Evidence enough to believe

 Coming from the catholic biblical school of thought, I have always believed and accepted that ‘Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture, though two different channels of revelation, are bound closely together, and communicate with one another. Together they transmit the fullness of revelation, and make up one single deposit  of the Word of God.’ By sacred tradition I mean creedal formulae, liturgies and dogmas be it oral or doctrinal that have always been transmitted through the teaching authority of the apostles and through their successors who in this regard are the bishops, and especially the bishop of Rome.

However we face challenges from our non catholic or evangelical tradition which argues that whenever what is doctrinal or liturgical or even moral belief cannot be substantiated biblically simply imply that it cannot be part of the deposit of faith. ‘if it is not biblical or if I cannot find it in the scripture, I exclude from my belief. Secondly, we have other schools of thought like physicists who refute biblical didache or catechesis and may fail to accept the evidence such as the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.

The Gospel of John explains in a nut shell what we need to accept: ‘There were many other signs that Jesus worked and the disciples saw, but they are not recorded in this book. These are recorded so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing this you may have life through his name’ (John 20:30-31). 

From the aforesaid we have enough evidence to deduce our belief in Jesus’ resurrection. This should give us the opportunity to live the life of hope - hoping that at the end of it all God will overcome death. Our lives do not end in the grave but that there will be the hereafter. Our belief hinges very much on the apostolic belief that the one who was nailed to the cross was raised to life by God the Father.

The one who believes in Jesus Christ is the one who can conquer the world just as Jesus conquered the world by dying for us and rising from the dead. Like Thomas, we claim our belief in Jesus as ‘my Lord and my God’.

Points for reflections

· Unless a seed dies it remains a solitary unity

· Was it necessary that the Christ should suffer so that he enters God’s glory

· Happy are those who have not seen yet they believe

Read

1 John 5: 1- 6 Believing in Jesus is to be begotten by God

John 20: 30-31 This was written for us to believe that Jesus is Lord and by so doing we may have eternal life through him.