Continuing to Understand

In the past I have written about understanding your belief system and the reasons for your faith. In my personal opinion it is fine to have a humble beginning in the formation of your faith journey, but I firmly believe that at some point you need to grasp a firmer understanding of your faith. I am not suggesting the need for you to run out and become an apologist. (In a future post I will discuss my thoughts on this topic.) I am simply stating it’s a good idea to gain a complete understanding of why you believe what you believe by building a firm and concrete foundation. If only for yourself, isn’t it more comforting to have a stronger understanding of your religion? Do you sometimes wonder why we as Catholics do certain things? Have you ever been stumped by a non-believer who asks you a question about your faith that you cannot answer? As I said you are not required to become the next great American Evangelizer, but it never hurts to know more. And lest we forget what the Bible says in 1 Peter 3:15 “but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you.” Additionally when you know more it strengthens the foundation of what you already believe.

So now that you are ready and willing to learn more about your faith, where do you turn? Well, you might want to consider the Bible, imagine that? Since our faith is based on the teachings of the Bible what better place to start. A wonderful companion to the Bible is the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Keep this reference guide by your side as you are reading the Bible. It comes in very handy when you reach a point in the Book, where you scratch your heads and think to yourself, “say what?” The Catholic Catechism is as thick as the Bible and is an all-in-one shop filled with all of the background information you could want surrounding the teachings of the Catholic Church.

In addition to the obvious there are numerous books on Christianity and specifically the Catholic Faith. I just recently finished a book by Timothy Paul Jones called Conspiracies of the Cross. This is a wonderful book which debunks the Top 10 conspiracies surrounding Christianity. From the notion that Jesus couldn’t have risen from the dead because his body would have remained on the cross to be devoured by dogs and vultures, to the theory that Jesus never even existed in the first place. Jones does an excellent job of detailing each of the conspiracies as well as identifying their biggest proponents. He doesn’t sell the conspiracies short in his descriptions of them. In fact while I was reading certain conspiracies, I found myself thinking, “wow that could be what happened, I never thought of that.” But then Jones uses history and well documented writings (including but not limited to the Bible) to set the record straight. This is a great read if you are one who wishes to be a Defending the Faith Crusader but is equally valuable as tool to simply enrich your faith. If you have read more than one of my posts, you know by now how passionate I am about expanding ones knowledge of their beliefs. It can never hurt to learn more. I have found the more time I have spent furthering my understanding of the Word, the closer I have come to God.

I don’t know if I could have ever actually classified myself as an atheist but I can tell you this, I never could have fathomed that I would be writing so frequently and passionately on the topic of religion. But I have come full circle in my beliefs; not by being a passive observer but rather being an active participant. In life it is important to continue to learn; this goes for anything and everything. So how much more important is it to continue to educate yourself in the ways of God? Only you can answer this question. But whether you are a faith-filled by-the-book believer or someone who is struggling with your faith, it can never hurt to know more.

Editors Note: This side note pertains to the book review above. Some Catholics are very cautious when it comes to reading books or articles on religion. I must say I am not one of them. I feel that I am educated enough (biased observation) and strong enough in my faith that I can discern the good from the bad in my selection of reading materials. I am aware that the Catholic Church has a listing of approved motion pictures which can be found on the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Website. I was unable to find a similar listing for reading materials but am sure there is something out their. If you are unsure if this book is suitable reading material for you personally, I recommend that you confer with your priest first.

In Christ,

-Scott

Is it Just Me?

Why is it such a constant struggle to follow God’s will? It should be so simple, shouldn’t it? The facts have been presented to me, so why must I struggle through daily transgressions of Faith?

I consider myself to be a decent and righteous human being. From an early age I have tried to live an ethical life. In my early development I developed an ethical foundation not so much do to my religious upbringing but rather because my heart told me the right things to do. I guess my parents covertly instilled morals into my life. Hmm, those sneaky so-and-so’s. Now that I am back on a spiritual track; one in which my faith has begun to blossom again (however slightly it may seem at times) my moralistic actions have taken on new meaning. As I once treated others how I wished to be treated simply because it was a logical thing to do has since transformed into actions that bring me closer to God.

The one problem I suffer from is (yes I live a very fruitful life and I only have one problem, speaking of fruitful, send me an email I am selling a few bridges in New York) the Light Switch Syndrome or LSS. Don’t bother looking it up, I just coined the phrase while trying to understand what was happening to me. The definition of LSS is, the action of turning your religious values on and off as simply as flipping a light switch. I use the word action rather than ability because I feel this act is not always a conscious one. Okay now that I have you totally confused I will give you an example of what I mean.

