I
grew up in the West of Ireland, where the winters can seem endless
because it is so dark for so long. Often it is weeks before we
see the sun, but we know it is up there. We know it because we
can see the effects of it for one thing. God is something
similar. We do not see him, but we know He is there, because we
see the effects of his being there. We see people continually
inspired to do good, even in the face of strong opposition. We
see people willing to suffer to get justice and peace. If you
are cynical you may not see God there, but if you have faith, you
will.
One
of the things that is causing many of us pain at the moment, is the
fact that so many of our younger people seem to have lost their
faith. Parents are continually saying to me: ‘My children
won’t go to mass,’ or ‘my children don’t practice anymore;
what should I do?’ Just because they cannot relate to the
mass, does not mean that they don’t have faith, or that they are
not searching for God. Almost everyone searches for God, but
perhaps not in a way that makes sense to us. It is often more a
question of them having lost faith in the Church as an institution
than anything else and this is very understandable, since most of
what they are hearing about it is negative, unattractive and
sometimes scandalous. What can we do about it? To be
honest I don’t know. It troubles me greatly and I pray
continually for them and that God will show us what to do. To
most of my generation and younger generations I am a complete alien
as a priest and I find that difficult too because it makes me quite
isolated.
Having
said all that, I have no doubt that God is acting and will act, for
two reasons: firstly, because they are also his children.
He created them and He is more concerned about them than we are.
Secondly because of the thousands of people who are praying for them,
including us. God hears our prayers and God knows how and when
to respond. We may not appear to see anything, but that does
not mean that nothing is happening.
Now
let us turn to this account of Jesus healing a man blind from birth.
The fact that he was blind from birth emphasizes that giving him
sight would be a complete miracle and totally unheard of. Once
he has been healed he then comes to believe that Jesus is Lord.
The miracles that Jesus worked were not just to show off. They
were pointing to who he was and is. When the man is questioned
by the religious authorities he is not able to explain what happened
or how, but simply that it did happen and that he now believes.
He does not have the official ‘education’ or religious knowledge,
to be able to know the things of God, and yet he comes to believe.
On the other hand the religious leaders of the time had the official
education. They were the experts, and yet they could not and
would not recognize who Jesus was. Perhaps it was partly their
religious knowledge which became an obstacle for them. Because
Jesus healed this man on the Sabbath they concluded that he could not
be from God, because that was their understanding of how God worked.
They had a particular understanding of how God must be, and since
Jesus didn’t fit this picture they concluded he could not be from
God. Essentially their minds were closed and they didn’t want
to know. But God often acts outside the way we think things
should happen.
We
have a particular understanding of what it means to believe and how
you should express that faith: namely by going to mass, praying and
loving our neighbour. This is good and important, but that does
not mean that God can not bring people to faith in a completely
different way as well. The Muslims, Hindus, and many others
believe in God too, but they have a very different understanding than
we do.
The
next generation may not understand God in the way that we do, but we
should not lose heart about that. God is just as interested in
them as we are. He has created them to be with him in heaven, just
like us. Our job is to go on bearing witness to the God we
believe in by living our faith as well as we can.
Meanwhile
we remember that even if we cannot see God at work, He is still
there. Sometimes we cannot see the sun, but we know it is there
and so we never lose hope.
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