We declare to you what was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and touched with our hands, concerning the word of life.
--1 John 1:1
The New Testament letter of John begins with a bold declaration. Pretty clearly, Christianity is not another brand of "spirituality" with Jesus being progenitor and chief guru. The shocking truth of the passage is that Christian faith is real life stuff, physical stuff. It's even a matter of the senses.
John, and the other disciples and witnesses with him, heard the risen Christ, saw and looked at the risen Christ, and touched the risen Christ. That definitely seems to be good enough for them. Is it good enough for us? Are we able to receive, accept, and then rejoice in their declarations? Having not seen Christ, do we still believe in Him? Or do we see faith in more spiritual (and less physical) terms where our thoughts drift and our emotions fly away to a mystical, serene place?
It's easier -- in fact, a piece of cake! -- to see the handiwork of God in a sunset. But what of the hurricanes, the tsunamis, the insurance adjusters and Red Cross personnel who descend on the destruction? We love the sunset because it's, well, beautiful. Surely, God must have had a hand in that, and we comfort ourselves with the thought. But mother nature is a wobbly lord -- a lord we can't quite be sure of. Tornadoes have been known to wipe out entire towns. Where, then, is our ground of confidence? Is it in rising early to see the cloudless sunrise on a Bahamas vacation?
Our ground of confidence is not in beauty itself. Rather, it's in the Lord who gave us the ability to sense such beauty. And the ugly reality of death could not hold that Lord; for He, as St. John declared, is the Word of life! That Word does not produce another version of spirituality. Instead, it creates faith! That's what sees us through!
PD
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