Knowing My Faith

By Ignacio Götz

Christianity is an enormously complex edifice whose numberless cubicles were built brick by brick over two thousand years. In it, every detail has been thought through so that it meshes perfectly with the constructs that went before. The bricks were shaped by scholarly men and women, theologians and saints, who wrote for the edification of their contemporaries. In this book, I have gathered some excerpts from their writings and organized them under the rubrics of the commandments, the tenets of the creed, the sacraments, and prayer. These materials should help us gain a deeper understanding of our faith and place us in the traditions that formed it.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Feb 5, 2018
• ISBN: 9781641401425

Book preview

Preface

The idea for Knowing My Faith came to me while I was still studying at the seminary in Kurseong, India, whose library holdings were extraordinary, especially in terms of sources. I felt that most Christians have been cut off from the sources of their faith, the Church fathers and mothers of the first centuries, and some of the great commentators of later ages. While their language and imagery may sometimes strike us as quaint or exaggerated, there is no question that their influence was profound and pervasive. We only weaken the faith when we remove ourselves from such sources. This trend of ignoring the sources I attribute to poorly trained priests and ministers who, through the centuries, have preached a religion of fear and simple catechetical dogmas, neglecting what is perhaps their main task: that of teaching and enlightening the faithful. It is so easy to thunder about hell, so difficult to preach, in intelligible words, the exegesis of the scriptures. Erasmus wrote of such preachers that they bray like donkeys in church, repeating by rote the psalms they haven’t understood.¹

There is more. Reading through the writings of the fathers and mothers of the past, one realizes the enormous and protracted effort that has gone on in the formation of what today we call Christianity. The things we believe today, with their detailed theological explanations, could not have come to be except through the explanatory efforts of countless devoted minds and hearts. Christianity is an enormously complex edifice, whose numberless cubicles were built brick by brick over two thousand years. In it, every detail has been thought through so that it meshes perfectly with the constructs that went before, and the whole forms an awesome complex beautiful to behold.

Besides gathering the excerpts, I wrote, too, a series of brief introductory passages to accompany each set of selections. In them I aimed at summarizing the core of the Christian faith regarding the particular item in question. Following the overall purpose, these summaries were grounded on scripture and tradition while containing insights from the major theologians of the day. The prayers were taken from the thousands of such rogations contained in various missals and ritual books.

Beyond the concern with the sources of the Christian faith, I also had in mind the imitation of the man Jesus, who went through life doing good (Acts 10: 38), not making money, despising the poor, or waging war. This has been a major interest of my life. I suspect that a great deal of the divinization of Jesus has had, as a major effect, the neglect of the person of the historical Jesus, and has therefore distracted most Christians from a genuine imitation of Christ. It is easier to absolve oneself for failure if one is imitating a god; it may be inexcusable not to imitate the man Jesus. In the thirteenth century, the Minorites were persecuted and killed because they sought to imitate the poor man Jesus at a time when popes, prelates, and princes wallowed in riches and luxury while singing the praises of God.

I have also been guided by Tertullian’s lapidary statement, Truth blushes for nothing except for being hidden. For, as Flannery O’Connor famously wrote in September 1955, The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.

The sources for all the excerpts have been meticulously detailed. And I should add that the ones chosen represent but a fraction of a much, much larger whole available to all. In some cases, the texts themselves have been modified to bring them into compliance with gender-inclusive language. Any additional comments are clearly the editor’s.

¹¹ Erasmus of Rotterdam, Praise of Folly, §54.

Abbreviations

Part I

The Creed

1

The Creed

What is the Creed, or the Symbol of the Faith, as it is called? Its origin is uncertain. Many legends circulated in early times about its Apostolic origin, but there is nothing certain about them.

One thing, however, is certain: we find a creed already in the letters of St. Paul. Paul’s creed is his message, the summary of his teaching, the essentials of the new faith. Thus we read, "I handed down to you the facts which had been imparted to me, that Christ died for our sins . . . that He was raised on the third day" (1 Cor. 15:3–5. Emphasis added). This is the summary of Paul’s preaching, namely, the death and resurrection of Christ.

