: bigger than our imagination

The quest for authentic faith that we have embarked upon is a journey of staggering proportions. It seems at times as if the horizon from starboard to port is filled with nothing but question marks. This pursuit will require that we think bigger and deeper than we ever have in the past. And then—when we think we have thought about as deeply as is humanly possible—we may have to think bigger still. That is why I say our journey is not about a destination but a Person—a Person bigger than our imagination!

So what do we need to collect in our backpack in order to make this journey? Let me suggest two distinctive bundles. First, we must bring an open-minded intellect willing to be engaged fully. To quote a spiritual mentor of mine, “a healthy faith is bigger than the intellect and any quest for authentic faith cannot bypass the intellect.” But we must also recognized that our journey will require us to involve non-cognitive parts of us—emotions, dreams and hopes and fears—as well. It is these non-cognitive parts of us that often force us to face some hard facts about life, faith and ultimately, God.

A word about what this journey is not. We have not embarked on a journey fraught with such peril that we immediately want to find the nearest calm harbor. In other words, we’re not in such a state that we are willing to believe anything as long as it gets us to calmer water. We’re not looking to swallow a religious—or for that matter an intellectual—placebo. We aspire to know Truth and are willing to stay the course in order to find Him. In other words, our search is not just about objective, detached, theoretical, academic truth.

It was novelist Walker Percy who pictured the difference between our search and the search for some theoretical truth in this way. Imagine a group of scientists gathered for a lecture on the effects of radiation in the outer Solar System. As the lab-coated lecturer drones on about the minutia of galactic radiation, an occasional murmur of “interesting” or “quite” can be heard among the chin-stroking audience. Then imagine that same group responding to the emcee announcing that a fire has broken out in the lobby and that people need to exit from the front of the stage. At this moment, no one keeps rubbing their chin in abstract thought. Why? It is because the real life situation that they find themselves in does not allow them the luxury of an abstract, disinterested, detachment.

Here are some questions to ponder. In what ways have we treated faith—our search to find and know God—in purely objective, detached or academic ways? Can we afford the luxury of that kind of abstract faith? What are the challenges we face in moving beyond a detached faith?