Bogoslovska smotra, Vol. 83 No. 3, 2013.
Original scientific paper
How to Rediscover the Beauty and Joy of Faith
Anton Tamarut
; Catholic Faculty of Theology, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
In the footsteps of the Benedict XVI's Motu Proprio Porta Fidei, the CDF's Note with Pastoral Recommendations for the Year of Faith, and the Pope's pertinent talks on the topic of faith, this article aims to emphasise the importance and the significance of the beauty and joy in faith. These are two, in author's opinion, essential traits, which colour faith with brilliance and warmth and make it attractive and much desired life companion. By remembering and pointing out the beauty and joy of faith one dares to hope for reawakened need to rediscover it, which also leads to the mission that the Pope entrusted to Croatian pilgrims during their seventh pilgrimage of gratitude to Rome on November 7th 2012, when he stated: »Similarly, be prepared to courageously witness the joy and beauty of the faith in Jesus Christ to all.«
Rediscovery of the joy and beauty in faith is impossible to imagine without the inner help of the Holy Spirit. Only through his light can one know and experience the beauty and joy of faith. In that sense, the Second Vatican Council's Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation Dei Verbum speaks about »joy and ease to everyone in assenting to the truth« (suavitatem in consentiendo et credendo veritati), which is given by the Holy Spirit (DVB).
The article draws attention to the beauty and joy of faith, which are seen equally in the act of faith as well as in its content. Faith is, namely, a »precious gift« in terms of the human being's cleaving to God as well as in terms of the human being's free assent to the whole truth that has been revealed by God. In author's opinion, the beauty and joy of faith primarily flow from its givenness. Faith is a gift of encounter and of relationship. Therefore, as any other vital relationship, it thrives on mutual longing and desire and on mutual expectations. God has his expectations of the human being and the human being has his/her expectations of God. God hopes for the human being and the human being hopes for God. Those of whom we do not expect anything also mean nothing to us. Faith is a vital, dynamic, transformative, and growing relationship.
In terms of contents, the article emphasises, among other things, the beauty and joy that flow from the faith in God's fatherhood and his unique omnipotence. The main emphasis is on the mystery of Incarnation, on revelation of God and the human being in Jesus Christ, on the image of ecce homo, and on the Risen Lord, the new human being created in Jesus Christ. At the end, the author draws attention to the Holy Spirit, who is the Gift of encounter and communion, the beauty and joy in God himself, but also in those in whom God resides through his love (Rom 5:5). The Holy Spirit is, namely, that »oil of joy« which the Scriptures mention (Ps 45:8; Heb 1:9), the whiteness and the light of the transformed and the risen Christ (Mt 17:2/1; 28:3/1). He is the author of the new human being, the new community - Church and of the new humanity. The Holy Spirit renews the face of the Earth through faces of human beings.
In conclusion the author reminds us that every gift, whether it is an object or a relationship, that is, a person, can be lost. That usually happens when we do not use a gift for a long time, when we stop nurturing certain relationships, when we do not see each other for a long time and do not talk to each other. In analogical sense, the same is true for faith as a precious gift, when we do not use it and when we do not live it. In author's opinion, when the gift of faith is lost, we should look for its ecstasy, beauty, and joy at the place where we first received it, where we first experienced its beauty and joy: in the baptismal, that is, ecclesial communion, in the community of faith, hope, and love, in that communion of life in which we were led by the Holy Spirit, the only creator of communion with God in the communion of human beings!
All those who have lost the way of faith are still bound by Jesus' call to conversion and to faith in the Gospel (cf. Mk 1:15); that is, by the possibility to return to the faith of their baptism. In this case, to convert means to clear the abandoned way of faith, to chop and burn the weed of hubris and selfishness. On such cleared, renewed, and reused way of faith, the beauty and joy of salvation return (cf. Ps 51:14). Paraphrasing Psalm 103, the author points out at the end that on our way of conversion and faith, the Lord forgives all our sins, heals all our diseases, redeems our life from the pit, crowns us with love and compassion, satisfies our desires with good things so that our youth (of spirit) is renewed like the eagle's (cf. Ps 103:3-5).
Keywords
faith; gift; relationship; encounter; way; beauty; joy; growth
Hrčak ID:
109822
URI
Publication date:
25.10.2013.
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