Like most people, I struggle with doubts about my religion. I keep wanting to interpret little things as signs form God of his existence, but I doubt most of them are as they usually little things, like seeing someone wearing a cross necklace. I wanted to end this, so last night I prayed that God would send me a true sign tomorrow. I’m not sure what I expected, but nothing miraculous or unexplainable happened today. Why didn’t anything happen? Was I putting God to the test?
You should not ask for signs, for you must not tempt the Lord.
It is especially unfortunate that not only one would feel entitled to ask his Lord for “a true sign” within an arbitrarily define time span as if he, a creature, were entitled to ask his Lord, the Lord of eternity, for anything…and even further, that ignoring his multiple imperfections, this creature would even dare to ask: why didn’t anything happen - as if he could discern God’s mighty works, or His ineffable thoughts, or discern His divine providence.
Many of us have been there. Certainly I have, and still am more often than I wish. It always feels comfortable to give up on our indecision, to give up on the need to trust, and to simply ask - no, request - to see, to receive a clear answer. But Christ does not work like that. He wants us to trust in Him - even when He seems asleep.
Many do struggle with doubts, but Catholics have throughout history known that a healthy distrust of our selves is essential, and we rely on our priests, subjecting ourselves in holy obedience to their direction on spiritual matters, knowing that the Christian will always face harsh trials and will always need a successor of the apostles to “confirm them in the faith” when all is dark and when we are scattered and confused.
Perhaps that was the sign of the Lord: that
nothing happened. Perhaps just there, in that absence, the Lord spoke to you. It is written:
God did this that they should seek Him and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far from every one of us: for in Him we live and move and have our being.
God wants us, above all else,
to trust in Him. God does not speak to us in mighty sings, nor dispense of the natural order of things solely because we are unable to discern the shower of blessings that his ordinary divine Providence places on our way. How blessed would we be if instead of questioning and asking, we were to say: “Lord, I am blind, my faith is weak. Have mercy on me, a sinner.”
Christ lives in your heart, so you truly need not look far away to find Him. Find Him in holy solitude and sacred silence, where He may be waiting for you, talking to you with a voice as gentle as a whisper, incompatible with the noise and frenzy of this modern world.
And by the way, God always and especially loves to talk to us through little things, through insignificant things, people, events. He was born in a manger, born of a humble virgin, and He grew in a humble little town. When He preached, people would say: isn’t this the son of the carpenter? He was, so to speak, insignificant. As for signs, remember the prophet who on the face of a mighty fire and of a powerful earthquake remained calm, but before a gentle wind prostrated on the ground…and heard the voice of the Lord, who was indeed, as Christ said, like the wind…meek and humble…
You will be in my prayers, that Christ may strengthen you in the Christian faith.
But you are correct in doubting your doctrine - the Anabaptist doctrine. There is much that is worth questioning and your soul, who loves Christ and seeks to be joined to Him more and more, will definitely try to lead you towards Holy Communion. May He bring to fulfillment that which He has begun in you.
Nothing happens without Him knowing. All goodness comes from Him. Everything has a purpose, a reason. When you are open to His Goodness, you can see it. Sometimes it makes sense to our mere minds, sometimes it doesn’t.