We know but don’t understand

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Footprints

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I don’t really know what topic to put this in…

Is it okay for me to say that I know the truths of the Catholic Faith and believe them but do not fully UNDERSTAND them? I don’t know why I was a bit worried that wasn’t okay to do?
What I mean is that I know Christ came to Earth and was born of Mary and died for our Salvation. I know Christ’s Body and Blood is present in the Eucharist. I know that He has revealed Himself and many things to saints. I know all of that and believe it. But I don’t understand the technicalities of His Conception or how exactly His Death saved us because I’m not God. I don’t understand how miracles happen but I know it’s through the power and might of God. I don’t completely understand how it all works but I know and believe it does and is true. It makes sense but it also confuses me?
 
Makes sense. What you are describing is faith. There is nothing wrong with having faith.

You certainly can dive deeper into the things you don’t understand and try to increase your understanding of them, but no matter how learned the person, belief requires faith. Reason only takes us so far.
 
@mrsdizzyd I guess that’s the word I was looking for! Faith!
 
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That’s right. And faith is a gift, of grace. Augustine said that he doesn’t understand in order to believe, but rather believes in order to understand.
 
@fhansen That’s actually really beautiful. Thank you!
 
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Footprints said:
I don’t really know what topic to put this in…

Is it okay for me to say that I know the truths of the Catholic Faith and believe them but do not fully UNDERSTAND them? I don’t know why I was a bit worried that wasn’t okay to do?
What I mean is that I know Christ came to Earth and was born of Mary and died for our Salvation. I know Christ’s Body and Blood is present in the Eucharist. I know that He has revealed Himself and many things to saints. I know all of that and believe it. But I don’t understand the technicalities of His Conception or how exactly His Death saved us because I’m not God. I don’t understand how miracles happen but I know it’s through the power and might of God. I don’t completely understand how it all works but I know and believe it does and is true. It makes sense but it also confuses me?
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Sounds like a marriage to me.
I’ve lived with my wife for almost 30 years, and I know everything about her, and still there are mysteries.
In God, we are loved by a person, not a book of knowledge. Our faith is in our personal adherence, our gift of ourselves, not how much we understand.
 
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Footprints said:
Is it okay for me to say that I know the truths of the Catholic Faith and believe them but do not fully UNDERSTAND them? I don’t know why I was a bit worried that wasn’t okay to do?
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It is perfectly okay @Footprints .

The basic truth is the Trinity .

Anyone claiming to understand the Trinity has a screw loose .
 
Faith by definition is believing what you can’t understand or be sure of. Until about 500 years no one understood why the moon and Sun rose and set nor what the stars were. I don’t know we will ever truly understand the universe, even the most talented physicists. One major theory might end up determining that our universe is just one randomly generated one next an indeterminate number of other random universes.

While I come from a scientifically background and perspective; it amazes my how much the creation story correlates to scientific theory. I’m certainly not a Creationist, but I find it amazing that some dust floating around the universe combined and evolved to be something that can understand, it part, the rest of the dust.
 
Footprints said:
Is it okay for me to say that I know the truths of the Catholic Faith and believe them but do not fully UNDERSTAND them?
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More than 2,000 years of teachings x an uncountable number of good teachers (not even counting the Old Testament teachings) = something no human can fully understand in an entire lifetime.
 
Yes, this is normal. We aren’t - in fact - suppose to be able to understand spiritual realities. The angels don’t understand the Trinity either.
 
Two things you mention. Christ’s conception and how we are saved by His death.

The Holy Spirit was responsible for Christ’s conception. We know how ordinary conception occurs and as Jesus was a physical man as well as God incarnate then that probably explains how that occurred surely. At some point spirit must have manipulated cells.

How we are saved by Him, He sacrificed Himself to pay our debt for one thing. Secondly He gave us proof through resurrection that life is possible beyond death of the body and through instigating the Catholic Church He gave all peoples the faith and religion necessary for salvation and eternal life too.

And having said all that faith is still necessary anyway, because none of has seen these things with our own eyes, pray for us St Thomas.
 
Footprints said:
Is it okay for me to say that I know the truths of the Catholic Faith and believe them but do not fully UNDERSTAND them?
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Not only is this okay, but it is a sign of holiness. We will never understand ALL of the faith, because some of it is mysteries beyond the human mind. But we give ASSENT because we believe that Jesus left His teachings with the Church, and the Holy Spirit infallibly protects this teaching. We choose to believe, and pray for understanding.
Footprints said:
I know all of that and believe it. But I don’t understand the technicalities of His Conception or how exactly His Death saved us because I’m not God.
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There are technicalities that we may never understand. It is the male Y chromosome that determines the sex of the child, so how is it that Jesus took his flesh from Mary, but was a male? Fortunately, it is not necessary to have to “explain” all these things to benefit from our faith.

There are many ways to better understand the reason Jesus’ death saves us without having to be God, but given that God could have saved humanity however He liked, why did He choose that way?

Think about the 3000 who converted and were baptized on the first Pentecost. They could not possibly have understood everything about the faith!

To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible. ~ Thomas Aquinas

Interesting statement from one who spent VOLUMES and YEARS with explanations.
 
guanophore said:
To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible. ~ Thomas Aquinas

Interesting statement from one who spent VOLUMES and YEARS with explanations.
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Ha!
I could have done with this comment on my recent thread ‘words like straw’

We all have a natural enemy waiting to trip us up - the tongue!

I’ve often thought that the wisest man would never speak. For many many reasons.
 
Yes it is right the way you put it. Our human mind is limited and can never understand fully the mind of God. The inner workings of such things as the Real Presence or the Trinity or Glorified Bodies are to our mind, a mystery.
 
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