11th Sunday after Pentecost 16.8.09 Strong in faith
These days atheists get a lot of publicity. A lot of people are quite proud to be known as non-believers in God. There seems to be a kind of status about it. They like to be seen as people who have the courage to throw off the chains of religious observance and face the world, alone and confident.
If we follow carefully the statements of atheists we detect a strong current of anger at (and even hatred of) religion, especially the Catholic religion. And they are angry with God (whom they say does not exist!)
We could say, in a certain sense, that if one believes in God it is because we want to believe and if we do not believe it is because we do not want to.
What I mean is that if we want to discover God (want to believe) He will make Himself known to us. But if we fight against Him and want to pretend He is not there, He will withhold His graces and let us wander in darkness, without the light of faith.
If our heart is pure we will be led by Him to belief, thus the gift of faith. If you seek you shall find.
If enmeshed in sin then I probably do not want to believe in Him. It is more convenient for me to be a law unto myself. In that case I will not be seeking Him and will not receive or retain the gift of faith.
If I ask you, Do you believe in God: Yes, you say. But do you really really believe it?
There are degrees of belief, in our minds and in our hearts. How much we understand Him and how much we love Him – they both need increasing.
We are looking for a deeper and deeper faith to be so close to God that nothing on this earth can disturb our equilibrium; that we are totally aware of Him at every moment; totally trusting, totally obedient, always yielding to His promptings. We need to be so convinced that we can be happy to be torn apart by lions (cf St Ignatius of Antioch), or be ridiculed by others.
People find reasons for not believing/trusting in God. He did not hear my prayers when my mother was dying. He did not help me when I needed such and such a favour. He lets cyclones and fires happen which kill a lot of innocent people etc etc.
But at root they do not want to believe. Questions about suffering etc are not meant to be asked in isolation. We cannot necessarily say why God would allow the death of a child etc. What we are meant to do is take Him whole , as revealed, and trust in Him. Then the more specific questions will sort themselves out sooner or later.
One thing we can say: If we trusted Him more there would be less disasters.
If we are prepared to listen: OK, Lord, I am listening. I may have a few complaints but I am willing to hear from You. We humble ourselves; let Him open our ears; listen to His word - and then we are better placed to explore both the reasons for our faith and to see it at work in daily life.
Our faith continues to grow and increase.
Our disposition is everything. If we are willing to let God in He will come. We have to humble ourselves first and then we will believe.
Having said ‘Yes’ we still have to deepen that response.
We are accused by unbelievers of believing only because we lack the courage to go it alone. No, we believe these things because they are true. St Paul in the epistle recalls us to the evidence on which our faith is based – the resurrection of Our Lord. It is certain fact; our trust in Him is equally certain.
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