In the final revelation before God, we shall be transformed into God’s own image because we shall see God as he really is. The Solemnity of ALL SAINTS is a celebration that honors all the uncountable men and women who lived the beatitudes while here on earth, but whose names are not found in the official canon of the Church. It is a feast that highlights the church’s long-held belief that sanctity is within everyone’s reach, and that in our struggles here on earth, we strive to achieve sanctity since it is for this that we were created. Sanctity, which is nothing other than leading a life that is informed by the beatitudes (values that call us into communion with the Holy Trinity), is the goal of creation. Men and women are created for God (to be in communion with God) and for the glory of God. This communion with God, otherwise known as heaven or eternal life, is the ultimate end and fulfillment of the deepest human longings (cf. CCC 1024). The uncountable men and women whom we are celebrating today have had this longing fulfilled for they are already rejoicing with the angels in heaven, rendering praise and worship to their creator God. 
As our final end and goal, the journey to heaven begins at creation. At creation, every man and woman is put on this path for we are created for God and our goal is to return to God. As such, every single action of ours is to be directed towards attaining this goal. It is not something that we do in addition to living our “ordinary” lives. It is not an extra effort that we have to put in addition to doing our daily tasks. Rather, it is in simply living our lives as God intended us to do that we stay on this path to sanctity. The majority of the men and women whose memory we honor today did not accomplish out of the ordinary feats, as it were. Most of them do not have streets and alleys named after them in recognition of their extraordinary achievements. Many of them do not even have headstones on their graves that detail their great accomplishments. They are honored today because they simply lived their lives as best as they could. Some of them are even known to us, for they are our mothers, fathers, family members, friends, and mentors. They are people whose lives challenged and inspired us in our encounters with them because they faithfully lived their calls as mothers, fathers, husbands, wives, teachers, housewives, and good neighbors. They lived the beatitudes.
Saints are those who have heard the summons of the gospel of Jesus Christ and taken it to heart. They are the poor in spirit, those who do not flaunt their achievements before God or lay claim to a reward for what they have done. They are those who stand before God not with hands that grasp and clutch but with hands that open and give. Saints are those who are meek and humble of heart, those who work for peace in their communities. They are those who have reconciled themselves with, and are living in harmony with God, with their fellow man, and with the self. Saints are men and women of faith, that is, those who walk in God’s ways, those who thirst for God in order to become perfect imitators of God (cf. Pope Benedict XVI,  Jesus of Nazareth). Saints are those who believe that God created us for a purpose, a purpose whose fulfillment begins here on earth where God has inserted us. 
In our celebration of these men and women, therefore, we not only recognize their fidelity in living out their call but we also assure ourselves that we too can fulfill our longing for eternal happiness with God. Their being declared saints is an assurance to us that sanctity is within our reach, for as St. John has reminded us in the Second Reading, we too have been found worthy to be counted as God’s children. We have attained sainthood already when we are faithful to our identity as sons and daughters of God, as brothers and sisters of Jesus.