The "Issue" of Faith

A "faith" that merely confirms us in opinionatedness and self-complacency may well be an expression of theological doubt. True faith is never merely a source of spiritual comfort. It may indeed bring peace, but before it does so it must involve us in struggle. A "faith" that avoids this struggle is really a temptation against true faith.
-Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation, ps.105-106


I wonder what informs me. Churning over media reports, documentaries, books, voices of family, friends, so-called-experts, the whole crowd -- what fixes my convictions, my Truth worth dying for?

I'd have to confess that each voice, regardless of how erudite, fades into nothingness, is dissolved into forsaken memory at some point. The most passionate of causes it seems, always has a counter-argument.

Have I fallen prey to relativism? Have I been so perplexed by the gray matter that the vacuum has suck me in? Perhaps.

But I would make another conjecture: like you, my brothers and sisters, I seek truth, and I am composed by the need to survive and thus the need to know myself and thus the ultimate need to be honest with who that really is. And so, the best theological claim that I can make, that I can stand on, is also the most subject to doubt, to vacillation, to criticism...

I am made of love. I was created to nourish the pilgrim souls of you, my brothers and sisters, even as you hold me in the best of your hopes. The only cosmic law is not my burdensome opinion of justice and righteousness but the explosion of every man-made dam that clogs up the greater anticipation, the endless resources of love that have waited patiently for every eternal second to cascade into our hearts.

I know this deep in my bones, with all of my heart and intellect, because this is my song of innocence and my song of experience -- and the chorus is the same: you are loved.