When the Saints go marching in

The song “When the Saints Go Marching In, “originated as a 19th century Protestant hymn and was famously recorded in 1938, by Louis Armstrong  transforming it into the timeless jazz tune of today. Its lyrics were inspired by the Biblical book of Revelation and other parts of Scripture.

When the saints go marching in, we all want to be in their number, after death, to go to Heaven -- a place where all the saints go. And to go there, we all have to be saints, because a person who enters heaven is a saint. Catholic saints are men and women who had lived holy lives on this good Earth, in obedience to God’s will.

In reading the lives of saints, and Jesus’ sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew we have to discipline ourselves like the saints to be concerned about others who are less fortunate than us. So, we pray: Dear God, thank you for giving us the glorious example of the Saints. We want to be in their company, praising you, forever in Heaven. Please help us to follow in their footsteps, and yours, Jesus Christ. Amen  

Jesus said, “I go to prepare a place for you... I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am there you may be also". We all know that Jesus will come on the Last Judgment Day.  Although we do not know when; but we know from the Bible what will happen on that last day:

“The sun will be darkened, the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky; the heavenly bodies will be shaken. The heavens will open.  He will come with the clouds.

And every eye shall see him..." And those “in the grave hear His voice and the dead will come forth”. It will be "a resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked".

Then the divine scrutiny will start on the basis of behavior toward one another; whether we had committed the sin of insensitivity like that in the parable of the rich man who was insensitive towards the poor man “Lazarus” near him. Similarly, do we not notice our brother in need; --- the thirsty, the stranger, the naked; for what we do for others is more important than what we do for ourselves to receive God's blessings.

And then, “He separates the people…as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats;” and then the King says to those on his right, “Come you who are blessed and inherit the kingdom prepared for you.”

“We all, who are still alive, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. “Lord we want to be the one on your right side among the throng of saints marching into heaven; we want to be in that number.

God created humans, to live forever on the earth. But Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit disobeying God’s order. So, they lost the chance of eternal life for themselves and brought sin and death to all of their descendants. But on the Final Judgment Day, Paradise lost in Genesis will be regained and we all want to go there marching with the saints in Paradise when we die.