For those of us on the Journey of Questioning, Doubting and Rejecting

Many years ago, I was told that to question was to care. People will question in classrooms, will question relationships, will question that which has a meaning and significance. It stands to reason that we will have deep deep questions concerning the Unknowable and the Indefinable - God.

In this time of uncertainty there is one radical step I encourage you to take on a very regular basis, as a matter of fact, this step should be taken many many times each day. You must claim the words of the Father to his Son at the Jordan, "You are my beloved and in you I am well pleased". Mary and Maria you are to claim it as you are my beloved daughter, in you I am well pleased. Pat and Max you must open your heart to hear you are my beloved son, in you I am well pleased. This statement never changes. Each one is loved by God ever before we were born. Psalms 109:3 "From the womb, before the day star, have I begotten you." From eternity, you have been loved with an unconditioned, unlimited, unrestricted, everlasting love, which by it's very nature will be without end. It is a now and forever eternal love. Over the years, I have given the following quotation from Thomas Merton to many many teens and those in their early twenties as well as those in their thirties and forties;

"God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing do. But, I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope that I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know, that is I do this, you will lead me by the right road, though i May know nothing about it. Therefore, I will trust you always, though I may seem to be lost in the shadow of death. I will not fear for you are ever with me, and you will never me to face my perils alone."

Confusion is a necessary part of the journey into being an authentic human being rather than being a robot. God we know has created us in his image and his likeness endowing us with an intellect and a will. If God has given us such a great gift, he definitely wants us to use that gift. So, go ahead ask your questions, let it be part of your life and you will be surprised at how gently you will be lead into the answer. We live in Kairos time not Kronos time. From my own experience, I struggled with a question for seven years before the answer was revealed to me in and through my everyday life experience. As I struggled, it dawned on me what my mothers experience was, she told me how she prayed for seven years for something before the situation resolved itself. There is something about seven I have come to notice. In America people change homes every seven years. Every seven years people seem to change jobs and we are told every seven years we ask a new set of questions and the old answers don't do anymore [ROHR].

I have come to see over the years how God uses time, places, people and events of our everyday life to reveal to us the loving and caring God. Not an indifferent, detached God locked away on His Heavenly thrown, but a God who is always present in us and with us [Emanuel], and He uses our reality to become a reality in our world. We are in partnership with God in the ongoing creation of this world which in entrusted to our care. What a great dignity our God has bestowed on each on of us to make us co-creators and co-perfecters of His universe. We are entrusted with continuing the work, first began by the Word, the Word became enfleshed in the person of Jesus Christ, who is the source of our blessedness.

Sometimes we can buy into this wonderful mystery of God cooperating with us and the necessity of us cooperating with God to make creation what our God intended it to be. When we have doubts about our abilities and commitments it is in these moments we are most effective because we know ultimately whatever is accomplished for good in this world, it is the creative love of God, the Holy Spirit, who is at work and we are the instruments of co-creation.