We can come up with various definitions. The Catechism says, “by faith we are to completely submit our intellect and will to God.” By faith we seek to know and follow the commandments of God and seek to understand the teachings of the Church. Yet, faith is not simply a set of commandments or doctrines, a set of lists to memorize or recite. Faith involves confidence and trust. In fact, one definition of faith I heard recently, is that faith is a “confident relationship with God.” So, when parents bring their children to the baptismal font, why are they bringing the child? They want their child to have a confident relationship with God that leads to everlasting life.
An example of faith held up for us in the scriptures today, from our second reading, the letter to the Hebrews, is Abraham, the father of the Jewish people, whom the Catechism says, is the Father of All Who believe. And three events in Abraham’s life are mentioned as signs of his faith.
First, God calls Abraham when he was 75 years old. Just when Abraham thought that his life was sorta starting to wind down a bit, God called him to begin something new—to pick up from the place where he had settled down with his wife, Sarah and to move to the promised land…at age 75. Not an easy or enviable task, but because Abraham had a confident relationship with God, he found strength for this task with his wife Sarah, to leave their home, leave their comfort, and journey into the unknown.
What is faith? Faith is a relationship with God, that enables us and empowers us, to travel confidently into the unknown, to begin something new, for God’s sake no matter how old we are, to matter how comfortable we’ve grown. We are never too old, or too set in our ways, to begin a new chapter in our faith life, our prayer life, new modes of charitable service.
The second incident in Abraham’s life mentioned by Hebrews occurs 25 years later: Abraham has arrived at the promised land, and God appears to him in a dream and says that he will become the father of a great nation, his descendants would be more numerous than the stars. Abraham and his wife Sarah are now 100 years old, and God says that he will make them more fruitful than anyone in history. Sarah laughed, but Abraham trusted. “By faith, he received power to generate” Hebrews says. And we know Abraham and Sarah gave birth to Isaac. Faith transformed barrenness to fruitfulness.
What is faith? Faith is a relationship with God that brings spiritual fruitfulness, again, no matter how old we are. Where there is only self-concern, faith can bring true charity. Where there is despair faith can bring joy. Where there is anxiety or turmoil, faith can bring peace. Where there is impulsiveness, faith can bring self-control. Where there is harshness, faith can make you gentle. If you let it, if you trust.
The third incident, involves Abraham’s relationship to the surrounding culture. People of faith are often tempted to believe and act just like everyone else around us “out there”, to give-up the ways of God and give-in to the ways of the world.
Well, when Abraham and Sarah moved to the promised land, it was still occupied with many pagan peoples. And one of the grizzly practices of those pagan Canaanites was child-sacrifice. The Canaanites would sacrifice their children to the Canaanite gods. And Abraham, likely because he witnessed the surrounding Canaanites willingness to sacrifice their children, began to imagine that God desired the sacrifice of his own son Isaac. So, we know the story, Abraham and Isaac ascend Mount Moriah, God tells Isaac that God would provide the lamb of sacrifice, Abraham binds Isaac, places Isaac on the altar, and raises the knife, but his hand was stopped by the Angel. God, pleased with Abraham’s willingness to offer the thing he most valued, did not desire the grizzly murder of Isaac. In the fullness of time, God would provide the Lamb, his own Son as the sacrifice for the salvation of the world.
What is faith? Faith is the confident relationship with God that sets us apart from the pagan practices of the world, that moves us to offer what we value most, to trust God more than pressures from the surrounding culture.
How does God want to increase your faith at this moment in your life? On what new journey, new endeavor, new ministry does God want to send you? What area of your life does God want to make more fruitful? And what is he calling you to give-up, perhaps something that has made you a little too much like the surrounding culture?
Speaking of faith, Bishop Robert Barren was in the news this week, lamenting the recent Pew Research report that over two-thirds of Catholics have lost their faith, or never had faith, that Jesus is truly present in the Eucharist—that bread and wine are truly transformed, not just symbolically, but truly, into the flesh and blood of Jesus Christ. If you are one of the two-thirds that do not believe, I invite you, I urge you, to ask the Lord for the gift of faith. For it has been taught from the very beginning that bread and wine are truly transformed at Holy Mass. Pope Francis said recently, “the Eucharist is the spiritual life-blood of the Christian because in receiving it we consume the body of the Lord, whose life transforms us, elevates and empowers us to become like him.”
To provide the opportunity to deepen our faith in the Eucharist, to allow the Eucharist to be a source of blessing and strength for our parish, I am instituting, on the first Friday of each month at 7pm, an hour of exposition of the Blessed Sacrament with devotions and benediction beginning the first Friday of September. Come and pray and adore the Lord. Also, on the second Friday of the month, I will be offering faith formation sessions, an opportunity to come together and study our beautiful faith. Come and Renew and study the faith.
For as we see in the example of Abraham, Faith brings us into a relationship with God where miracles can occur, it brings fruitfulness, and Christ-like self-sacrificial love.
Lord, deepen our faith. Through faith, give us courage, fruitfulness, and the willingness to sacrifice for the sake of the Gospel for the glory of God and salvation of souls.
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