“IT IS GOOD TO LIVE EVEN THOUGH I DO NOT ALWAYS PERCEIVE IT. I AM WANTED”

BY POPE BENEDICT XVI

“Father – with this word I express my certainty that someone is there who hears me, who never leaves me alone, who is always present. I express my certainty that God, despite the infinite difference between him and me, is such that I can speak to him, may even address him familiarly as “thou” (German “du”). His greatness does not overwhelm me, does not reject me as insignificant and unimportant. Certainly I am subject to him as a child is subject to his father, yet there is such a fundamental similarity and likeness between him and me, yes, I am so important to him, I belong so closely to him, that I can rightly address him as “Father”.

My being born is not a mistake, then, but a grace. It is good to live even though I do not always perceive it. I am wanted; not a child of chance or necessity, but of choice and freedom. Therefore I shall also have a purpose in life; there will always be a meaning for me, a task designed just for me, there is a conception of me that I can seek and find and fulfil. When the school of life becoms unbearably hard, when I would like to cry out as Job did, as the psalmist did – then I can transform this cry into the word “Father” and the cry will gradually become a word, a reminder to trust, because from the Father’s perspective it is clear that my distress, yes, my agony, is part of the greater love for which I give thanks.”

 

A PERSON WITHOUT FAITH IS A BIT LIKE A DOG AT A BIRTHDAY PARTY – HE SEES ALL THESE INTERESTING THINGS GOING ON AROUND HIM, BUT HE DOESN’T KNOW WHAT IT’S REALLY ALL ABOUT

Note that St Peter said “we have believed and have known”, not “known and believed”. Faith comes first, then understanding. “Faith Seeking Understanding” could, I suppose, be a sub-title for many great works of theology. “Understanding Seeking Faith” could be a sub-title for many works by agnostics. It is faith that gives us that deepest penetration into reality – more so than any other human mode of cognition. Why? Because faith is sharing in God’s own knowledge. Just as our life of grace gives us a share in His life, and makes us “partakers in the divine nature”, as St Peter puts it (2 Pet 1:4), so, corresponding with the human faculties of will and intellect, we have charity and faith. By charity we share God’s love, as anyone can see by looking at Mother Teresa. By faith we share in God’s knowledge, as has often seemed plain to me from seeing certain people praying before the Blessed Sacrament. It is only by faith that we are fully in touch with reality.

People without faith live in a grey, nightmare sort of world. They cannot see its meaning or purpose. They do not know why things happen. They see things happen, of course, but they do not know the meaning. It is like a dog at a birthday party. He is having a great time. All these people eating! At any moment, food might fall to the floor. He is really enjoying himself, and he looks as though he is entering into the spirit of the thing. But all the same, he does not know what it is really all about. He does not know that it is a birthday party.

And so people without faith do indeed observe the world; they observe it very closely. But they do not know the why and wherefore of it. To them, it seems to be ruled by chance, or by “natural selection”, or whatever they care to call it. But it is only we, who know that God is our Father, and see the whole world bathed in the light of his love, who see it as it really is.

I remember seeing my mother, when she wanted to buy a reel of cotton, take it out of the shop into the daylight. To see things as they really are, we must look at them in the light of God’s love. It is only to a believer that the world really makes sense. (Fr Hugh S. Thwaites) A

PRAYER FOR UNBELIEVERS

O Lord Jesus Christ, upon the Cross you did say: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” And this surely, O my God, is the condition of vast multitudes among us now. They deny that there is a God, but they know not what they are doing. They renounce all faith in you, the Saviour of man. They mislead the wandering, they frighten the weak, they corrupt the young. Others, again, have a wish to be religious, but mistake error for truth – they go after fancies of their own, and they seduce others and keep them from you. They know not what they are doing, but you can make them know. Teach them now, open their eyes here, before the future comes; give them faith in what they must see hereafter, if they will not believe in it here. Amen. (Blessed John Henry Newman)