Friday, July 19, 2013

July 19 Continuation of Pope Francis' letter on "The Light of Faith'"

Connie Walker's photo
Christians are one but still individuals, in service to others.

Faith is necessarily ecclesial professed from within the Body of Christ as a concrete communion of believers.
St. Paul says,"One believes with the heart and confesses with the lips."
 Faith is not a private matter and "unless you believe you will not understand,"  Isaiah says to King Ahaz according to the Greek version of the bible- but the Hebrew version has Isaiah say to the King, "If you will not believe, you shall not be established."
This moves toward more trust in God where as the Greek has the notion of intellectual understanding.

The prophet challenges the king and us to understand the Lord's ways, seeing God's plan as wise which governs the ages.

Augustine tells us God is trustworthy, He is faithful throughout history . He holds together times and ages and gathers into one the scattered strands of our lives.
We need knowledge.
We need truth because without these we cannot move forward.
Faith without truth does not save-
no sure footing just a beautiful story.
As such Ahaz would be right not to stake his life and the security of his kingdom on such feelings.
Today we need the bond between faith and truth given the crises of truth in our age.
Today we consider the only real truth is technology. Truth to the modern world is what we suceed  in building and measuring by our scientific know-how. 
Truth is  what makes life easier and more comfortable.
But truth itself which would explain our life as individuals and in society is regarded with suspicion.
Ultimately this means the question of God is no longer relevant.
The question of truth is really a question of deep memory for it deals with something prior to ourselves.

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