Have faith
Podcast
Scripture references
- Wisdom 1:13-15; 2:23-24
- 2 Corinthians 8:7, 9, 13-15
- Mark 5:21-43
Reflection
Last Sunday morning, children in this parish prepared Faith Boats as gifts for their fathers. The boats, works of origami, were filled with candy in the shape of fish and each boat bore the inscription Thank you for helping me have faith.
Students are only just out of school, and here I am talking about teaching and learning again, but this kind of learning is different. Faith can’t be taught like mathematics or science. Faith is learned most effectively when it is modeled by parents, grandparents, siblings and friends.
Some of you have perhaps heard me speak of my cousin Priscilla. This weekend, she’s competing in the Canadian National Track and Field Championships in Toronto. Her discipline is 100 m Hurdles, and as a matter of fact, she just completed the final race this afternoon. Priscilla’s good at what she does. She won bronze at the Beijing Olympics and now she’s among the fastest hurdlers in the world, but what I like most about her is that she never lets the fame go to her head.
After her return from Beijing, media reporters wanted to know what her secret was. She replied, ‘Yesterday’s race is already finished. Today’s race is always new’. Priscilla is quick to point out that support from her family and faith play huge roles in her ability to do what she does.
The faith dimension of life plays a very important part for all of us, but we’re not always quick to recognize how deeply it influences all that we do. All of creation is holy. In fact the Wisdom writer calls it wholesome (Wis 1:14) and because we are made in God’s image, we are also infused with the divine.
We are in constant relationship with a God of wonder who transforms us and heals us. In moments in darkest despair, Jesus speaks to us as he spoke to the synagogue official Jairus, ‘Do not fear, only believe’ (Mk 5:36). Any one of us who has experienced the illness of one of our children, or of a loved one, or who has experienced the death of a family member, knows only too well how difficult such an experience is to face.
If not for our faith that consoles us and helps us to endure, we would perhaps have a much harder time coming to grips with the sometimes harsh realities of life, but with faith, things can look very different. Holiness, relationships, healing and transformation are all connected through faith.
Faith that is grounded in beauty and wonder challenges us to treat each other and all creation as precious. Faith enlivened by the Holy Spirit invites our participation in the mission of God who embraced our humanity in the person of Jesus Christ, choosing to become one of us so that we in turn could learn how to become more like him.
God calls us all in faith to recognize the holiness that is in all that we see, feel, hear and experience each day, even as we continue to act in hope and wonder toward the dream of a day when all that can be will come to pass.
