors, symbols or wisdom. God speaks to us in so many ways because we all hear in different ways - and we tend to be hard of listening. But it’s all true.
Remember that Jesus’ primary message is proclaiming the Kingdom of God. When Jesus began his Sermon on the Mount with these Beatitudes, he is teaching about the Kingdom. His message is clear. Our fundamental senses of wrong, grief, sorrow, and our hunger for good and mercy and justice open our hearts, minds and spirits to receive the grace that God has for us. You may be down, you may suffer and be persecuted for His sake, but nothing is going to separate you from your ultimate reward; your place in His kingdom.
Jesus will go on to teach and demonstrate that in many ways; with analogies, parables and references to the Hebrew Scriptures. He will show what it looks like in very tangible ways in his healings and miracles. Ultimately he will demonstrate it in his person. What is the Kingdom of God like? Exhibit A is the risen Christ himself. When he rises from the dead, he is physically among them. He is not a spiritual apparition. He is definitely still him, scars and all, but he’s transformed into a new body that will never age, get sick or deteriorate. He is physical, yet able to come into the room despite locked doors, able to walk for miles yet vanish in a moment.
You may think, “That’s Jesus, he’s the Son, part of God,” which is true. He is different. But note what the Apostle John wrote in his first letter. “Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is.”
In other words, the apostles didn’t understand everything about the risen Jesus, but they did understand that he was a new creation, as Paul put it, the first fruits of the kingdom to which he will bring his people. And, as Jesus himself revealed to John, “They will hunger no more and thirst no more.” They will not be stricken by the heat of the sun or anything else, and God will wipe away every tear.
Once Lewis opened his heart to God, the scriptures became alive to him. Yes, he knew all of it was true and he realized that truth sat at the center of everything else, all meaning and purpose in life and the entire creation. That truth unleashed an atheist to become the most effective Christian writer of the 20th Century.
This truth drives us to celebrate All Saints Day. We are not merely remembering those who have gone before. The figures in our stained glass and on colored crosses remind us that we are surrounded by the great cloud of witnesses to Christ. We are celebrating saints alive with Jesus now. Mercer Barrows, Mark Estes, Fred Ryan, Paula Templeton, John Updike and the Rev. Deacon Palmer Wood are with him; they are as he is.
Meg and I love Tolkien and Lewis. Tolkien is her favorite, Lewis is mine, but we love them both and we have a lot of Inkling-style discussions about their work. So, when we went to Oxford four years ago I arranged a Lewis-Tolkien tour that was great, but wound up being 90% about Lewis and 10% about Tolkien, which was far too little.
I promised Meg we’d go back and fill that gap, which we were able to do a couple of weeks ago. This time our guide focused on Tolkien, but of course given their friendship there was some Lewis as well, including one very special place we’d missed on the previous trip that involved them both: Addison’s Walk
Our guide tried to surprise us as we approached Addison’s Walk. But I realized where we were and whispered it to Meg. That’s when it happened. But I need to set “it” up.
At the end of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the four children who are the main characters, Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy, have been reigning as kings and queens in Narnia long enough to have nearly forgotten our world. One day they go on a hunt together chasing the elusive White Stag, which would grant wishes if you caught him. The stag leads them into a deep part of the forest. There, they stumble across the lamp post they’d seen when they first got to Narnia, but it had been so long ago that they only vaguely remembered it. They push past it and eventually stumble back through the wardrobe back into our world, children again with no time having passed at all in our world.
Back to Addison’s Walk. As we approached it, our guide recounted the story of Lewis’ conversion. But Meg and I were staring in stunned silence. Our guide turned to see what we were looking at. There, about 30 yards away lying in the open field, was a white stag. Our guide, who has been doing these tours for a living for years, said, “I’ve never seen this before.” He whipped out his phone and started taking pictures. We did the same.
And we all felt the same wash of grace. That grace was speaking to our hearts what the Lord spoke to Lewis’ heart that fateful night, which is simply this. Meg and I bear witness to you. It’s all true. All of it. That is your future. It is so easy for the cares of the day to distract us from it. But remember every day, no matter what, how loved you are and the sure promise Our Lord has prepared for you. Look at Jesus. We will be as he is, with all the saints.
AMEN!