Daily Retreat 09/19/07
2007 Sep 19 Wed/ Januarius, bp, mt
1 Tm 3: 14-16/ Ps 110(111): 1-2. 3-4. 5-6/ Lk 7: 31-35
From today’s readings: “You should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth.... How great are the works of the Lord!... Wisdom is vindicated by all her children....”
The Church of the Living God, the Pillar and Foundation of Truth!
Faith is by nature deeply personal, but it must also be interpersonal. When someone comes to believe in God, that person soon realizes that other people also believe in God, yet there are differences (some big, some small) in what is believed! So the person must decide: Is my faith the only right faith? OR Are all beliefs about God right, even when contradictory? OR Does this or that group of people have it right?
The first option (my faith is right, everyone else is wrong) is hopelessly subjective and idiotically arrogant. God helps anyone with a rational mind and an ounce of humility to get past this option quickly.
The second option (faith is purely personal, so you can believe one thing about God, I can believe the opposite, and yet we’re both right) is appealing on the surface because being open-minded is generally esteemed as a virtue in our culture. Yet obstinate open-mindedness can petrify into an eerie inability to commit to any truth – to paraphrase G.K. Chesterton: “We must never forget that the reason for opening the mind is the same as for opening the mouth: so that ultimately, it can clamp down on something solid (rather than stay open indefinitely)!” If one person believes that God cares about our personal morality (and that will affect our salvation) and another person believes that God has already arbitrarily decided who goes to Heaven, they can’t both be right. Certainly God has made fundamental truths about Himself (and His expectations of us!) crystal clear, or there would be no reason to believe in Him! So the second option is a dead end.
So, inevitably, in a search of faith, one must consider what groups of people believe. For all who follow Jesus Christ, Paul’s praise of the Church as “the pillar and foundation of Truth” should give us cause to think: if the Church solemnly teaches a certain doctrine, but I believe something else, which one has the Truth?
1 Tm 3: 14-16/ Ps 110(111): 1-2. 3-4. 5-6/ Lk 7: 31-35
From today’s readings: “You should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth.... How great are the works of the Lord!... Wisdom is vindicated by all her children....”
The Church of the Living God, the Pillar and Foundation of Truth!
Faith is by nature deeply personal, but it must also be interpersonal. When someone comes to believe in God, that person soon realizes that other people also believe in God, yet there are differences (some big, some small) in what is believed! So the person must decide: Is my faith the only right faith? OR Are all beliefs about God right, even when contradictory? OR Does this or that group of people have it right?
The first option (my faith is right, everyone else is wrong) is hopelessly subjective and idiotically arrogant. God helps anyone with a rational mind and an ounce of humility to get past this option quickly.
The second option (faith is purely personal, so you can believe one thing about God, I can believe the opposite, and yet we’re both right) is appealing on the surface because being open-minded is generally esteemed as a virtue in our culture. Yet obstinate open-mindedness can petrify into an eerie inability to commit to any truth – to paraphrase G.K. Chesterton: “We must never forget that the reason for opening the mind is the same as for opening the mouth: so that ultimately, it can clamp down on something solid (rather than stay open indefinitely)!” If one person believes that God cares about our personal morality (and that will affect our salvation) and another person believes that God has already arbitrarily decided who goes to Heaven, they can’t both be right. Certainly God has made fundamental truths about Himself (and His expectations of us!) crystal clear, or there would be no reason to believe in Him! So the second option is a dead end.
So, inevitably, in a search of faith, one must consider what groups of people believe. For all who follow Jesus Christ, Paul’s praise of the Church as “the pillar and foundation of Truth” should give us cause to think: if the Church solemnly teaches a certain doctrine, but I believe something else, which one has the Truth?
posted by FrPitstick | 9/17/2007
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