Oct. 6, 2013: 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time C
Can you think of a song that you listened to this week? Did it have a good beat, melody, and may be even a catchy lyric? Now, would you let your priest listen to it? Why not? I asked the same question to the seniors at our Catholic school. Each had their favorite, but they all said, “No, Father, we can’t let you listen to it!” Now mind you, these are songs played on our ordinary radio. I asked if the songs helped increase their faith, and they all said, “no.” I remember, too, in my high school days when I would play loudly the songs of my favorite bands on cassette tapes, over and over again. None of those increased my faith. Really, they helped me ‘lose’ my faith.
Of course, faith is not a thing. So when we say we lose our faith, we don’t lose it like a key or a purse. Faith is not a thing that one loses; we merely cease to shape our lives by it. Faith is not a thing, but a relationship with God. Can you live your life in such a way that your relationship with someone strengthens? Think of various ways in which you strengthen your relationship with your parents, children, grandchildren, and friends. Your relationship depends on openness to connect with them, your care and concern for them, and your desire to be close to them. Likewise, you can live your life in such a way that you can harm or even sever that relationship. We call that sin.
Someone described faith as a window through which we can see something. What matters is not whether the window is six inches or six feet high; what matters is the God that your faith is looking out on. If it’s God you’re looking on, then the tiniest little peep-hole of a window will still give you access to power like you never dreamed of. In the gospel Jesus said that even the faith the size of a tiny mustard seed would accomplish great things in God.
What is this power that one receives through faith, this relationship with almighty God? It’s not a power that you use for your own whim, pleasure, or influence. Sometimes we say, “I’ve done all this. I’ve given all that money, I’ve worked so hard--surely God will be satisfied with that?” Some people think that God owes them something. They imagine God as being like the typical employer. If we do the work, then our employer owes us our wages. Therefore, God owes us a reward in heaven provided we serve him faithfully on earth, as the thinking goes. The stark truth is that we can never put God in the position where he is in debt to us. Jesus says that even when we have done all we are expected to do, we still can’t make any demands on God.
This brings us to what increases our faith--this relationship of trust with Jesus. The disciples openly asked Jesus in today’s gospel, “Lord, increase our faith.” For us to enjoy an increase of faith requires that we must see and do things God’s way. To increase our faith we must diminish our willfulness. If we ask for our hearts to be opened to see God through the window of faith, we must first be emptied of everything not of God.
That is the insight that St. Francis of Assisi discovered. How many of us have felt, one time or another, sadness, betrayal, a hurt, despair, and even hatred for someone? How can we see God through these lenses of darkness? We can’t. Imagine that someone is experiencing a darkness in his life at this time. What can we do? We draw, through our faith, the power from Heavenly Father, to sow love, to forgive, to give hope, to give light, and to give joy. St. Francis said that we shouldn’t ask first for what’s in it for us. Rather we give first, and like the servant that Jesus mentions in the gospel, be satisfied that even when we think we’ve given all we can, we still owe God so much more. God’s sheer goodness to us cannot be repaid. Ask Jesus today to increase your faith to become a better instrument of his love, his hope, his light, and his joy.
