Beleaguered by Belief

June 30, 2024 | The Rev. Dan Puchalla

I shouldn’t admit this … but I kind of detest the word “belief.” It’s a word that has come to mean too many things that I just can’t get behind. “Belief” is used as a shelter for people who want to impose their opinions on others without being subject to opposing facts and arguments. “Belief” is pitted against things like science and history. “Belief” is a way of reducing a complex religious heritage into a list of fundamental things we have to assert in order to belong to that religion. “Belief” squeezes out things like doubt and skepticism. None of these are what I mean when I say that I believe in God, in Jesus Christ, in the Holy Spirit. I wonder if you feel the same.

In this Sunday’s gospel, Jesus encounters two women whose disparate lives become mysteriously intertwined. Their belief looms large in their stories. But what this belief actually means provides an alternative to the modern ways this word is abused and used to abuse others in our time.