It is not strange, then, that at the time of baptism new Christians were asked to profess their faith—that is, the Creed—in a loud voice. So did Philip ask the eunuch, the official of the queen of Ethiopia, if he believed in Christ Jesus, and forthwith baptized him (Acts 8:36–38) And St. Cyril of Jerusalem explained to his neophytes, You were led to the holy pool of divine baptism . . . and each of you was asked whether they believed in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and you made that saving confession and descended three times into the water, and ascended again (Catech.Mystagog. II, 4; Hippolitus, Apostol. Tradit. XVI, 13–16). Here the creed has been made explicit in a trinitarian formula, but it remains the same profession of Christian faith.

Later on, as the years passed by and heresies appeared and were refuted, more explanations were added at international conclaves called synods (eight of them in ancient times), and the creed became not merely an expression of faith but a touchstone of orthodoxy as well. Thus we get the longer credal formulas of Nicaea and Constantinople, which remain in use till the present. Creed, then, is like a summary of what Christians believe—a brief statement of the mysteries of the faith as well as a reminder of the mysteries to hope for.

Lord, I believe in You

with all my soul and strength,

with all my mind,

because I know You cannot deceive me,

because I know You are eternal wisdom,

infinite knowledge,

the only worthy object of my mind.

Increase my faith, Lord,

that I may ever walk toward You

in the light of Your revelation.

Justin. We do not believe in groundless myths nor in irrational teachings, but in doctrines based on reason, inspired by the divine Spirit, abundant with power, and teeming with grace.²

Nicetas of Remesiana. A believer in Christ is one who follows him as a leader toward the true life, much as the people of Israel followed Moses and entered the land of promise. One who trusts in the leadership of Christ renounces the Enemy and his angels, that is to say, all manner of magical superstition which depends on the emissaries of Satan. Moreover, the Christian renounces all the Devil’s works—cults, idols, omens, auguries, pomps and shows, robberies and frauds, sins of the flesh and drunkenness, dancing and lying—not to mention much else which separated you from the Lord and allied you with the Devil. They are the chains of the serpent, loaded on the souls of people to lead to the prison of hell. Only when people have rid themselves of these evils, and cast off these chains from their back and thrown them, so to speak, in the face of the enemy, can they proclaim their act of faith with sincerity.³

Rufinus. i believe stands right in the foreground, as the Apostle Paul insists when writing to the Hebrews: For they that come to God must first of all believe that He is, and is a rewarder to them that believe in Him.⁴ The prophet, too, points out: If you will not believe, you will not understand.⁵ Since you want the door of understanding opened to you, it is only right that you should first of all confess that you believe. No one, for example, embarks on the sea, committing their life to the watery depths, without first believing in the possibility of their survival. No farmer buries the seeds under the upturned sods or scatters the fruits on the earth without the confident belief that, fostered by the rains and the cooperation of the sun’s warmth, the soil will multiply the fruit and bear its crop, ripening it with favorable winds. In fact, there is nothing in life that can be transacted without a preliminary readiness to believe. Is it then at all surprising that, when we approach God, we first of all confess that we believe, seeing that without belief even the common routine of life cannot be accomplished? I have set out these axioms at the outset because pagans are in the habit of objecting that our religion lacks a rational basis, depending solely on the persuasions of belief. Consequently I have demonstrated that, unless belief exercises its prior influence, nothing can be done, or, for that matter, stay as it was. Marriages, I may add, are contracted in the belief that a family will result. Children are sent to school to study in the belief that the schoolmaster’s instructions will settle into the pupil’s mind. A monarch assumes the emblems of sovereignty in the belief that peoples, cities, the armed forces themselves, will obey him. But if no one undertakes enterprises like these without first believing that certain results will ensue, is it not all the more understandable that belief should be the way to the knowledge of God?⁶

