Faith is
the realization of what is hoped for
and the
evidence of things not seen.
Hebrews
11:1
I have been at this “priest
thing” almost all of my life. I really never wanted to be anything else. I
first felt that I may be “called” to it when I was seven years old. I started seminary at age
fourteen. I was ordained at twenty-six. I have been a priest now for fifty-two
years. Eighteen years ago, for the first and only time in my life, I actually
thought about quitting. It was back when we were going through the sexual abuse
scandal here in Louisville. I was so angry, disappointed, embarrassed and
disillusioned that I thought about throwing in the towel, moving out of state
and finding a job that had nothing to do with God, the church or the priesthood.
I really wanted to quit, but I didn’t – and I won’t!
I felt like Jeremiah who was
called to be a prophet at a very tender age. Jeremiah gave his all to his job,
but one day when he was so frustrated he reached the point where he wanted to just quit. He screams at God,
“You seduced me into taking this job and now I feel like I have been used! I keep telling myself that I won’t even mention your name ever again, but when I
do, a consuming love for your word burns in my heart. I can’t help myself. I feel that I really can’t quit. I feel that I have to keep going!”
When I was deep in my depression,
the question I kept coming back to was this one: “Ron, where is your faith placed?”
Is it in priests? No! Is it in bishops? No! Is it in the Pope? No! They are
merely the “earthenware jars” that hold the “treasure,” but they are not the
“treasure.” Is your faith in organized religion? No! Organized religion, has and will
always be, in need of reform. I knew that to leave would be to turn my back on God. I also knew enough scripture to know that I cannot have God without his church, no
matter how many people try to have it that way! When others say “I’m spiritual, but
not religious,” to me they are like the kids who want to eat the filling out the Oreos, and leave the cookies! My faith is not just personal. It is also communal! We are in this faith thing together!
No, for me to leave would be
to turn my back on God and his people. (1) How could I turn my back on the God who called me to
be a priest, simply because of the gross sins of a handful of brother-priests and those who were misguided in their efforts to protect
them? (2) How could I turn my back on God who “adopted” me at baptism and
made me a member of his family, the church? How could I victimize my “faith
family” again by leaving, when it has been severely wounded and in need of spiritual care? How could I go off and leave my “faith family” in its time of
need?
After my mind explored the
possibility of leaving, after I wallowed in my depression for months, after I
wrestled with the question of faith, I finally came to the realization that, if
I have any faith at all, then this was the time to prove it - to prove it by staying, by
remaining faithful, by remembering why I am doing this to begin with!
Today, Abraham is held up to
us as a model of faith, and so he was! In fact, Eucharistic Prayer I refers to
him as “our father in faith” because of his extraordinary ability to trust God,
even when God’s promises seemed utterly impossible. Even in his old age, Abraham did
not bat an eye when God called him to leave his country, everything that was
familiar to him, and head to a place unknown. He went simply because God told
him to go. In his old age, when God told him that he would father a son, his
first, one that he had longed for all his life, he did not bat an eye, despite
all the natural evidence to the contrary. Abraham and Sara were both senior
citizens. When Abraham heard the news, he did not bat an eye, but believed that
somehow God would do it. Sara, on the other hand, snickered with laughter when
she heard the news, and worse yes, denied having laughed when she was caught. Abraham's ultimate test of faith came when God asked him to sacrifice his precious,
one and only, son Isaac. Without batting an eye, Abraham prepared to sacrifice his
precious little boy in unflinching obedience, not knowing how God would keep
his promise of making his descendants as numerous as the stars, if he
did!
What bout you? Do you have faith? No, I
don’t mean do you believe this or that Bible story or this or that Church doctrine to be true. I mean, do
you really trust God? Can you believe in things you can’t see, promises
that God hasn’t kept yet? Can you keep walking with God, even when you can’t
see where you are going, even when your most precious things, relationships and
assumptions are taken away from you?
I am amazed at people who
say they have “lost their faith” when an old church was renovated, when an
altar rail was removed, when a Mass time was changed or when a priest said something to disappoint them. I am also struck when I hear that someone has lost
their faith over the death of a loved one or during a major health crisis. They surely lost something, but it wasn’t faith! If faith only holds up when things
are going well, when the world is the way we like it, when we are blessed with
all that life has to offer, when we are young and in perfect health, then it is not faith. Faith is only faith when we
cannot see where we are going or cannot understand the things that happen to
us, when we are swamped by doubt and confusion. It is only then do we know
whether we have faith or not. If we can go on loving and trusting God, after we
hear the diagnosis of cancer, then we can say we have faith. If we go on loving
and trusting God, after our house burns down, when we lose our job, when a family member dies and if our friends
abandon us, then we can say we have faith. If we can trust God after we have
lost everything we can lose, then we can say we have faith!
If your faith hasn’t been
tested yet, and surely it will be, I hope you can, without batting an eye,
keep on loving and trusting God in the darkness and confusion. If you can do
that, then you will know that you really are a man or woman of
faith!
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