Our readings today speak of courage, faith, and obedience. We can see from the flow of the readings that these three themes work themselves out in order: If we have the courage to have faith, we will live according to the word of God, and we will be accompanied and rewarded in this effort.

Doubt can challenge our ability to have courage, and it can pull us away from faith. Yet, as Fr. James Martin said on his podcast recently, doubt is part of being human. We should not see our doubt as a sign of weakness. We need to take those doubts to conversation with Jesus so that we can ensure that doubt is always our passenger and never our driver!

Today, I want to discuss my own experience with doubt and the helpful (and unhelpful) ways that I have tried to deal with these doubts.

First experiences with doubt

One night when I was about five years old, I asked my father to explain Heaven to me. I just could not grasp what it would be like. I especially could not grasp the idea of “forever” or time without end. Everything has to have an end, right? At the same time, is it really possible for existence, broadly, to end?

This challenge has remained with me. Sometimes, it intensifies so much that as I ponder this question I get so distraught that I feel a physical need to recoil or even shout. These doubts, and others like them, are an ongoing struggle. If you don’t have this exact struggle with doubt (and I’m sorry if I just introduced a new one to you!), I am sure you have something. Maybe you doubt that God loves you. Maybe you doubt your own ability to persevere and draw closer to God.

What doesn’t work

Here are three ways that I have learned not to deal with doubt.

First: Don’t try to ignore it. Doubt does not signify weakness or a lack of holiness. We do ourselves a disservice if we try to push these feelings aside, ignore them, or convince ourselves that they do not matter.

In a talk shortly before his death, Christopher Hitchens admonished his audience to never, ever listen to anyone who tells them to stop questioning, stop searching for the truth, or to simply accept what they are told. Ironically, Hitchens’ words have inspired me in my faith! He’s right: we absolutely cannot ignore evidence in front of us or push aside our questions.

Doubt is not a sign of weakness; it’s a sign of awareness and seriousness. If we have questions, we should search for answers—not fear them. If we are wrestling with a question of doctrine, we should research the support for the doctrine and the questions that we have about them. If we are doubting God’s love for us, crack open scripture and read what God promises to us. It won’t take long to find an answer. We are blessed with an ability to search for the truth, and the truth will set us free.

Second, don’t let doubt drag you down on the journey. Doubts—especially doubting ourselves or God’s love—can be exploited by the evil one to pull us away from God. Sometimes we feel discouraged and want to back away from the Sacraments altogether. We can overcome these situations by spending more time in prayer, not less. We can seek counsel in prayers such as the Examen prayer and talk to a priest or other spiritual director about how to recognize consolation and desolation, and how to recognize what is coming from God—and what is not. Strong discernment is an essential companion of strong intellectual searching.

As one of my favorite philosophers, PBS’s Daniel Tiger, says, “We have to look a little, look a little, look a little closer, to find out what we want to know.” Daniel teaches children that if you are afraid of a sound or a shadow, you can usually ease your fear by searching for what is actually there. It does not help to cower under the covers. We must keep searching.

The third mistake is to wear doubt as a badge of honor. Too often, I have found myself identifying as a “Catholic but” (Say the term out loud and it’s kind of funny). I essentially say “I’m a Catholic but…” with something after the “but” that tries to make me sound better than other Catholics or like I am smarter or more modern in my approach to faith. Now, again, we all need to be constantly searching and questioning. But I sometimes read Catholic writers who want to introduce doubt where we actually have clarity. This does not represent a healthy form of doubt; it risks producing an incomplete and arrogant form of living out the faith.

Healthier approaches

In addition to the counterweights to some of these unhelpful approaches to doubt, I want to introduce two ways that we can deal with our doubts.

First: In addition to all that I have outlined above regarding the importance of searching, questioning, and discerning, we also have to recognize that faith will always, to some extent, require believing beyond what can be observed. St. Paul tells us, “Faith is the realization of what is hoped for and evidence of things not seen.”

In my own struggle to conceptualize Heaven and eternity, I have tried for decades now to find scientific and material explanations that can help me. Fortunately, many of them have been helpful! I have learned, for example, that God is beyond time and space. That our eternal glory cannot be understood in terms of how we experience time on earth. I have read scripture that helps me to understand this better. I have read about peer-reviewed studies around near-death experiences and read about the scientific evidence for a soul and an afterlife. Recent reads by Fr. Robert Spitzer (Fr. Spitzer’s Universe) and Professor Scott Hahn (Hope to Die) have been especially helpful.

At the end of the day, though, we are limited in our understanding. No one on this earth will ever have absolute certainty about what happens when we die based on our intellectual faculties alone. Believing in God’s promises will always require faith and grace.

Ultimately, this comes down to trusting that God is who he says he is, that Jesus says who he is, and that we are who they say we are. We can read about the historical Jesus and read the mountains of evidence of his existence, the testimonies of the Apostles and Church Fathers, and the lives of the saints. We can read the proofs by Aquinas and Anselm and everyone else.

But we absolutely must support our intellectual searching with a life of prayer. We do not just learn about Jesus from reading—even reading scripture. We learn about God from taking the time to pray to him and converse with him. If we do not turn to Jesus and ask for these graces, our intellectual pursuits will be built on sand—the seeds of knowledge will land on concrete rather than rich soil. We must have faith. Evidence does not just come from reading, it comes from experience.

The letter to the Hebrews tells us of this journey by Abraham.

“By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place

that he was to receive as an inheritance…

By faith he sojourned in the promised land as in a foreign country…

By faith he was given the power to generate…

By faith when put to the test, offered up Isaac…”

Each time that Abraham acted by faith, God rewarded him—even in ways that seemed impossible beforehand.

Finally, our Gospel today speaks to the implications of what it looks like when we work hard to live with and overcome our doubts to live a life of courage and faith.

Jesus tells the disciples, “Do not be afraid any longer, little flock, for your Father is pleased to give you the kingdom.”

Let us pray for the courage and faith to believe this extraordinary promise!

Then what?

God’s promises require our own action. In this case, Jesus instructs his disciples to sell their belongings, give alms, and to realign their priorities: “For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.”

Jesus provides a warning to the Apostles: “Be like servants who await their master’s return from a wedding, be ready to open immediately when he knocks.”

Jesus calls them to be vigilant at all times, for they do not know the hour at which the Son of Man will come.

Then he gets to the heart of this matter of faith and courage. Once we come to believe, we have responsibilities. Perhaps, sometimes, we embrace our doubt because doubting allows us to keep Jesus at arm’s length. If Jesus knocks on the door and we tell ourselves it was just the wind, we have no responsibility. But if we follow Daniel Tiger’s advice and look for the truth of who is knocking, Jesus will require something of us when he enters. This will require something of us.

If we make the choice to have our doubt as our companion rather than our driver, then we have to follow the road that Jesus lays out for us.

He tells Peter, “Much will be required of the person entrusted with much, and still more will be demanded of the person entrusted with more.”

Here’s the last thing: When we invite Jesus fully into our lives and into our hearts, he carries the burdens with us and or us. He provides the graces for us to travel through life’s difficult terrain. And he is a greater keeper of promises than anyone else in our lives—even the people who love us most. He requires much of us because he has entrusted much with us.

Our Father is pleased to give us the kingdom. Let’s spend some time this week reflecting on that phrase. What does it look like for God to give us the kingdom? What would it take for us to fully trust that promise, and to live accordingly?

Like the father in the story of the Prodigal Son, Jesus is standing and watching us, ready to run toward us when we turn his way. Let us live in the joy of this truth!