Last night while driving home from work on the way to pick up my children from daycare I was listening to one of my favorite Podcasts,The Catholic Hack with Joe McClane. It was halfway through an interview segment of this Podcast that I realized Joe hadn’t prayed at the beginning of the program as he normally did. After the interview segment concluded Joe remarked that he had neglected to pray at the beginning of the program and decided to do so at that moment. His prayers (however unconventional) are always well structured and spiritually uplifting. His ordered prayers would appear to be a scripted, yet he has the uncanny ability of delivering them in an effortless manor, which to the ear would suggest that they are off-the-cuff. As he began the prayer I had pulled into the parking lot of my children’s school. Knowing that I would have to finish the Podcast at a later date, I couldn’t go into the building until he finished praying. Once the prayer had concluded I entered the school with an uplifted heart. I was ready to take on the world with Jesus as my guide. I was ready to live out the rest of the day with the What Would Jesus Do mentality. When I entered my daughter’s classroom I was instantly greeted with her disdain for having to leave school for the day, a frequent occurrence I might add. Apparently for her school is a more enlightening experience than the alternative of having to endure a ride home with Dad and her younger brother. In any case I plodded on with this daily drama, as I knew her feelings would soon pass and the rest of her day wouldn’t be so bad after all. After we united with her brother we headed home in the car.

Enter the Light Switch Syndrome. About halfway home my uplifted heart, unbeknownst to me was no longer following the ways of God. I was instantly irritated with my fellow commuters who obviously have not been trained in the art of merging into traffic nor had they been educated in the school of common courtesy. A simple wave of thanks would have made things all better, at least for me, but I digress. I found myself becoming judgmental and irritated at these individuals for what I perceived as transgressions against me. I had to stop and ask myself, what am I doing? Would Jesus be proud of me for the way I was acting, even if it was only in my own head? I didn’t think so, so I flipped the switch again and tried to change my current tact.

This longwinded example may seem trivial to some of you but I often wonder to myself, how can I change? If I am considered to be a creation of God’s own likeness, than how come it is so easy for me to turn the righteous switch on and off? Does this flaw make me a bad person? I guess it doesn’t, especially if I notice it within myself and take immediate corrective action. But I struggle with the fact that this happens in the first place. I want to do the right thing because it is what God would expect of me. And although life is good, heaven is soooooo much better!

I’d be interested to find out if there are others like me who struggle as much as I do with my Faith Journey. Is LSS an isolated case study or is it an epidemic that will be recorded in the annals of religious psychiatric phenomena? Do tell.

God Bless,

Scott

Alter your Path Based on Faith

Why is it so hard for many of us to put Jesus Christ first in our daily lives? Is it that we are too busy with the trials and tribulations of daily life? Is it because we feel that he doesn’t provide us with signs of his true continuation? Are we unable to find comfort in his healing ways? Is there too much “white noise” getting in the way of our relationship with him? Or worst yet, do we say we are believers but yet we aren’t quite convinced of his existence?

I think it is safe to say that we have all struggled at one time or another with our faith in God. I often question myself as to why this has to be. I have come to only one conclusion on the matter. Simply stated, we are human. It is in our DNA to question everything. It’s how we are wired. We require supporting documentation in order to process things and to determine them to be concrete. You might say the Bible is pretty concrete and I would have to agree with you. But where are the signs? 2000+ years is a long time. Why doesn’t God make his presence known to us today as he did with the Old Testament Jews? My first thought is that 2000 years is a long time for mankind, but how long is it for God? How long will the world turn before it ceases to exist? For a lot of us our biggest problem stems from the first question I asked at the beginning of this entry. We need to let go and let God. Once we have done this completely and succinctly we will see all of the signs we long to see.

Faith is a Journey, not a Destination

Accepting things on faith is very difficult for many people to do. Because by accepting something through faith, you are fighting your own instincts when you are unable to rationalize why something is what it is. This is also known as reason. When you consider your own faith you should also consider through reason that your faith is well documented throughout time. Jesus’ first followers have laid the groundwork for your belief system. It has been recorded for all to see and to comprehend. All you need to do is to take the time to review the facts placed before you and to rationalize it for yourself.

Whether or not you realize it, you take things on faith during the course of your daily lives all of the time. Take the following example as a for instance. Let’s say you are pulling out of the parking lot of your local grocery store. As you wait to take a left hand turn onto the main road another vehicle pulls into the parking lot and the driver signals you to roll down your window. They proceed to tell you about a major accident a half of a mile down the road, in the direction you are about to head. You take the information in and make the determination to take an alternate route. So instead of going left you turn right and alter your course. What just happened here? You rationalized that the person (one you have never met) was telling you the truth. Out of the kindness of their heart they decided to make you aware of the accident in an attempt to prevent you from sitting in traffic caused by the accident. Because you surmised that this individual wasn’t lying to you, you heeded their advice and made a change to your preplanned actions.

