Sections:

1)Some Ideas on the Existence of God

2)Why be a catholic?

3)Crisis of Faith & the instiutional church

4)Atheism: "Help My Unbelief"

5)Atheism, faith and love

6)"Faith Through Crucible of Doubt" (Two Prophets: Dostoevsky and St. Thérèse of Lisieux)

7) In search of God - and of Christ

 

 

The Crisis of Faith and the Institutional Church

Many years ago Professor Arnold Toynbee could write:

"We have obviously, for a number of generations past, been living on spiritual capital, I mean clinging to Christian practice without possessing Christian belief - and practice unsupported by belief is a wasting effort, as we have already discovered to our dismay in this generation."

The famous Sister Teresa of Calcutta who worked among the poorest of India, said she was more distressed by the SPIRITUAL poverty of Australia than the MATERIAL poverty of India! The crisis of faith is sadly evident in the diminishing numbers at Sunday Mass. In 1964, Mass attendance was about 64% of Catholics - today it has plummeted to about 16%. Vocations to the priesthood and religious life are minimal, and religious vocations are normally the barometer of the faith of any country.

THE INSTITUTIONAL CHURCH: Many teenagers today tell me they reject the Church - but not Christ. That is a fallacy, a contradiction because the Church is the extension of Christ who founded the Church to continue his mission through time and space. Christ accepts us on HIS terms, not ours! One of the most famous Jesuits of this century, Fr Teilhard de Chardin, wrote: "Without the Church, Christ is fragmented, evaporates, or cancels himself out."

The Church is not only divine, but also human - sometimes too human, with all the limitations of men since Christ works through human instrumentality. St Augustine, of "Confessions" fame and one of the greatest theologians of the Church, expressed the divine-human element thus: "If Judas (a bad priest) baptises, Christ baptises." We must constantly try to see beyond the inevitable human limitations to the divine reality, CHRIST, who is always there.

There are, and always will be, mistakes and failings in the Church. In our times, it seems to me, the Church fails to communicate adequately. The eminent American Jesuit, Fr Avery Dulles, rightly observes: "We cannot nourish contemporary man with the stale fragments of a meal prepared for believers of the 4th, 5th or 16th century …. The Christian message must be refocussed in a way that speaks immediately and directly to the deepest concerns of the present."

A few years ago the famous Jesuit Cardinal Martini, Archbishop of Milan, who speaks about ten languages and is author of about forty books, said to me:

"This is 1996 but some people are talking as though it were 1966 or worse, even 1866. At all times we must listen to the people."

Communication is now, probably, the most powerful weapon - for good or for bad - in the world. The Churches must recognise this fact and modernise their techniques. We have the greatest "product" ever to promote - JESUS CHRIST AND HIS GOSPEL OF LOVE. We are not doing that job as well as we should. Internet - website - can be the answer, giving us not merely very limited parochial potential but truly universal, global potential.

A SOLUTION: The person of Christ, as brother, friend, saviour, ALIVE in our midst, should be the constant inspiration and hope of our lives. We must work at faith, just as we have to work at sport, business, marriage. If we find our faith is getting dim and weak, we must increase our prayer, attendance at Mass and recite that magnificent prayer from the Gospel: "Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief." And never think of the Church as a "kill-joy" but as a way to happiness and fulfilment as Christ promised: "I have come that you may have life and have it to the full." Yes, even in THIS life.

Pope Leo XIII highlighted the benefits of the Church with these famous words: "The Church has for her own immediate and natural purpose the saving of souls…. Yet in regard to things temporal, she is the source of benefits as manifold and great as if the chief end of her existence were to ensure the prospering of our earthly life."