Cathedral of Saint Joseph, Sioux Falls
By Jason Heron, OlbSB
Christianity is, at its core, a relationship with the truth. But it’s not the sort of truth you arrive at when you calculate that the Diocese of Sioux Falls covers about 35,000 square miles. It’s a different sort of truth—more like the kind you discover when you realize a friend truly loves you. In both cases, we begin with a question. And in both cases, we arrive at answers we hope are true. But the methods we use to get there are vastly different. Square mileage involves measurement and math; love involves trusting what you hear, see and experience.
A lot of what Christians claim to be true relies on trusting what the Apostles—and the generations after them—heard and saw. And sometimes, that gets frustrating. Why doesn’t the Lord simply download everything we need to know directly into our minds? Why doesn’t God manifest divine power in a way that everyone can immediately recognize as indisputable truth? In other words, why does our Creator choose to present the truth about the Trinity, the universe, and our own lives in a way that fundamentally requires trust?
Sometimes, in my more frustrated moments, I wish the answer were just a number. But the Lord asks us to trust for several very good reasons.
First, we do not all have the time or the training to be professional theologians or philosophers. The Lord graciously accommodates our limitations by revealing the truth through people, historical events, stories, parables and relationships. Christianity is not a puzzle designed only for intellectuals. Rather, it is broadly and universally accessible, meant for every human heart, regardless of a person’s intellectual capacity.
Second, human beings are naturally cautious. We are hesitant to take risks on things we aren’t absolutely sure about, and we build walls to protect ourselves from being duped. Because of this, we easily fall into the trap of thinking that by sticking to the safe and familiar, we can become self-sufficient. When we insist on absolute certainty, we remain sealed up within ourselves and our limited understanding.
But love demands vulnerability.
By asking us to trust him, the Lord invites us to take a risk. He calls us to step out into the unknown, where we are forced to acknowledge that we are not entirely self-sufficient. We need help to be who we are created to be.
Third, we are free. A relationship based on faith honors that freedom, whereas a relationship based on mathematical certainty leaves no room for it. Our diocese either is 35,000 square miles or it isn’t; my free will doesn’t enter into the equation. But whether I return my friend’s love is very much a question of freedom. It’s a choice that requires me to decide how I will freely give my time, my energy and my heart.
And so, fourth, this really is simply about love. From our species’ beginning, love has been the heart of the matter. The story of Adam and Eve is the story of a loving Creator rejected because his children no longer trusted that love. The story of Israel is the story of a loving Creator who patiently waits for his chosen people to use their freedom to remain faithful.
And the story of Jesus is the story of a loving Creator who comes to us in the flesh, inviting us to be his friends. We couldn’t quite believe him, so we killed him instead. But not even death could stop him. On the third day, he returns to us and asks again, “I love you; do you love me?”
The story of the Church is the extension of that question through time and space. For 2,000 years, across the planet, Christians have heard Jesus ask: “I love you; do you love me?” Christianity is the answer to that question.
So, the 35,000 square miles of our diocese isn’t just a geographic measurement; it is the physical landscape where the drama of answering Jesus’ question is playing out in our homes and our parishes. If the truth about God were like the truth about our square mileage, our story would not be very interesting at all. But because the truth about God is fundamentally the truth about love, our story is filled with all the risk and drama we should expect when humans use their freedom to step out into the unknown.
It’s a story worth telling. And it is faith that makes it so.
