Faith Matters

October 28, 2003

By Lucas D Sayre

 

 

One's Christian faith must arise from her upbringing, Holy Scripture, the Church, and from careful observation of God's creation (in no particular order here). All four components are necessary to varying degrees, and relying on only one of the four results in a weakened, and often misplaced, faith. I'll look at each component separately.

 

First is upbringing. A child is naturally ignorant in matters of religion. They are unaware of the history of Christianity, the origins and content of the Bible, and of the full nature of his creation. These are issues that all of us tackle as we grow older, all the way until our death. Our upbringing, then, naturally guides us initially in our quest to answer the questions regarding the mystery of God's existence and His creation. Ultimately, our upbringing should teach us the questions to ask more than try to inculcate in us the answers. We can overcome a poor upbringing through natural curiosity and conscious, but the faith-building process in such a situation is ultimately slower and less likely to be successful.

 

Second is Holy Scripture. The Bible contains many of God's basic theological messages as well as some historical context behind the beginnings of Christianity, and is an essential component of Christian faith. One caveat is that belief in the Bible as the Word of God cannot be based only in faith itself. The fundamental Biblicist commits an error of circular logic. He believes in God because the Bible says God exists, and he believes the Bible is the Word of God because of his faith in God. Not only is this fallacious reasoning, but it ultimately results in the worship of a Book, and not in the principles of God overall. Complete Biblicism ignores the other components of faith, at a detriment to a rich understanding of God's creation.

 

Another caveat is Biblical literalism. A careful, or even somewhat cursory, reading of the Bible reveals important theological, scientific, and historical contradictions. Therefore, the entire thing cannot be read literally. Some passages are fundamentally inconsistent with the continuing themes contained within Scripture and some passages are symbolic in nature. Both caveats are solved through research of the Bible's origins as well as a holistic reading of Holy Scripture. Trust and understanding of the Bible must include an understanding of who contributed to the writings, when the passages were written, who assembled and edited the numerous books, and what lingual translations are involved. Furthermore, the faithful must read the Bible with context and consistency always in mind.

 

The third component of faith is the Church. Few people have the time necessary to invest to thoroughly understand the Bible, in the fashion aforementioned. Men (and women) of strong spiritual character who have devoted their lives to the worship of God and the study of the Bible provide an important and necessary service to the rest of us. Their theological counsel is essential for the average Christian. I am partial to ordained priests under the Catholic Church because of the institutional processes that ensure a high level of committment on their behalf, but I recognize that lay ministers can also provide us with great insight and education.

 

Another reason I am faithful to the Catholic Church is that I believe faith should be a unified community exercise, rather than a purely individual one. Through community worship, we learn from and teach each other elements of faith that otherwise would be missed. Unity is important to assure the coherence and consistency of the community faith base. Protestantism, taken to its extreme, leads to the splitting of faith bases ad infinitum. With division comes weakness, confusion, and even conflict. I also recognize that with a unified Church authority structure, corruption and compounding errors are real problems. These must be overcome institutionally for the ideal of the One Church to be realized. Vatican II took great strides for the Catholic Church in this regard. A continued push for openness, democratic processes, internal dissent, and external lay influence all will check the dangers inherent in a unified faith structure.

 

The fourth and final component of faith lies in the observation of God’s creation. God’s grace must guide each of us in our spiritual journey here on Earth. The birth, growth, and destruction seen in nature; the virtues and vices of acted out by mankind; humanity’s interaction with nature; and everyday average human interactions can and should teach us volumes about God’s creation. Additionally, the development of a personal relationship with Jesus via prayer and sanctity shapes our overall observation of the divine creation and underlies our faith. As with the other components, this cannot be isolated completely. The purposeful ignorance of Holy Scripture, upbringing, and the tradition of the Church, leads to mysticism.

 

God’s Creation is a mystery that Christians will never fully understand. Indeed, if any of us did completely understand it, our place would be in Heaven, not on the Earth. Our mission, I believe, is to grapple with this challenge with the utmost sincerity of our hearts. All four of these components of faith are tools we can use in this challenge, yet none of them answer the question: “Why do we believe?” For that, mere words are utterly insufficient.