Some days faith is hard. Life challenges us with the state of the world or the events of our own lives and families. We have constant updates from so many sources, so our minds are infiltrated with the news, close to home and beyond. The apostles following Jesus didn’t have iPhones or social media updates and still they said to the Lord, “Increase our faith.” (Luke 17: 5-10, Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time). I pray the same request on many days!
Earlier this week we celebrated the Memorial of our Guardian Angels. I recalled a night, many years ago, walking the dog late in the evening. It was very late, no one out and about, so I chose to walk him in the middle of the street so he would have plenty of room and could survey the neighborhood. We were halfway down the block, but in the still of the night I heard a car turning the corner, speeding with screeching tires, on the street perpendicular to the one I was walking on. My heart raced as I had a feeling the car would turn onto the street I was walking. But I was frozen. In a split second the car did turn and we faced it head on. Suddenly I felt a push on my left side and looking ahead at the dog saw him move in the same way, looking straight ahead but his body being pushed entirely to the right in the same way that I was being moved. The car sped by. I knew in an instant that I didn’t move us and that we had been spared from being hit. I can’t say I thought of my guardian angel much before that night, after giving up the youthful evening prayer of “Angel of God, my guardian dear…” My faith in the presence of my guardian angel grew on that evening and in the many instances I have been protected since.
I read a reflection by Br. Michael Marcotte, OSB, of Conception Abbey on the Gospel for today. He pondered how we continue to find, and grow in, faith when we can’t see the Lord as the apostles did. He quoted Fr. Jacque Philippe and St. Augustine with thoughts to help us grow in faith. He wrote: “Fr. Jacques Philippe maintains that it is through prayer—especially praying with the scriptures—that our faith increases. He wrote “Faith is the capacity of believers to act not according to impressions, preconceived ideas, or notions borrowed from other people, but according to what they are told by the Word of God, who cannot lie.” (Time for God, p. 9). As St. Augustine put it, “Believe in order to understand.” Faith is not a matter of acquiring the right kind of knowledge. It is about entering into a relationship of trust and love.”
Scripture shows us that God is faithful. If we look at our lives over a broader spectrum of time, I believe that we can see that as well. It can be challenging in the moment so I think that Br. Marcotte’s suggestion offers us a roadmap for the journey. He asked, at the end of his article, that we consider how we can deepen our relationship with Jesus and grow in faith.
I need to spend time on that question this week. Maybe you do too? Then perhaps it will begin with the faith of the mustard seed, and over time, grow into a strong and sturdy conviction and confidence.
Wishing you abundant peace and hope this week, Deena
Image: One of the memorials in Portugal where the Angel of Fatima, or the Angel of Peace, visited the shepherd children preparing them for their spiritual mission and teaching them prayers.
Deena Pavinato - Journeys 