My friends, the readings this week from the prophets, Elisha, Jesus and Paul, call us to consider the virtue of faith, what it is, what it is not, and what it personally means to each of us.  We all come out of somewhat the same experiences, given our ages, as far as faith goes.  Prior to the 2^nd Vatican Council when Pope John XXIII was about, “opening windows and doors,” speaking poetically about letting, “fresh air” into our beloved Church that hadn’t known any significant changes in belief or practice in hundreds of years, we all were trained to be “black and white” believers – that is, if Father said it, it was so – “Father,” the priest, was pretty much synonymous with God.

   Then came Angelo Roncalli – “Good Pope John” who wanted our beloved Church to be more open, inviting, and compassionate, where basically “love” would supersede law.  And history tells us that this was no simple fix – we humans very easily get stuck in our ways and find change hard, even if it is for the best.  In fact, we see a concerted effort at present within our Church, among some of the bishops, our own especially, to back track to pre-Vatican II times.

   So, that brings us to today’s readings which I said in the beginning revolve around our faith.  So, what is faith anyway?  If I were to ask each of you, the answers may be somewhat the same, yet somewhat different.  I will jump into the middle here and say first what I believe faith is not.  It is not “lack of doubt, but really the opposite.   So, to give us a working definition, I would say, “faith is believing in something or someone that we don’t have all the answers about, yet we believe, and trust in that “truth” anyway. 

   Think of the articles of faith that you have believed in, or perhaps accepted all your life that we really don’t have proof of:  creation of our beautiful world by a benevolent God who supposedly wants good and not bad for us; that this benevolent God became one-of-us in Jesus, to show us the way, that this same Jesus lived, died and rose from the dead, to give us a path to follow, and so on.  Now, we don’t have proof of any of this, except that if we look historically, there was a man, Jesus, from, as some have said, “the little backward town of Nazareth,” that did indeed live, but beyond that, the rest we take on faith from those who first believed.  And, without a doubt, our human ability and willingness to believe, has been abused over the years and centuries by those with power, to write the story for their own benefit. 

   In the past I have shared the untruth around the belief in our mother and sister Mary’s immaculate conception, which would have us believe that she was conceived and born without the “original” sin that the rest of us were supposedly “stained” with.  Now, it must be remembered that to be “human” means that we are “imperfect.”  If Mary was without sin at birth, or ever, then she was not human, which was why supposedly Mary was needed – to give Jesus the human component. 

   My friends, this is just one example of how those with the power in our Church decide what the narrative that they want to promote will be, and then they back track, to basically make it so.  And that chosen narrative was that we humans really “blew it,” God became angry with us, and only the death of his beloved son could make up for our sins, and make us right with God again. 

   Now, if you have ever doubted that such a story could be true, I would submit that your faith is intact!  Because you see, faith does not mean that we have “certainty” about a given thing, but in fact, we may doubt because we just don’t know, but yet, we can believe perhaps in a bigger concept, such as, that our God loved us enough to become one-of-us, and live-with-us.  If we have “certainty,” then there is no need for faith. Let me repeat that: If we have “certainty,” then there is no need for faith.

   So then, let us turn to today’s Scriptures for the ways they can enlighten us.  In the 1^st reading, Naaman, a man with leprosy is asked to believe in the prophet Elisha who tells him to wash in the river Jordan in order to be “made clean.”  He takes the prophet’s word on faith, not knowing if what he hopes for will come to pass.

   Paul, in his 2^nd letter to Timothy tells us that, “there is no chaining the Word of God,” unlike the chains that imprison Paul as he writes to Timothy.  My friends, when our “faith” is based simply on “black and white” rules – do this, don’t do that, no questions asked, and often set in place by those, as I said earlier, who want to control the story, so as to control the people, then “faith” ceases to exist.  Faith, grownup faith that is, shouldn’t necessarily come easily –ideally, it is something that we should struggle with. 

   Jesuit priest and musician, Dan Schutte has rightly stated that our faith must be approached through both our hearts and minds, beginning with our hearts.  Using this approach, of starting with the heart, allows us to apply love, compassion, and understanding, to a situation which can really “open us up” to much more than just beginning with our minds – basically, the law says no, therefore it must be wrong. 

   Naaman’s cure from leprosy was about believing in something he couldn’t fully understand, yet trusted in – somehow…  Paul’s counsel to his student Timothy, was, “the Word of God couldn’t be chained” – boxed in, that is. 

   I have shared many times over the years that my personal call to priesthood moved outside of a man-made law that said, “this couldn’t happen” in order that I could hear, “the Word of God,” that wasn’t, “chained,” that could move beyond the law, in order that love, compassion, and understanding could happen.

   Finally, the story in Luke’s gospel today about the one man with leprosy, now cured, who returned to “thank” Jesus is compelling for us simply because of the more expansive reaction (love-gratitude) that his faith brought forth.  We see this same reaction in the response of Naaman to the prophet Elisha in the first reading today, who cures him from leprosy. Naaman wants to gift Elisha for what has been given to him, but Elisha won’t accept a gift for what he feels God has done through him. Still, Naaman takes the next step, which you may have wondered about, asking Elisha to give him “two mule-loads of earth” to take to his home – Naaman’s purpose was that he would kneel on that earth each day to pray to, and show gratitude to the God of Elisha.

   Jesus’ reaction to the man – a Samaritan in fact, who most Jews at the time looked down on, “your faith has been your salvation,” could no doubt be discussed at length as to what Jesus actually meant, and I would simply suggest that he meant more than physical salvation, but “heart and mind” salvation too, that ability then, going forward toward  becoming more open, more loving , more understanding – of all that he would meet. Amen? Amen!