An age without faith is an age of superstition. Religious belief is so essential to the heart that once it is cast aside, some form is called in to fill the void. Unless the house is tenanted with goodness, seven devils worse than the first come in to dwell there. When minds abandon their concern about final destiny, they substitute for the mystery of what happens after death, the mystery of how someone was murdered. But the mystery there must be. At the end of the twentieth century we find ourselves in a era of superstition in which minds believe everything as fanatics and quacks become shrines of worship and objects of adoration.
Whence came the millions to accept the superstition of Nazism, Fascism and Communism if it were not from an emptiness of soul brought by a loss of faith? The essence of political superstition is the identification of the political and the sacred, as the essence of economic superstition is the Communist identification of the labouring class and Messianism. It was the great boast of the eighteenth century that "God" and "the supernatural" would be exorcised by an exposure to light. But what happened with the rejection of religious faith was the upsurge of political superstitions which came very close to making the world a madhouse.
If there is not one great Face of Love that bends over mankind, its troubled mind will fill it with a thousand horrible masks. When religion is strong, it purges the unconscious mind of all those which psychoanalysis tries to expunge in the soul without faith. Even when psychoanalysis does effect what it calls a "transference" of the mental state, it never appeases the hunger of the soul for something spiritual and beyond self to adore and worship. Faith in a human being is not like sawdust in a doll. You cannot rip it open, shake out the sawdust on a couch, analyze its tree origins, put it back and make a new creature.
The thirsty traveller in the desert who mistakes a mirage for an oasis is superstitious. He has abandoned reason and sees a dream for a reality. So our twentieth century, impatient with its long voyage on the sea of life, after having denied a port and thrown away the compass, has turned clouds into islands and fog-banks into imaginary continents. Denying God, we seem to find it necessary to make gods, not out of gold and silver and clay, but out of science, psychology and economics.
Quite apart from the theology of it, the psychological fact stands out that those who have a deep and profound faith in Christ, the Son of God, are less likely to make unmanly submission to unworthy pretenders. This has been proven in thousands and thousands of cases in which Christian missionaries during times of persecution withstood their persecutors while those without faith succumbed. Freedom from dependence on "phonies" is purchased by loyalty to Truth and Love.
The grave danger of loss of faith is not only that others will arise to insist on dominating us, but that our wills will become so weak and our minds so confused as to insist on giving assent. Two women, after undergoing "brainwashing" in a political prison, were finally released. Both women returned to the relative freedom of their homes and families; in a few weeks they asked their captors to return them to prison because they wanted to be dominated. Superstition manifests itself not only in credulity, but also in servility. Scripture says the "last times" will be characterized by a refusal to endure sound teaching.
Many live under the illusion that their rejection of religious faith is a proof that they are immune from credulity. The truth is that they too accept authority, but it is the vague, vaporous, anonymous authority of "they". "They" are wearing green, and the like. Who are "they"? The person of faith at least knows the One Whose guidance he accepts. Few things are more strange than the eagerness with which many so-called educated people swallow the dicta of a mere human being, and swear by his glory. Great indeed is the void left in the heart by the exile of Christ.
BY ARCHBISHOP FULTON J. SHEEN (1895-1979)
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Sunday, May 24, 2009
I have through years of reading, pondering, reflecting and contemplating, the 3 things that last; FAITH . HOPE . LOVE and I would like to made available my sharing from the many thinkers, authors, scholars and theologians whose ideas and thoughts I have borrowed. God be with them always. Amen!
I STILL HAVE MANY THINGS TO SAY TO YOU BUT THEY WOULD BE TOO MUCH FOR YOU NOW. BUT WHEN THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH COMES, HE WILL LEAD YOU TO THE COMPLETE TRUTH, SINCE HE WILL NOT BE SPEAKING AS FROM HIMSELF, BUT WILL SAY ONLY WHAT HE HAS LEARNT; AND HE WILL TELL YOU OF THE THINGS TO COME.
HE WILL GLORIFY ME, SINCE ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. EVERYTHING THE FATHER HAS IS MINE; THAT IS WHY I SAID: ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. - JOHN 16:12-15 -
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