Faces of Faith

Seeing the Face of God first in the faces of others

07/27/2017

EX 19:1-2, 9-11, 16-20B In the third month after their departure from the land of Egypt, on its first day, the children of Israel came to the desert of Sinai. After the journey from Rephidim to the desert of Sinai, they pitched camp. While Israel was encamped here in front of the mountain, the LORD told Moses, "I am coming to you in a dense cloud, so that when the people hear me speaking with you, they may always have faith in you also." When Moses, then, had reported to the LORD the response of the people, the LORD added, "Go to the people and have them sanctify themselves today and tomorrow. Make them wash their garments and be ready for the third day; for on the third day the LORD will come down on Mount Sinai before the eyes of all the people."

           Would you like to see God? Of course, we all would love to gaze into the God’s eternal eyes, and, please God, one day we will in heaven. But here on earth, we first find God’s divine Face in the human faces around us. We know that no one can believe in God unless He gives them the gift of faith: that special eyesight to see spiritual things. But that gift of faith is delivered through the faces of faith we see around us. Try to think of some of the faces of faith that have helped you to see God a little better.

            The very first face of faith is found in our parents, especially our mother. I don’t mean just because mom always drags you to church on Sunday. Doctors say a baby’s eyesight extends about 12 inches, the precise distance between a baby’s face nursing at the breast and her mom’s face. The very first glimpse we get of God is when we stare into our mom’s eyes.  How so?  Well, however inchoately, we sense in the unconditional love of her eyes, the love of God. Here at Immaculate Conception not one week goes by that I don’t hear a story of how someone became Catholic thanks to Msgr. John O’Donnell, or “OD” as some affectionately call him because people “overdosed” on Jesus while he was here. In Msgr. O’Donnell’s face, people caught a glimpse of the Face of God: in his joy, his eloquence, his tenderness, even in his Irish wit they saw God’s goodness. The first time we see the face of God is when we see him reflected in the face of man, in faces beaming with faith.

            The Scriptures today tell us this is in keeping with the divine design, that is, God wants it this way. In Exodus 19, Moses meets God on Mt. Sinai, but God says surprisingly, “I am coming to you [Moses] in a dense cloud, so that when the people hear me speaking with you, they may always have faith in your also.” Did you catch that last part? God wanted the people to have faith in Moses, too, so that when they saw Moses’ face they would remember God’s presence and power. Moses had a face of faith that helped the people to see God. In the gospel, Jesus explains why he speaks in parables, saying, “Because knowledge of the mysteries of the Kingdom of heaven has been granted to you, but to them it has not been granted.” The apostles were to be the faces of faith to the early Christian community (because they knew the mysteries of the Kingdom), just like Msgr. John O’Donnell was a face of faith to the Fort Smith community. The first place we see the divine Face is in a human face.

Folks, what kind of face do you show the world? Remember this world is desperate to see God: from our first breath coming out of the womb until our last breath before we’re place in the tomb, our hearts beat with a more or less conscious desire to see God. And the first place someone sees God’s Face is in a human face, maybe your face. Do you have a face of faith?

           Let me conclude with a longish quotation from Bishop Robert Barron, whose self-professed goal is to show God’s face to our culture. Bishop Barron writes: “In 1933, on the nineteen-hundredth anniversary of the redemption, Pope Pius XI invited Christian missionaries to take the Gospel literally to the ends of the world, to ensure that the message was heard everywhere. The Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate took up the challenge. A small group was sent to the northern reaches of Canada, where they proclaimed Jesus Christ risen from the dead. Then they asked, ‘Are there any people further north?’ When the answer came back in the affirmative, they set out, found the more distant community, and proclaimed Jesus to them. This process continued until they came, finally, to a tiny gathering of people who said, ‘No, we’re the last ones.’ When the Oblates had preached to this little band, they went back to Rome with the message: ‘We’ve announced Jesus Christ to the ends of the world’” (Catholicism, 142). They showed God’s face to everyone. My friends, whether it’s in Canada or in Cammack Village, the first place people see the Divine Face is in a human face.

Praised be Jesus Christ!