Belief is Natural

My Dearest Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

Have you ever sat down to read the Bible and it just didn’t do anything for you? It just wasn’t inspirational or moving. It was just kind of there. As I sat down to contemplate today’s gospel reading (Mark 12:35-37) I had such a day. I prayed again and reread the versus and again – nothing. Why wasn’t I inspired? Knock, Knock – Hey God are you there? I thought all the words of the Bible were supposed to be awe inspiring. Why was my mind so closed to the message? What happened to me? Was I spiritually dead? And then it dawned on me, maybe today’s message was meant for me. Maybe I wasn’t reading the right sign. Maybe it just wasn’t my day.

So you’re probably wondering, what was this uninspiring message? What Bible versus could be so dead that it had no meaning? In today’s gospel message, Jesus proclaims that He is the descendent or Son of David; that He is the Messiah and that He is the Lord. Well yeah, who doesn’t know that? Doesn’t everyone believe that Jesus is the Son of David, the Messiah our Lord and our Savior? Is there any doubt? I didn’t need this passage to tell me that. Why does one need to be told the obvious? And then I read my daily devotional reading from the Magnificat. The Meditation of Day was the inspiring message I was seeking, I had just looked in the wrong place. I now knew the message I was to write.

The meditation was from a letter written in 1861 discussing the growing concern within the religious community of the decline in religious faith by humanity. However, the author argued just the opposite that; “Humanity believes in God as easily as it believes in the existence of matter; it prays to God quite naturally as it lives. And as to you who are not humanity, and who really find it difficult to believe, consider that we believe willingly in what we love, and rarely what we love not.” Therefore, if we truly love God, belief is natural. If we do not express our love for God, how then can we truly believe that he is the Lord God of Heaven? But there is one thing in life that has no limit to its value, one virtue that can be practiced without any need for moderation. And that is love: the love of God and the love of other men in God and for His sake” (Thomas Merton). St. Thomas Aquinas said, “There is no point at which it becomes reasonable to abate your interior love for God or for other men, because that love is an end in itself: it is the thing for which we were created and the only reason why we exist.” If we exist to love God, then loving God is natural. If loving God is “Believing in God”, then believing in God is natural. It is the things that are unnatural that are most difficult to do. Therefore, it is most difficult not to believe in God. We have to work at not believing. It is like being right-handed and trying to do things with your left. It is possible, but very difficult. How many times have you heard that a so-called atheist thanked God or blessed you when someone sneezed? It is more difficult for them to remove God from their life then it is to accept God. Breathing is natural, therefore we breathe without thinking. Loving God is natural; therefore, we can love God without forcing ourselves.

Phew, and I thought I was spiritually dead today. Sometimes you just need to stop thinking and let the natural course which we were created to do come through. Love God because He loves you.

A Simple Prayer God, I Love You!

Yours in Christ Michael Marcon