THAT, in effect, was what Christ told some people of his time. In spite of what Christ taught and did, they refused to believe him. “We played the flute for you, but you did not dance. We sang a dirge, but you did not weep,” he said.
“For John the Baptist came neither eating food nor drinking wine, and you said, ‘He is possessed by a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking and you said, ‘Look, he is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’” (cfr. Lk 7, 31-35)
Christ concluded this lament by saying that “wisdom is vindicated by all her children.” It’s his way of saying that everything that he said and did were proven true by all those who cared to listen and follow him.
We have to strengthen our belief that true wisdom can only come to us if we believe and follow Christ through our Christian faith. We have to be wary and be properly guarded against the strong pressure to acquire our wisdom from our own estimation of things and from other sources.
We are always in need of faith. We can never say that we have enough faith. We should never be complacent in this regard. Faith is an ever-dynamic thing that needs to grow and grow as well as to inspire us more deeply, thoroughly and consistently.
We need to make it grow to cope with our natural needs. In this level alone, we always need faith to make things very clear for us, even if in theory we can handle the natural challenges and difficulties we can encounter in life.
We cannot deny that there are just too many of these natural challenges and difficulties for us to handle with a certain ease and confidence. Especially these days when the pace of development is faster, and the developments themselves are more complicated and tricky, we need the light of faith to see things properly.
Besides, it is faith that gives the ultimate meaning and proper direction to all our human knowledge and endeavors. It is what gives the original perspective to all events, good or bad, in our life. Otherwise, we would end up confused and lost.
We also need to make our faith grow to cope with the multiplying infranatural consequences of our human condition that is weakened by sin. There’s no other way to manage and survive the consequences of sin, ours and those of others, than by relying first of all on our faith. Without faith, we will find no exit, no relief from this wounded status of ours.
That’s why St. Paul said: “Above all, take the shield of faith, wherewith you shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.” (Eph 6, 16) Faith holds pride of place in our armory to wage that lifelong battle with our wounded flesh, the temptations of the world, and the tricks of the devil.
Thirdly, we need to make our faith grow to cope with the tremendous goal of attaining our supernatural goal in life, that of becoming the true image and likeness of God in which we have been created. Our human and natural powers simply cannot handle this aspiration. It would require nothing less than God’s help which starts by giving us the gift of faith which we have to receive and make full use of./PN
