Why Is Faith Important?

How does the virtue of faith make a difference to the life of a Christian? Theologian of the Papal Household and beloved Angelicum professor Fr. Wojciech Giertych, OP shows how faith is the spark that ignites the life of virtue.https://t.co/epX2u2nsbW pic.twitter.com/zcchGMLAUe

— Angelicum Thomistic Institute (@TAngelicum) July 22, 2022

Not a Scholastic Explanation of Faith

Faith is the ardent desire for God, a bold effort to change, the courage to love, constant progress.

— Pope Francis (@Pontifex) August 27, 2021

Faith and Trust

A thankful heart is a trusting heart, even when it seems like God isn’t answering our prayers or when things aren’t going as we had hoped. I’m sure when Joseph was betrothed to Mary, he never dreamed his life would end up as it did. https://t.co/UIgHozYUJR

— OCN (@MyOCN) December 19, 2020

The Nominalist Bogeyman?

CWR: Negotiating grace, nature, freedom, autonomy: A conversation with Douglas Farrow
“The faith is handed down to us by the Church. We don’t get to invent it,” says the author of Theological Negotiations: Proposals in Soteriology and Anthropology. “But we do share in the task and responsibility of trying to understand it.”

Dr. Farrow: It takes me next to two very basic areas of dispute: the relation between justification and sanctification, in which Luther becomes my chief interlocutor, and the relation between “satisfaction” and punishment, a subsidiary but crucial topic that if anything is even more misunderstood today. Both of these have very significant implications for pastoral theology, as for systematic theology.

Those two chapters are followed by a pair on doxology. The first of these treats what I call “doxological Pelagianism”; that is, the tendency to rely on nature to perfect itself even in the act of worship, where the grace of God in Jesus Christ should be most evident. It will be among the most controversial chapters in the book, since it takes its cue from Protestant thinkers while contending that the problem is more exaggerated in Protestantism than in Catholicism, where it is also present.

The second is a detailed treatment of the problem of transubstantiation. Here I return to Aquinas, and to the task of rethinking some of his ideas by way of a more adequate eschatology. I expect this chapter to be controversial as well, even inside Catholicism. But both Catholics and Protestants, if they read it patiently, will perhaps find that the whole stubborn business—the very serious business—of transubstantiation appears in a fresh light.

I'd need more historical evidence before accepting his claims about nominalism:

CWR: In the Introduction, you write, “Nominalism is Western civilization’s wounded side, from which is flowing, not water and blood, but blood and fire.” Can you provide some background and context to that strong statement?

Dr. Farrow: That is said with respect to modernity’s doomed attempt to re-found Western civilization on the basis that “God” is merely a concept in the world, a way of speaking about emergent order in the world, rather than the living God, the God of the Bible who through the incarnation suffers and dies with man, who as man actually conquers death for the sake of life eternal. It was through nominalism that we learned to regard the latter as myth, as an empty vessel that could be filled with fresh content as required. But the fresh content we have poured into it has not brought progress towards perpetual peace, as the fathers of modernity hoped. It has brought moral confusion, incited hubris of every kind, and led to the sickness unto death; that is, despair. Western civilization is crumbling before our eyes, and being torn down by our own hands. We’ve decided that there’s little or nothing there worth salvaging, not even the statuary, as it turns out.

"Faith"

This is the "pisteuo" Πιστεύο pblm.
Credere does not mean epistemic belief, but trust, which I defined as "pisteic", a kind of doxastic committment . From the Nicene credo: "Πιστεύομεν εἰς ἕνα Θεὸν"
In Engligh, "belief" ~beloved.
Note: δόξα = belief, gift, & glorification. https://t.co/qZYuRKfKPz

— Nassim Nicholas Taleb (@nntaleb) May 3, 2020

2/ In Semitic lang., "Amen" means "trust", not epistemic belief, so professions of faith state trust.

The Syriac credo is "mhayminan 7ad aloho" = "WE TRUST only one god". (not "I" since; is no Nicene creed for non Greek-Orthodox/Cath)
Doxa in Christian Aramaic/Syriac is tshba7. pic.twitter.com/VLTM6j7Fbo

— Nassim Nicholas Taleb (@nntaleb) May 3, 2020

3) The pisteuo pbm is the reason first-order atheists a la Dawkins & religious people talk past one another: simply religious beliefs never claimed to be epistemic that is, belief in the scientific sense.

You need to remove verbalism & labels to understand what something means.

