The readings last Sunday focus on the virtue of Faith. What is Faith? The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches in number1814: Faith is the theological virtue by which we believe in God and believe all that he has said and revealed to us, and that Holy Church proposes for our belief, because he is truth itself. By faith “man freely commits his entire self to God.”78 For this reason the believer seeks to know and do God’s Will. “The righteous shall live by faith.” Living faith “work(s) through charity.”79
In the first reading the Prophet Habakkuk complains to the Lord about the apparent triumph of evil over good. He complains about the mistreatment of the Chosen People by pagan invaders. The Lord answers him with a call to patience and hope. The day will come when the evil ones will be punished. Eventually evil people will fall, but the upright ones will live by their faithfulness. God and His loyal followers will always triumph in the end. Living by faith, means, that God calls us to live as His children in every moment of the day. We must be patient and place our hope in the Lord. In addition, the Church reminds us in the month of October to draw closer to Our Lady by reciting the Holy Rosary each day. Prayer and the Sacraments enable all the virtues to develop and grow strong. The Rosary is a powerful spiritual weapon and the reason why it is so efficacious is that Our Lady prays with us when we pray Her prayer the Holy Rosary. It restricts the action of the devil and brings one to peace of heart and this peace will spread to those around us. The Rosary was personally given to St Dominic in 1214 by Our Lady when he asked Her for to help him in converting heretics in France back to the true Faith. Through this devotion he had outstanding success and many of his followers who had in the past embraced heresy, were won back to the true Faith by his preaching and Our Lady’s intercession.
In the second reading St Paul encourages Timothy whom he had recently ordained, to be firm in Faith and to fulfil his vocation to preach the plain truths of the Gospel, without worrying about human respect, but to rely on the power of God.
The Church urges us all to keep the furnace of our interior life of prayer going and never let it be allowed to go out. Through out steadfast prayer life and sacramental life our Faith will remain strong, and we will overcome our defects, be able to persevere in times of crisis and be witnesses to others. A solid prayer life will give us energy which will help overcome all the obstacles, difficult circumstances or personal weaknesses in our lives.
There is however, such a thing as dead faith. This does not save. It is faith without works (cf. James 2:14-16. Dead faith is found whenever daily life is separated from belief. Some easily adopt the mindset of the world and ending up become practical atheists. For example, those who say they are Christian but adopt the morality of the world in areas such as: pre-marital sexual relationships, contraception, abortion, euthanasia and homosexual relationships. Sadly, they allow themselves to become contaminated by a world view contrary to the Scriptures and Church Teaching. Instead our faith must a lived 24/7 and the Lord expects good deeds which prove our faith.
Although at times in our lives our Faith may be seriously tested, God never abandons us. Alexander Solzhenitsyn had been arrested as a dissident and placed in a Gulag which is a Russian Prison Camp. Here he was forced to do back breaking labour until he came to the point of exhaustion, with little food and little rest, he was constantly watched by the guards and never allowed to communicate with another human being. He was never permitted a newspaper or magazine from outside. Alexander came to believe that he was forgotten by everyone, even God. In despair he decided to commit suicide, but he could not reconcile that act with the teachings of the Bible. Then he decided to end his misery by trying an escape, knowing that he would surely be shot. He rationalized that his death would be at the hands of another, not his own doing. The appointed day came. He started to jump up and run, but suddenly a prisoner he had never seen before stood in front of him looking into his eyes. Solzhenitsyn said he could see more love in those eyes than he had ever seen before emanating from the eyes of another human being. The prisoner then stooped down and with a small twig in his hand began to draw the symbol of the Cross in the soil of Soviet Russia. When Alexander saw the cross, he knew God had not forsaken him. He knew God was right there beside him in his deepest pit. Little did he realize that Christians all over the world had been praying for his release, and within three days he would be sitting in Geneva, Switzerland, a free man.
How often when a crisis comes, we concentrate on the crisis instead of on God. This is a common fault of humanity and was the fault of Solzhenitsyn. All the crises of our lives are opportunities for spiritual growth. There is more growth in the valleys than on the mountain tops. When we lean on God with prayer our faith will grow in times of crisis. As God said to Habakkuk: The upright man will live by his faithfulness. Praise be Jesus Christ, now and forever.