Sunday: now faith is ...

In the news this morning. What doesn't really bother me all that much: that Prince Charles may have dozed off at Harry and Meghan's wedding. So, ...

Our second reading for today, which for us is Rally Day when leaders of the various ministries put up displays showing and telling what they do, and inviting folks to participate; Backpack Sunday, the Sunday before school starts the fall semester, when students bring their backpacks and leave them before the altar for a blessing to be prayed for those who wear them; a dinner that is a grand feast, the oyster guy at his booth opening cold and salty ones, Fr Steve's pulled pork, fried chicken, everyone brings something, Linda made Southern style cornbread, chocolate brownies, and we are taking a ten-layer caramel cake. It you miss this, don't worry, I'll make sure your oysters don't go to waste.

Back to the reading, one of my favorites, where it's made clear that faith is neither knowledge nor certainty.

Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Indeed, by faith our ancestors received approval. By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.

By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to set out for a place that he was to receive as an inheritance; and he set out, not knowing where he was going. By faith he stayed for a time in the land he had been promised, as in a foreign land, living in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God. By faith he received power of procreation, even though he was too old-- and Sarah herself was barren-- because he considered him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one person, and this one as good as dead, descendants were born, "as many as the stars of heaven and as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore."

All of these died in faith without having received the promises, but from a distance they saw and greeted them. They confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth, for people who speak in this way make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of the land that they had left behind, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; indeed, he has prepared a city for them.

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"a better country, a heavenly one" - - my mind is pondering what of Creation is outside Earth's atmosphere, what's beyond our solar system, beyond our Milky Way Galaxy, beyond our Universe, beyond a Multiverse, is there always something more, something unknown beyond all that we can ask or imagine?

Faith is that which I choose to have confidence in, that which I am willing to let be without seeing for myself. I can neither see God nor to the limits of our Universe. Faith is a zone beyond where religion and astronomy blend into the dark vastness of space beyond my imagining.

RSF&PTL