Trust
the Questions
“I began
to trust the questions themselves to lead me beyond answers to
understanding, beyond practice to faith.”
Joan
Chittister, OSB
I am told that some
religions discourage their adherents from asking questions. If one
has doubts or questions, they are made to feel faithless, disloyal.
If that is the case, something is wrong. A religion that punishes
questioning is failing its followers, and denying their right to
arrive at their own understanding of sacred meaning. Jesus himself
urged us to, “Ask and it shall be given to you; seek and you
shall find; knock and it shall be opened to you.” (Matt.7:7)
However, the most
important part of the message above is moving beyond answers to
understanding, and beyond practice to faith. We can study and
memorize the Bible, or any other sacred text, word for word, but if
we don't move beyond study and memorization to a deeper understanding
of the message to us personally, then we only scratch the surface. We
humans, myself included, store millions of facts in our big brains,
but just knowing something does not connote understanding. We have to
move those facts from our head down to our heart, to our gut, and
into our very cells before we understand the fullness of their
meaning. We can sit in meditation for a lifetime, but if we never
allow insights shown to us in meditation to alter our lifestyle, we
have missed the point entirely. Learning to ask the questions and
trust the answers that we are shown is an act of faith. But having
the courage to live by the answers—well, that's a whole other ball
of wax.
Whatever religion you
espouse, (or if you have none at all), I encourage you to ask all the
questions that come up for you. Ask and keep asking until you receive
answers and are shown the way forward. The answers may not come in
the form you expect, nor from the source you anticipate, but they
will come. Then it's up to you to decide whether you will act upon
them or not. “For everyone who asks, receives; everyone who
seeks, finds; and to anyone who knocks, it will be opened.”
(Matt. 7:8) Go ahead. Ask.
In the Spirit,
Jane
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