— Nassim Nicholas Taleb (@nntaleb) May 3, 2020

Fr. Blankenhorn on Spiritual Communion

The Exodus took Israel through a long period of profound physical penance and spiritual purification: the two seem to be inseparable in the spiritual life. The desert became the only way for Israel to reach the Promised Land, and by God’s saving will, the people could only traverse this barren place by turning to the Lord each day for manna and quail. Israel had to learn radical trust in God, to recognize her utter dependence on him for everything: the direction of travel, the way to order the community’s life, and, of course, the reception of sufficient food and water.

Related:


Updated (4/9):

An essay touching upon the same topic, but much shorter. Still, it refers to the same two sources, St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas.

St. Augustine's Journey to Easter by C. C. Pecknold

Yet it is precisely in this exile that we must find our way to Calvary this year. We may be weary pilgrims, spiritually gaunt for so much sacramental fasting, but we are still pilgrims who must press our lips to the Cross. We cannot enter into the Paschal Triduum through Skype or Zoom. So what are we to do, we poor banished children of pandemic?

St. Thomas Aquinas gives us a hint: “the reality of the sacrament can be had through the very desire of receiving the sacrament.” He makes a distinction here between the signum and the res—the sacrament and the reality that the sacrament communicates. It is a distinction that goes back to St. Augustine.

There is at least one objection to this in the combox, concluding that if it is true, it renders going to Church superfluous. (Actually, it would render receiving the Sacraments superfluous.) I would think that desire is not enough -- one needs to ask God for the gift of life and trust in His goodness and mercy.

Αἰτεῖτε καὶ δοθήσεται ὑμῖν. -- Matthew 7:7 (cf. Luke 11:9)

The Power of Truth

CWR: A sorely needed theological justification of the truth of the Catholic faith by Eduardo Echeverria

Cardinal Gerhard Müller’s book The Power of Truth addresses the challenges to Catholic doctrines and morals today—not only by the culture at large, but also by elements within the Church.

Pascha, Resurrection, and Faith

Church Life: What Does Belief in the Resurrection Look Like? by David Fagerberg

Faith and Practical Reason: Fr. Wojciech Giertych, O.P.

First Things: Is There a Saving Truth? by Gerhard Cardinal Müller
Does our eternal salvation depend on the concrete acceptance of the truths of faith?

Faith and Humility

Fr. John Guy Winfrey on Pistis

How much (supernatural) prudence is required for the discernment of whether someone has entered into the glory of God or not, as opposed to the movement of the Holy Spirit? It makes sense to me for this to be left in the hands of the local bishop, who might have more of a familiarity with the person in question, or at least with the local cult of that person, as opposed to using a bureaucratic means of assessing that person's holiness. It also makes sense for that person to be adopted into the local liturgical calendar first, and then adopting that feast in the universal calendar of that rite, after the cult has spread, etc. But do bishops no longer have that "authority" to change the local liturgical calendar? Or is it a right that they can reclaim for themselves from the bishop of Rome?

Does a patriarch have sole authority over the liturgical calendar for his region or "particular Church" or rite?

How much of the average Latin Catholic's judgment concerning the sanctity of a person is shaped by that person's exposure through the mass media, a form of "marketing" as it were, rather than by personal familiarity with that person, or knowing someone who is familiar with that person? Should the opinion of someone shaped solely by mass media be taken into consideration in assessing the state of the cult? What role does faith play in the private or public judgment of individuals of someone else's sanctity? Plenty were told Fr. Maciel was a saint and believed it.

Salvation by Faith

Benedict on the Loss of Missionary Zeal by Jude P. Dougherty

PISTEVO Episode 4

Watch #PISTEVO and better understand the definition of the Orthodox Christian Faith. #Ibelievehttp://myocn.net/pistevo-watch-the-art-of-belief-episode-iv-the-definition-of-faith/

Posted by Orthodox Christian Network on Thursday, September 17, 2015

PISTEVO, Episode 2

Do icons help you to connect with God? Please share!Watch PISTEVO – The Art of Belief Episode II – The Next...

Posted by Orthodox Christian Network on Wednesday, August 26, 2015

The Faith of Angels - Fr. Serge-Thomas Bonino, OP

Help my unbelief.

I believe, help my disbelief! Lord have mercy on me!

Posted by Orthodox Christian Network on Wednesday, March 25, 2015

On the Love for God and Neighbor

Post by Zenit News Agency.