Although this is a minor action of faith, you based your decision solely on the report of one individual. You didn’t see or hear a news report concerning the accident. You certainly didn’t visualize it for yourself first hand, yet you followed the advice of this one person and consequently acted on faith. Now take a close look at your faith in God and Jesus Christ. There are multiple reports on Jesus and his actions, from different points-of-view. If you are able to take a leap of faith (however small) from someone you have just met, aren’t you then able to find faith in Jesus? The facts are there for you to rationalize; now you just need to alter the path of your life and follow God.

Navigating Faith Part I

Faith is defined as a firm belief in something for which there is no proof. This can be a tough concept for a many of us to swallow. We aren’t wired to accept things as they are. We have an internal need to personally verify the existence of everything we come to accept as true. Unfortunately, we do not come by faith intuitively. As in all things we need to weigh the options and make our own conscious decision as to whether or not we believe in something. Take for example a toddler who has recently learned to speak. When you tell this young person something that is fact there response to this new piece of information is inevitably, why? As you proceed to expand upon this fact they continue to ask why. Through the use of reason this child wants to know and to completely understand the rationale behind why something is what it is. It is our nature to be inquisitive and to be able to understand things completely. So it is not hard for us to understand why taking something on faith is an extremely difficult thing for us to do.

So how do we come by faith? In some cases we are nurtured by our families to have faith in God. As is the case with many life lessons we are instructed and mentored by our loved ones. If our parents and siblings have a stronghold on faith it is easy for them to pass the beliefs onto us. This was not difficult in my case, as I stated earlier my father was a Lutheran minister. He dedicated his life to the teachings of Christ. He not only believed in God, he lived God’s teachings on a daily basis. I not only learned to have faith through his teachings but better yet witnessed his faith through his actions.

Not everyone has had the benefit of coming to faith through the nurturing of others. Some people live their entire lives wanting to believe but weren’t provided with examples by which to follow. So how do these people come to have faith? There are many reasons and circumstances that transpire to inspire people to come to faith. In some cases finding faith beats the alternative. What I mean by this is that being a faithless person can be a lonely existence. As we all know trying to sort through life’s challenges on our own can be a very difficult thing to do. I have come up with a term for the times in my life when my faith has wavered, I call it Free Solitary Confinement. I know this term is an oxymoron, much like artificial intelligence but let me explain the rationale behind my phrase. I use the word free because we are all free. We can do what we want when we want to. We are free to choose where we work, who we socialize with, and what we do with our spare time. When I speak of solitary confinement, I am referring to the times we spend in the personal cell of our minds, if you will. These are the times when we try to rationalize the purpose behind why we are here. What purpose do our lives have? What does it all mean? Is there something greater than me?

A faithless person will spend a lot of time within the hallowed halls of their minds. If that person doesn’t allow themselves the ability to believe in a power greater than he, he will begin to feel a lack of self worth. Additionally he will begin to put the weight of the world on his own shoulders. Living in such a way lends itself to be a miserable existence. As some might define it, these people spend their days in a living hell.

So how do we come to have faith if we weren’t nurtured in such a way as to have a foundation in faith? I wish I had the magic answer to this question. There is no magic wand that can be waved over the faithless that will instantly grant them a belief in God. Finding faith takes a concerted effort on your part. Although, I can say with conviction that Jesus is constantly tugging at our heart strings and asking us to believe in him. Whether or not we answer his call is completely up to us. God provided each and every one of us with free will. There it is again, the word free. Although he wants us to believe and trust in him, he allows us to make this decision for ourselves. How can I be so sure that Jesus is constantly calling, you might ask? Let me provide you with an example. How many times in your life have you done something that you know in your heart is wrong? It may be that you lied to your spouse, or took something that wasn’t yours. How did that make you feel? What power was so great that it made you act in a particular way even though you knew it wasn’t right? That power was evil. Now I am not suggesting that you are an evil person, I am simply saying that evil has a calling card just as does God. Free will allows you to listen to which ever voice you choose to hear.

Present day humorists continually demonstrate the constant struggle between good versus evil. A common tool they use to illustrate this is through the depiction of a person with a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the opposite shoulder. The devil pressures the person to do something they shouldn’t while the angel tries to counteract this by persuading the person to do the right thing. These types of exhibits haven’t occurred by accident. God through the power of the Holy Spirit is constantly calling for us to be with him. He wishes for us to be keenly aware of his presence in the world. But at the same time he has refused to impose his will upon us. The choice is yours; will you accept his call and follow him?

I'm not preaching, I'm just teaching.

-Scott