II. NECESSITY OF FAITH.

Why is Faith, or Belief, Absolutely Necessary to Salvation ?

SINCE God has not only enabled us to know Him by the use of reason, but has made Himself and His holy will more fully known to us by divine revelation, we must believe. It is not allowed to man to be free in the sense that he may believe or not believe, as if unbelief were no sin for him. On the contrary, it is our simple duty to accept the faith, to preserve it, and to live in it and by it. It is only by fulfilling this duty imposed upon us by God that we can hope to obtain heaven. Hence, belief is absolutely necessary. "The just man liveth by faith " (Romans i. 17). Faith is the life of the soul. Without it there is no justification meritorious before God. Hence, "Without faith it is impossible to please God" (Hebrews

xi. 6).

Consider, Christian reader, how enormous is the sin of unbelief. Not to believe is nothing other than to repel from one's self divine truth, to oppose the Creator who has made Himself known to us, and to wish to know nothing of Him and His holy will. And as the Lord God has sent His Son to bring us the tidings of salvation, and, as that Saviour was judged, and died, in order to save us from judgment, to refuse to believe is nothing more or less, on our part, than to concur willingly in the sentence and judgment of the Saviour. This is what Christ means when He says in John iii. 18, "He that doth not believe is already judged." The unbeliever can not escape responsibility. How foolish then for any man to say, "I do not need to believe as long as I do right." The Lord, on His side, says, "He that believeth not shall be condemned." Thus it is that the wisdom of man would array itself

against the express law of God, and that the world would set itself up in opposition to its Maker and His holy Gospel.

True Faith.

Not every or any form of belief can secure man's salvation, but only the faith of Jesus Christ. The Son of God brought down the unknown truth from heaven and opened to us the mysteries of the divine kingdom. Equally with the eternal Father He is the fountain of truth. He is the truth itself. And He is, beside the truth, the way and life. Hence we can believe in none other than in Jesus. Now, whoever believes in Him is on the right road. Only such as believe in Him have life and come to life everlasting. No other belief can lead to salvation, "for there is no other name under heaven given to men whereby we must be saved" (Acts iv. 12). Hence the Lord says, "He that believeth in the Son hath life everlasting, but he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him" (John iii. 36). On the Day of Judgment it will be made manifest that only the followers of Christ can be saved. Their great protecting shield against condemnation will be, on that day, the powerful name of Jesus.

Christ was pleased to make His Church the depositary of truth. He Himself, having ascended into heaven, is no longer with us. To whom could He entrust the true faith? Men can err, though they be saints. No system of belief has any value unless the things to be believed are purely and certainly true. Now, in order that this most precious of all goods might be preserved unimpaired for the benefit of all generations, Our Lord bequeathed it as a legacy to the Church founded by Himself. The Church received it in the persons of the

apostles, and has ever guarded it jealously. The bishops in all ages have guarded this deposit of faith like trusty and fearless watchmen, while they have not ceased to cry out to all men in the words of St. Paul to his friend Timothy, "That keep which is committed to thy trust, avoiding the profane novelties of words, and oppositions of knowledge falsely so called (I Timothy vi. 20.) Any system of belief not founded on Christ is not wisdom, it is foolishness. What folly it would be to suppose that Christ had exposed His sacred word, the fountain of salvation, the treasure of faith, to every change; that He had neglected those precautions necessary to keep the light of faith burning clear and undisturbed before the eyes of those who were created to be guided and saved by it!

Consider, Christian reader, the great grace which God conferred upon you when He permitted you, without any merit of your own, to be born in the bosom of the holy Catholic Church. That Church is the city of God of which we must be the citizens, if we hope to enjoy His protection and favor. In this city you were born, and by the free gift of God you are entitled to all the citizens' rights. How many thousands are deprived of the blessings which you enjoy! Your name is inscribed in the book of life. You have but to comply with your duties as a citizen. You have but to have faith in God. But you say, "That is just

my greatest trouble. I can not believe. I can not overcome my doubts in matters of faith. My reason shows me nothing but contradictions.”

Then you are acting foolishly. Let me ask you, as St. Theophylus asked Autolicus, "Why do you not believe? Do you not know that faith prevails in all things and in all places, human as well as divine? What farmer could gather his crop if he did not first

have faith enough to confide the seed to the earth? Who would trust his life at sea if he had not faith in the vessel's captain and crew? Belief in a physician and confidence in his treatment must precede the restoration of a patient. How can any one learn a science, or acquire an art, if he do not first of all surrender his mind to his preceptor? If, then, the farmer believes in the elements, the seafarer in his officers, the sick man in his doctor, how can you distrust God, from whom you have received so many evidences of truth? While you refuse to believe, your soul is sick. If faith do not illumine your pathway in life you are a pitiable wanderer."

Then, Christian reader, embrace faith, keep it, defend it, let no bribe induce you to part with it, for, as St. Augustine says very beautifully, "there is no more solid wealth, no greater treasure than Catholic faith. Pray, strive, wrestle with God for the sake of your faith, as Jacob of old did wrestle to obtain God's blessing, and that same blessing will attend you as it attended Jacob."

III. QUALITIES OR PROPERTIES OF FAITH.

Our Faith must be Universal.

FIRST of all we must believe all that God has revealed and the Catholic Church believes and teaches.

We believe because God is truthful.

To believe only partially in Him, who is all truth, is the same as not to believe at all. For if we believe one truth and reject another, we believe, not because God is truth, but because it pleases us so to believe. It is as if one said, "I believe not God; I believe myself." Such belief is of no value.

Our Faith must be Firm.

Firm and unshaken faith or belief is only a natural result of the very nature of faith. To better understand this we must remember that there are many sources of evidence, that is to say, many grounds by which we can become convinced of the truth of a thing. These may be drawn from the realm of nature and are then called natural grounds of belief; or they may be founded above the sphere of nature, and are therefore called supernatural proofs or grounds.

Natural sources of belief may be designated thus: 1. The testimony of other persons, that is, where we hold a thing to be true because we have heard it from others.

2. The testimony of our senses, that is, where we are convinced of the existence of an object because our eyes, our ears, or some other sense, assure us that it exists.

3. The testimony of our reason, that is, where a process of reasoning makes a thing clear to us.

The first kind of belief is called natural, or human, faith; in the two latter we have natural human knowledge. We are convinced of a thing on supernatural grounds when we hold to be true whatever God says and because He says it, or when God permits us to see a truth in His light, as is the case with the blessed in heaven. In the former case we have supernatural divine faith; in the latter supernatural divine knowledge.

Now, it is not difficult to comprehend that it is far more probable that our fellow-men will deceive us, than our senses and reason. Hence, natural knowledge is based upon a higher grade of testimony than is human faith. But our daily experience teaches us that even