The concept of ‘faith’ has to be reconceived in light of the findings of the
new Biblical scholarship and the study of religions. Faith has been fused with
belief. In a sense they are opposites, because faith does not ask for evidence or
proof, whereas belief is shattered when evidence is produced to the contrary. But
what has been called faith is often nothing more than credulity, a willingness to
believe that improbable events took place. This is not faith, but literalism. True
faith is not thinking contrary to our senses, not a work against the intellect. Faith
involves the capacity to experience transcendence, and to see God in all things.
Faith allows us to see the presence of spirit in the most unlikely places, and to be
open to the possibility of the transcendent in the mundane. Faith enables us to see
the virgin birth, the feeding of the five thousand and the resurrection as spiritual
possibilities in the here and now. It is not about believing in the supernatural, but
believing in the deeply natural.