A sermon for proper 14, August 12th 2007

The Rev. Mark Ainsworth

Do you have faith, the woman asked me? She looked intently, questioning, not in an accusatory way but with honesty. I, a priest, was being asked a direct question about my own faith. Perhaps some of you have been in a similar position. We are being asked about this unique form of knowledge we call ‘faith’, a form of understanding reality that is required in many circumstances in life.

I will speak in a moment about Christian Faith, but before we get there it is worth reflecting for a moment on how ‘Faith’, in the broadest sense, is basis for all human knowledge. We have to believe – and ‘believe’ and ‘faith’ are the same word in Greek – we have to ‘faith in’, so to speak, the credibility of a person or an idea in order to have any foundation for knowledge. As Saint Augustine wrote, ‘faith seeks understanding’, not the other way around - let me give some examples.

Think about how children learn. A child will operate as if his or her parent’s teaching is valid and believable. So those of you who are parents are laying down a foundation of wisdom and knowledge that are the presupposition for future knowledge. And unless your child’s faith in your credibility is altered and diminished by belief in someone else, your instruction will act as the critical tool for analyzing further knowledge.

Now when the child grows up does this kind of faith disappear? No, it is modified but not superseded, it is gathered up into more sophisticated approaches. Even as adults we attribute the basis for much of our apprehension of reality to what we call ‘authorities’. Think of how we relate to our physician or our accountant. Think of the medicines we take – we must have faith that the scientist responsible for an empirical conclusion is competent, and honest.

We simply do not have the time, intelligence or resources to evaluate everything we want and need to know empirically and exhaustively. "Faith" is used instead.

Now let us go back to a child for a moment. You parents, as you may be aware, are not infallible. Some of what your children learn from you is wrong – and I not merely talking about so-called facts but also so-called values, although the distinction between the two is overly stated by secularists. Your child learns that you will be wrong, that ‘faith seeks understanding’ and that it is one form of rationality to trust you in the absence of other sources of information, but it is also rational to question. And the child also learns that it is irrational to cling rigidly to everything he or she was taught in the face of countervailing evidence. But, very importantly, what is to be counted as evidence is also governed by a certain amount of faith.

Now let us go to that old chestnut – the supposed distinction between science and faith. We have faith, but scientists don’t need it – is that true? Faith is seen a sort of last resort for those who lack other forms of knowledge – at least that is how certain key figures in the Enlightenment saw it. But you can see, from what I have said already, that this isn’t quite as simple as it at first seems.

Scientific knowledge is actually also dependent, in the broadest sense, on 'faith'. The distinguished Hungarian chemist and philosopher Michael Polanyi in his book ‘Personal knowledge’ argued that scientific discovery begins with a scientist's faith that an unknown discovery is possible. Think about that! Scientific discovery thus requires a passionate commitment to a result that is unknowable at the outset. That is personal knowledge, not some dispassionate supposed totality objective knowledge. It is, bottom line, faith in the intelligibility of the universe.

Polanyi argued that the scientific method is not an objective method removed from passionate human commitment. On the contrary, scientific progress depends primarily on the unique capability of human beings to notice and investigate patterns and connections, and on the individual scientist's willingness to commit time and resources to such investigation. That research usually must begin before the truth is known or the benefits of the discovery are imagined, let alone understood fully. It could then be argued that until one possesses all knowledge in totality one will need an element of faith. And faith, in the scientific sense, involves a tradition and a community – where would Einstein have been without James Clarke Maxwell and Isaac Newton?

Now to Christian faith. Faith in Christian theology is also a participant in the elements we have already identified. It seeks understanding, it is not irrational, but is committed to a rationally that accords with the object of its inquiry. Its is, most of all, relational, passionate and communal. Yes the object of faith is beyond this world, but God has engaged with this world and is knowable because God has made himself known. Therefore Christian faith is defined as resting on the promises of God who has communicated his truth by means of his Word. Faith is….. being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see’ (NIV) or ‘faith gives substance to our hopes and convinces us of realities we do not see’.

Faith gives us a grasp of the future that renders it as hope (Romans 8:24-5) so we are firmly assured that the future to which we are summoned has genuine substance, intelligibility and is worth committing our lives towards.

Faith enables us to interpret the present in terms of realities we cannot see (2 Corinthians 4:18).

And without faith it is impossible to please God. Why? Because we will not be able to enter into relationship with God. Faith is personal, relational knowledge based upon an apprenticed tradition. But faith is also what God helps grow in us – so it is not about us, on our own, white knuckling our way through to some settled state. Faith is trusting God’s work in the community of faith as it has handled and handed on the deposit of faith given in Scripture.

If we think about figures identified in today’s readings Abraham is a good example of faith. He precedes us, and therefore our faith is not a blind leap in the dark but is predicated upon, and in relationship to, the past figures. We are not in the same position as Abraham. Instead we position ourselves based upon the faithfulness of Abraham, and in the knowledge of the faithfulness of God to Abraham. Hence the reading from Hebrews is the record of faith that we can take to the bank.

And faithfulness is an apprenticeship like that of the learning of children and adults in which there is humility, and distinct practices that involve communal and individual loving obedience so that the inner mystery of what we believe can become an appreciated reality in our hearts, habits, affections and wills. ‘For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.’

As we gather Sunday by Sunday we have faith to seek understanding to listen and receive God’s word in scripture and sacrament and to seek to be faithful in every aspect of our lives.