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One of my favorite daily puzzles is what’s called a “Sudoku.” I
first learned about these puzzles when flying in and out of town on
business trips while perusing those in-flight magazines normally
placed inside the seat pocket behind the
“airsickness”
bag. Solving a Sudoku takes a lot of concentration and, I am told,
this is a good thing because medical studies are said to have demonstrated that
people who regularly spend time solving puzzles—like a
Sudoku—actually have a lower rate of Alzheimer’s disease.
Impressive as those findings might be, they provide no guarantee,
however, of not getting Alzheimer’s disease, especially in families
where the disease appears to be hereditary.
What’s more important about puzzles, I think, is their popularity. Take,
for example, the number of people who attempt to solve the daily
Jumble, Crosswords, and Sudoku. The popularity of these and
other puzzles demonstrates that we human beings are designed to
solve problems. Difficult and frustrating as some puzzles may be,
it seems that we’re “hotwired” to solve them.
Solving those daily puzzles is one matter. But, solving “faith
puzzles” is an entirely different matter.
I suspect that’s why I oftentimes find myself wondering if we’re
being tempted when we think that “faith” is simply about answers to
spiritual and religious questions that appear in books like the
Bible or the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The
temptation we confront is whether or not we will believe that those
words define the truth about spiritual and religious matters which
are all too difficult for many of us to grasp, let alone
understand. So, we have faith in—we believe—what we don’t
understand. The problem is that all too many of us leave our faith
right there, that is, words in a book.
The reason I think this may very well be a temptation is because
faith has been defined traditionally as “belief seeking
understanding.” We believe what those words state—for example, each
Sunday we say “We believe in God, the Father almighty”—in order that
we might better understand what those words actually mean for how we
are going to live our lives each and every day. The challenge the
“faith puzzle” puts before us can be stated in the form of a
question: What does belief in God, the Father almighty, mean for how
we are going to live our lives today, that is, each and every day?
Or, does the “faith puzzle” seem so difficult to solve that we’re
tempted to leave behind what we believe here in church today and
forget about solving the puzzle until next Sunday?
Today’s readings from scripture offer a different definition of
faith, that of “loyalty.” While this definition certainly
simplifies solving the “faith puzzle,” this definition does makes it
more difficult for us to leave behind what we don’t understand until
we’re forced to deal with it again next week. Loyalty requires that
we do something right now…immediately, not tomorrow or next week.
Reflect back upon the first reading, where the prophet Isaiah said:
“Observe what it right, do what is just.” Now, that’s a pretty
straight-forward solution to the “faith puzzle.” It’s similar, in
fact, to what many parents have said to their children: “Just shut
up and do what I say.” Being righteous and just—loyal to God’s
commands—makes any person acceptable to God. That’s the solution to
the
“faith puzzle”
but, aye, there’s the rub! If we are loyal, then we must be
righteous and just each and every day. And, as we all know, that’s
pretty difficult, if not near to impossible for mere mortals!
St. Paul follows up on this notion by pointing out something that’s
pretty obvious: all of us have sinned. Because of that, none of us
can boast of our righteousness and justice; after all, none of us
has been loyal. We have all disobeyed God’s commands in one way or
another and, hence, are not acceptable to God. But, St. Paul solves
this “faith puzzle” by stating that it really doesn’t matter if
we’re not acceptable to God. Why? Because “God delivered all to
disobedience, that he might have mercy upon all.” All we have to do
is to accept the gift of God’s mercy and once again God makes us
acceptable. That’s the solution to the
“faith puzzle”
but, aye, there’s the rub once again! We demonstrate that we accept
God’s gift of mercy by being loyal to God’s commands each and every
day. Once again, we all know that’s pretty difficult, if not near
to impossible for mere mortals.
Matthew presents this notion of faith as loyalty to God’s commands
in a different way, offering the image of a Canaanite woman—someone
with whom faithful Jews could never associate. This woman is
seeking a miraculous healing for her daughter who is tormented by a
demon. The “faith puzzle” that needs to be solved is how—despite
being an outsider to the Jewish community, despite being oppressed
by the Jewish community, and despite the fact that neither Jesus nor
his disciples wanted her around—this woman will get her daughter
healed. The solution to this puzzle is found in this mother’s
loyalty. The Canaanite woman was loyal to her daughter and this
faith of hers gave this woman the gumption to persist against all of
the stumbling blocks that were being placed in her way. The
Canaanite woman was also loyal to her friends and believed what they had told
her about Jesus and hoped Jesus would do for her daughter.
This loyalty gave the woman the gumption to hold her own as she
argued with Jesus. So successful was the woman with her arguments
that Jesus finally relented and said, “O woman, great is your
faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.” Don’t
overlook the importance of her success:
in
the four gospels, this is the only person who wins in an argument
with Jesus!
The point is that faith is more of a “puzzle” than words found in
the Bible or Catechism of the Catholic Church. As a
daily puzzle,
faith sets before us challenges to understand better what we believe. Defined as “loyalty to God,”
faith challenges us to
think about each day as presenting a puzzle that we need to solve as
we determine who we will be righteous and just, that we will accept the gift of God’s mercy,
and as we gin up the gumption to persist against all of the
stumbling blocks that are put in our way.
How
does faith—defined as “loyalty” make it possible for us to do all of
this? Well, it’s likely due to what Elwood Blues said to his
brother, Jake, in the movie, The Blues Brothers. Do you
remember the movie? After Sr. Mary Stigmata chased the two
brothers out of her office wielding a yardstick for using foul
language, Elwood said to Jake, “We’re on a mission from God.”
Faith
sends us off on a
mission that requires loyalty not words in books.
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HOMILY
