Faith isn't about answers. It's about asking questions and listening for God's voice in the noise.
"Once you were a child. Once you knew what inquiry was for. There was a time when you asked questions because you wanted answers, and were glad when you had found them. Become that child again: even now."
- C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce
Creation
Who are we in relation to God?
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The Catechism tells us we are part of God's very good creation, made with freedom to love and to choose good. We have chosen poorly and yet God comes to us in many ways through history — through the prophets, through words recorded in scripture, through a relationship offered to us.
Before God and with the people of God, we confess to our brokenness:
to the ways we wound our lives,
the lives of others,
and the life of the world...
With the whole church
We affirm
That we are made in God’s image
befriended by Christ, empowered by the Spirit.
With the people everywhere
we affirm
God’s goodness at the heart of humanity
planted more deeply than all that is wrong.
With all creation
we celebrate
The miracle and wonder of life;
the unfolding purposes of God,
forever at work in ourselves and the world.
The Iona Community
- Confession and Affirmation
We start with what the Catechism says about who the Creator is, who we are as God's creation, and how our relationship with God began in Scripture...
Human Nature
Q. What are we by nature?
A. We are part of God’s creation, made in the image of God.
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Q. What does it mean to be created in the image of God?
A. It means that we are free to make choices: to love, to create, to reason, and to live in harmony with creation and with God.
Q. Why then do we live apart from God and out of harmony with creation?
A. From the beginning, human beings have misused their freedom and made wrong choices.
Q. Why do we not use our freedom as we should?
A. Because we rebel against God, and we put ourselves in the place of God.
Q. What help is there for us?
A. Our help is in God.
Q. How did God first help us?
A. God first helped us by revealing himself and his will, through nature and history, through many seers and saints, and especially through the prophets of Israel.
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The statement of what we believe begins first with who we are in relation to God. We have so often made God in our own image, as Brennan Manning says. We have looked around at broken humanity and at our own family, which has not always been good to us. We have been told God is far off or that God judges us harshly. We have started with wrong ideas about ourselves and about God. We can, instead, start with good creation, with freedom, with a God that persistently comes for us, and offers us grace.
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So, let's start with who we are and where we see God in our own story.
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First, draw a horizontal timeline in your journal beginning from your birth and ending today. Spend some time thinking about the big milestones in your life both negative and positive. Think about important people, decisions, and transitions. Consider family, school, work, and relationships. If you had to write your autobiography, what big events would you include? Add them along the timeline.
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Next, look at your timeline and spend some time writing your reflections on these questions:
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Where do you see God at work in your story?​
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When do you make the choice to love and live in harmony with God?
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Where along your story do you see the impact of the times you misused your freedom? What were the consequences?
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Think back to the first time you really saw God working in your life. What happened? How did you know God was present or acting on your behalf?
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When did you resist God in your story? Why didn't you respond to God in those moments?
God the Father
Q. What do we learn about God as creator from the revelation to Israel?
A. We learn that there is one God, the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen.
Q. What does this mean?
A. This means that the universe is good, that it is the work of a single loving God who creates, sustains, and directs it.
Q. What does this mean about our place in the universe?
A. It means that the world belongs to its creator; and that we are called to enjoy it and to care for it in accordance with God’s purposes.
Q. What does this mean about human life?
A. It means that all people are worthy of respect and honor, because all are created in the image of God, and all can respond to the love of God.
Q. How was this revelation handed down to us?
A. This revelation was handed down to us through a community created by a covenant with God.
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What did you learn from your family about God? What about from the culture around you? Do you see God the same way now you did as a child? What ideas about God do you need to let go of?
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Where have you seen God sustaining and directing your life? When have you questioned God's loving nature in the way your life has gone? Have you believed God wasn't involved or had forgotten you?
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When have you struggled to treat others with respect and honor?
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When you have been mistreated by others? How has that changed your image of God?
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When you think about the community of faith and what they've handed down to you, how do you feel?
The Old Covenant
Q. What is meant by a covenant with God?
A. A covenant is a relationship initiated by God, to which a body of people responds in faith.
Q. What is the Old Covenant?
A. The Old Covenant is the one given by God to the Hebrew people.
Q. What did God promise them?
A. God promised that they would be his people to bring all the nations of the world to him.
Q. What response did God require from the chosen people?
A. God required the chosen people to be faithful; to love justice, to do mercy, and to walk humbly with their God.
Q. Where is this Old Covenant to be found?
A. The covenant with the Hebrew people is to be found in the books which we call the Old Testament.
Q. Where in the Old Testament is God’s will for us shown most clearly?
A. God’s will for us is shown most clearly in the Ten Commandments.
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Think of a covenant like marriage vows, promises people make to one another and uphold not out of duty but out of love. Who has modeled this kind of loving commitment in your life?
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Thinking back on your story, when did you first feel God had initiated a relationship with you? How did you respond?
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What have you believed God requires of you? How has that impacted your view of God and yourself?
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Does thinking about God requiring you to love justice, do mercy, and walk humbly with God change the way you think about your relationship with God? Does it feel like an easier or more difficult requirement than what you imagined before?
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Think of the Ten Commandments not as rules but as the good kind of living that God imagines for his people, the kind of life built on love, satisfaction in what we have, kindness toward others, and grace for ourselves. Where has this kind of life shown up for you? Where has your life fallen short of this kind of goodness? Can you see these commands as God's good intentions for your life?
Look again at your story timeline. Do you see God in places you didn't before? Do you see any moments of your life differently when you think of them through the lens of a God who wants you to be in loving relationship with God, others, and the universe you are a part of. Add those new places to the timeline, where God is showing you new things about your story.
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Spend some time writing your reflections about engaging with your story in this way. Maybe write it as a letter to God in your journal or perhaps to your younger self who had a misshapen image of God. Tell him or her how you've healed and how you see God more clearly now. Keep your timeline and keep adding to it each year. Keep asking God to show you where you're participating with God's good intentions for you and when you're resisting them. Look for patterns across the whole arc of your story. Where is God showing up for you in ways you've missed before?
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Now, Onto Prompt 2!