Theodore of Mopsuestia. These few things have been said out of many in order to rebuke those who have strayed from the truth, and to show that they have strayed because of their lack of faith. Indeed, the error of those who have gone astray because of their lack of faith is great and possesses many ramifications, and as error increases in proportion to its remoteness from faith, so also knowledge increases in proportion to its nearness to faith. It is by faith that we know that God is, that He is the creator of everything and that He created everything from nothing. It is by it that we understand that those who have passed away and perished will come back again to life and existence, when the creator wishes. It is by faith that we have known that the Father has a Son born of His nature and God like Himself. It is by faith that we have accepted that the Holy Spirit is of the same nature as God the Father and that He is always with the Father and the Son. It is by faith that we have no doubt nor suspicion concerning the preaching of the Economy of Christ which took place in the world.⁷

Irenaeus. All this I heard with great attention, and I have noted it down not in paper but in my heart; God has granted me the grace to meditate on it often with great love.⁸

---

² Dialog. cum Trypho, c. 9;

FC

Vol. 6.

³ De Symbolo;

FC

6, p. 43.

⁴ Hebrews 11:6.

⁵ Isaiah 7:9.

⁶ Commentary on the Apostles’ Creed, 3;

ACW

Vol. 20.

⁷ Commentary on the Nicene Creed, Ch. 1. (English from A. Mingana’s translation in Woodbrooke Studies, Vol. 5, pp. 23–24.

⁸ Epist. ad Florin., quoted in Eusebius, Histor. Eccles. V, 20;

MG

7, 1225.

2

Humanity’s End

People are persons, and therefore they were not created for anything that is below themselves. People were not created to be slaves of other people or to remain at the mercy of material nature. Nothing below humanity can be said to be the purpose for which humanity was created.

If this is so, then there is only one end that can be called humanity’s end, only one end which can explain humanity’s existence. This end is indeed personal, but on another, higher level. It is a Person, and so the tending toward it is personal, through intellect and will. It is on a higher level, and therefore it is humanity’s end, the goal toward which all travel, the point at which all must aim.

People, then, are created for God, to know, to love, and consequently to serve God. Material things can indeed be known, but only a person—and God is a person—can be loved; only a divine Person can claim unconditional surrender and service. As St. Augustine said, You created us, Lord, for Yourself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in You (Confessions, Book I, 1).

This is the argument of reason, and we do well sometimes to listen to the arguments of reason. But besides this—nay, above this, because faith is above reason—we know people have been not only created but also redeemed by God, a fact of faith that gives God the fullest title to be humanity’s end.

A made thing belongs to its maker, but the maker cannot love it. People likewise belong to their Maker, to their Redeemer, but they can—and must—acknowledge and love Him. Creation and redemption are facts, religious and ontic, and therefore no human life can be explained or ultimately understood outside of them, just as no new invention can be explained outside the maker’s purpose.

People, considered or placed outside this end, cannot be really understood. Often our ability to perceive the realities that belong to the religious and ontic sides of our lives become numbed, and so we fail to see the absurdity of our position.

Lord God,

direct our actions by Your inspirations,

perfect them through Your help,

so that every prayer and work,

every action undertaken by us,

may have its beginning in You

and find its end also in You.

Peter Lombard. If one should ask why people were created . . . the answer, briefly, is this: Because of God’s goodness. And so Augustine, in his book On Christian Doctrine,⁹ writes: Because God is good, we are; and in so far as we are, we are good.

And if it should be asked: to what end was the rational creature made, one can answer: in order to praise God, to serve Him, enjoy Him. And in these things the creature itself profits, not God. For God is perfect, full of goodness, and He cannot acquire or lose anything. The fact that the creature is made, therefore, must be referred to God’s goodness and the good of the creature itself. Briefly, then, the answer is this: the rational creature was made because of God’s goodness and for its own good; for it is profitable to serve God and possess Him.

