In The Midst Of Life

Where does faith happen? Does it happen in a pew, or in a classroom? Does it happen at Church, during a hymn or the pastor’s sermon?
Where does faith come in? Does it come when we or someone we care about is faced with death? Does it come at the gravesite, the funeral, or only after the fact when we have time to think of that person and about our own mortality?
Where is faith found? Is it on the mountaintop or in the valley below? Perhaps it is on the way to Emmaus or on the Damascus Road.
When does Faith occur? Is it in the morning when the sun arises, or in the evening with a bedside prayer?

The truth is that faith can happen at any of these times or places. But then again, faith doesn’t happen, it just is. Faith is a state of being. Faith is a constant consciousness. Faith is more than a feeling, more than a thought, more than any single action. In fact, the feeling we call faith, the philosophical position that we refer to as faith, or any act of faith, is not really faith, but emerges from, or is provoked by faith.

Faith happens anywhere and everywhere. Faith occurs all hours of the day. The faith that is required of us is a faith that never sleeps. It is not an ideology to be applied to situations for a moral outcome. Faith is not simply A way to approach the world, for a Christian, it is THE WAY in which we approach life! There is no line separating ‘secular’ and ‘Christian’. WE try so hard to draw that line, when in fact, that is the opposite of what we are supposed to do. Christ came to create gray areas while we are struggling to maintain black and white. He came to show us that our faith, if genuine, is not a tool to be pulled out when a problem arises, but the constant state in which we live in this world. With true faith, we cannot separate our ‘beliefs’ from reality. Our faith is how we view reality. It is how we approach reality. Faith becomes our reality!

In the same way, we cannot separate ourselves from the world, to do so would be to separate ourselves from life. We emerged fully in life, and, in the same way, we should be fully emerged in our faith. So how does one find this faith? Why, it is elementary my dear reader. Simply, faith is found in the Midst of Life.

PS-> as an addendum check out my old campus minister's blog post on a prayer of St. Theresea
http://revtmnewell.blogspot.com/2005/10/with-kindness.html