On Becoming a Saint (Please scroll down line by line as you read)

We become saints by living according to what God has given us, nothing more, nothing less. We often live in envy or jealousy of someone else's life and in doing so miss our own life and vocation.

St. Paul in I Corinthians 12 talks about the "unseemly members" of the body being the more necessary. In Romans 9 he talks about the Potter and the clay and that God fashions some vessels for honorable use (Ming Vases) and some for dishonorable use (toilets), but in the end you can live without a Ming vase easier than the other and in a pinch you'd use a Ming vase for dishonorable purposes.

I told the men at the Shelter, the reality is that more of us are toilets than vases and our purpose is taking crap from life and other people gracefully, like Christ who took all the crap Satan and humanity could dump on Him as God. "Dishonorable use" doesn't mean "going to hell" it just means we are perhaps blessed with a greater and more needful purpose and therefore will have greater temptations and trials in life. Those who have it "easy" don't often become saints.

It is those who fulfill their purpose and are willing to take the crap and do the "dirty work" of being holy, who go to and associate with the lowly, the dirty, the dregs- and yes, even the assholes - who are the ones who are saved and who save those around them. The saint in this icon is the one you can't see... like most of the saints in this life.