What is Faith? Journal
1. In the section of
“What is Faith?”, the main topic of concern is discovering the true definition of faith. In the readings book, two main definitions of faith are given. The secular definition of faith represents faith as allegiance to duty or a person; loyalty. This meaning of faith typically refers to the everyday in a non-religious sense, while theological faith is described as an intellectual assent to a loving God and His revelation. This is the religious and catholic breakdown of the definition of faith. An interesting question brought about from this section is what do we put our faith in? There are so many things that an everyday person must go through, putting or not putting faith in another person or thing. Whether it is having faith in the McDonalds worker to have put your cheeseburger in your bag as you drive away without checking it, or it can deal with a relationship-having faith in your partner. We experience faith-like situations everyday and we can make these decisions to the best of our abilities if we understand what we are dealing with. Although this is a very complicated and complex definition, the main idea of this section is to try to more thoroughly understand faith.
2. I think that one of the most important ideas from this section are the concept of “faith seeking understanding”. I don’t think that it is possible for anyone to just “believe” in something without testing it or further looking into it. To have faith, means that one understands what he or she is putting their faith in or at least has tried to understand it and has come to an agreeing point. You don’t believe that SLUH is supposedly one of the best schools in the Midwest because you hear it once, but you look into the curriculum of the school and you get different views, investigating if your belief is understandable and reasonable. You don’t believe in God just because you hear all about him every Sunday or in every theology class, but you base your opinions on what you have perceived and learned and also through what you believe is understandable. This is worth remembering because I think that to be able to completely trust something and have faith in it, you must understand it. Faith can always be understood more fully, which always keeps people finding out more and more about what they put their faith in.
One of the other most important ideas from this section is the concept of risk. The moment that a person puts faith in someone or something, they are taking a huge risk. If I put faith in my girlfriend not to cheat on me and she does, I am at risk of being hurt. When engages in a faith-relationship, they are opening themselves up and becoming very vulnerable. If I believed in God all of my life, and when I died I found out that God never even existed, I might feel like I could have had more “fun” without consequences or not have felt bad about any amoral actions I could have committed. Therefore, there is a great risk in believing in God. Another example would be if I religiously donated to the church as a belief in God, I risk that I may be throwing away my money if there is no God. Therefore there is another great risk in believing in God. This is worth remembering because faith is truly a risk, and one can be hurt and sometimes deceived by a false sense of faith. One needs to know when to take a calculated faith risk and this is very important. These are two of the concepts of this section that I think are the most important and should be strongly emphasized.
3. Fr. Gary Braun is a person that comes to my mind when I think about faith. Not only is he a man of great faith because of the fact that he is a priest, but he is a great friend of mine, always making me feel so good about myself. Fr. Gary gave a homily called “Do you like to Gamble?” in which he described faithful decisions. He emphatically said that he gambled his whole life that there is a God and he has faith in this. I am very close to Fr. Gary and I try to go to mass usually every Sunday at the CSC, a community that he has faithfully brought up as the head pastor. When I think of faith, I think of this wonderful man and how every single word that comes out of his mouth is so warm and comforting. I have developed my own faith in Fr. Gary and the things that he says, as I have 22 of his recorded homilies on my ipod that I often listen to before going to bed. When I think of faith, the first thing I think of is trust and the next is Fr. Gary Braun, in whom I have complete trust and complete faith in.
4. Is it okay to have periods of doubt in people or things in which I thought I had faith in before? Is this bad?
I think that any human being will have times of doubt in everything, as they have to find out themselves whether or not the thing that they are putting trust in is reliable and reasonable. Everyone will go through periods of doubt while dealing with faith, as the four biblical virtues stated. Although, one might wonder, “If I doubt something will I be able to regain the trust I once had, after second guessing it and looking at it from another view?”. I think the answer is yes. I myself have doubted God, and at times I think that my faith is stronger now than it was before I doubted him, meaning that a more profound faith can be achieved even after doubting takes place. Even though we cannot have a complete understanding of anything to do with God, we can try as best we can and one of these methods could be to doubt and look for other solutions. Therefore doubting can make one’s faith become stronger, after a realization that there really is a God, or that God really is good. I think that everyone will go through times of doubt and disbelief, but I also think that they can achieve a greater faith than they had before, making doubting a potentially good process as well as a possible bad one.
"Do you Like to Gamble"