And so, when either humans or angels are said to have been made for God, one does not mean to say that God is in need of either, for He is in no need of us; but that they have been made to serve and possess Him whom to serve is to reign. This, then, is profitable for the servant, not for the Master. Says Augustine:¹⁰ And in the same way as humans have been created for God, that is, to serve Him, so also the world has been created for humans, that is, to serve them. Humans are placed in the middle, so to say. They are to serve and to be served. And on both counts they profit, that is, both from the service they receive and from that they render: everything is for their own good. For such was God’s will, that humans should serve Him and yet, from this service, humans, and not God, should profit; and likewise that the world should serve humans for the profit of humans. Everything therefore is for humanity’s good, namely, that which has been made for them and that for which they themselves were made.¹¹

Ignatius Loyola. Humans are created to praise, reverence, and serve God our Lord, and by this means to save their souls. The other things on the face of the earth are created for humans to help them in attaining the end for which they are created. Hence, humans are to make use of them in as far as they help them in the attainment of their end, and they must rid themselves of them in as far as they prove a hindrance to them. Therefore, we must make ourselves indifferent to all created things, as far as we are allowed free choice and are not under any prohibition. Consequently, as far as we are concerned, we should not prefer health to sickness, riches to poverty, honor to dishonor, a long life to a short life. The same holds for all other things. Our one desire and choice should be what is more conducive to the end for which we are created.¹²

Louis of Granada. True happiness can be found only in God. If worldly people understood this well, they would not pursue mundane pleasures as they do. Therefore, I intend to prove this all-important truth, not only by the authority and testimony of faith, but also by arguments from reason.

No creature can enjoy perfect happiness until it attains its ultimate end, that is, the last perfection that is due to it according to its nature. Until it arrives at this state, it is necessarily restless and discontented, as is anyone who feels a need for that which they yet lack. Now, what is the ultimate human end, the possession of which constitutes their complete happiness? Undoubtedly it is God, who is our first beginning and last end. And just as it is impossible for us to have two beginnings, it is likewise impossible that we have two ultimate ends, for that would necessitate the existence of two gods.

Moreover, if God alone is our last end and true happiness, it is impossible for us to find true happiness outside of God. As the glove is made for the hand and the scabbard for the sword, and they serve for no other purpose than that, for which they were made, so the human heart, created as it is for God, cannot rest in anything outside of God. In Him alone is it content; without Him it is poor and needy. The reason for this is that our perfect happiness especially consists in the operation of our most noble faculties, intellect and will, and as long as these are restless, we ourselves cannot be tranquil and content. But these two faculties can never be at rest except in God alone. St. Thomas says that our intellect cannot know and understand so much as not to be capable and desirous of knowing more, if there is more to be known, and our will cannot love and enjoy so many goods as not to be capable of more, if more can be given. Therefore, these two faculties will never be satisfied until they find a universal object wherein are to be found all things and which, once it is known and loved, will leave no more truths to be known and no more goods to be loved. It follows from this that no created thing, not even the possession of the entire universe, can satisfy our heart, but only He for whom it was created—God.

In order that you may understand this truth more clearly consider the needle on a compass. The needle has been touched with a magnet and as a result it always points to the north. Observe how restless this needle is and how it fluctuates until it points to the north. Once this is done, the needle stops and remains fixed. So also, God created us with a natural inclination to Himself, and as long as we are separated from God, we remain restless, even though we possess all the treasures of the world. But once we have turned to God, we find repose, as does the needle when it turns north, for in God we find all our rest. Hence, those alone are happy who possess God and they will be the closer to true beatitude who are closer to God. And since in this life the just are closer to God, they are the more happy, although the world does not understand their happiness.

Another argument, no less convincing than the former, is based on the principle that much more is required to make a thing perfect than to make it imperfect, for perfection requires that a thing be completely perfect, but imperfection requires only one defect. Moreover, perfect happiness requires that people have all that they desire, and if only one thing is missing, this may contribute more to their unhappiness than do all the other things to their happiness. I have seen people in high places and with great possessions who in spite of these things were most unhappy because they were made more wretched by the lack of something they yet desired and could not obtain than they were made happy by all they had. However much people may have, it will not give them satisfaction as long as they are tormented by a desire for something. It is not the possession of many things that makes people happy, but the satisfaction and fulfillment of their desires.

St. Augustine explained this beautifully when he wrote: "To my way of thinking, people cannot be called truly happy who have not attained what they love, whatever be the thing they love. Neither are they happy who do not love what they possess, although the thing itself possessed be very good. For those who