Doubts are inevitable, they move us to a higher level in the Spirituel.

After conversations about, which represent the seven cardinal sins, we will gradually bring conversations about the virtues. We start with faith.

“When faith focuses purely on doctrinal formulations, it risks speaking only to the head without touching the heart. And when it focuses only on the action, it risks becoming moralizing and reduced to only the social side.

However, faith is life, it is experiencing the love of God, who changed our existence,” says Pope Francis in the book On Vices and Virtues .

We talked about life with the gift of faith with Franciscan Gabriel Prievalský, OFM, who decided to believe when he was 33 years old.

“God is always patiently offering us this gift and waiting for our response. However, after accepting it, we must not rest on our laurels that we are already finished Christians. It is a life-long voyage, if we stop rowing, we move away from the goal,” explains Father Gabriel.

It also encourages parents who worry that their children have lost their faith. It is natural that there will be moments in a person’s life when faith does not make sense to him.

“However, such situations presuppose faith on their part as well. It is God’s formation not only of a person in a moment of crisis, but also of their maturation in faith,” says the Franciscan.

Faith does not work without doubts, they are even necessary for us to move forward in our spiritual life. Father Gabriel compares it to an “atomic bomb” that sometimes God throws into our lives so that we consider his direction.

What does it mean that faith is a theological virtue?

Its originator and giver is God. Faith opens a person to devotion to God. So it is not faith in the sense that we believe the teacher that three plus three is six. It is focused on God.

If faith is a gift from God, how come not everyone has it?

God truly offers this gift to everyone. But the acceptance of the gift presupposes a human response. There are various circumstances in life that prevent a person from accepting faith. However, this does not rule out that one day the moment will come when he opens up to something higher. The Lord God leads us along different paths, and only he sees into the heart of a person.

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However, the faith of those who received this gift is not the same. Does God give different sizes of gift boxes?

The Lord God gives to everyone according to his natural abilities and possibilities. At the same time, it is the freedom of God to give as much as He wants, considering the intentions He has for man. However, He gives everyone enough to be enough for salvation and personal perfection. No one is deprived.

St. Francis de Sales talks about the fact that the piety of a religious is different, the piety of a worker is different, and the piety of a bishop is different. The same applies to, for example, the spiritual life of a mother or religious. Everyone has their own spirituality and comparison is not appropriate.

Let us not look to the faith of others, let us take care to realize our vocation with the equipment with which we have been gifted. Envy can lead us to realize what we would like in life and who we would like to be, says theologian Lucia Hidvéghyová.

There will be moments in a person’s life when faith does not make sense to him. Are such doubts natural?

Doubts in faith are even necessary in order for us to progress further in our spiritual life, to a higher level.

The first significant moment is for young people during puberty, when they start to rebel. And this rebellion in the area of ​​faith consists in the fact that their childish faith is no longer enough for them. They need to take it to another level and believe in a personal God.

I tell parents who worry about their child’s loss of faith that such situations presuppose faith on their part. It is God’s formation not only of a person in a moment of crisis, but also of their maturation in faith. To despair of a patient is to insult the doctor.