Keep the Faith

29^th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Cycle C

But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?

I wonder…was Jesus just musing, or was he exasperated? Was he frustrated that his disciples just didn’t get it? Was he feeling that he was wasting his time, that people just weren’t getting the message or were willing to make the necessary effort? I can imagine how he felt. I’ve raised teenagers.

This passage in Luke’s gospel falls at the end of one of Jesus’ discourses about the end of the world, when the Son of Man will come again in his glory. He says that many who think they will be saved will not be and many that the righteous think are unworthy will be saved. Narrow is the door, and many will not enter it.

It’s easy to think the same thing in our world today. We can look around at the state of our culture and the trends in the churches and ask if we are facing a dwindling of faith. It seems that every few weeks this poll or that comes out with more depressing news. The Pew Research Center released their annual survey of the religious affiliations in the US this past week and it showed that the number of American adults who identify as Christian continues to drop, from 65% to 60% in the past decade, and the Catholic population has fallen from 23% to 20%. Those “nones” continue to grow, which means that when people leave they are not jumping to another denomination or religion, they are just ceasing to believe in any religion at all. We see these statistics and it’s easy to get frustrated or discouraged.

And I bet that practically all those people who leave still believe in God and still believe they will go to heaven. Because all good people go to heaven, don’t they? And most people, if not all, are good, basically, aren’t they? Narrow is the door, and many will seek to enter it, but it will be closed to them.

The danger today is not the enemy without, it is the enemy within. And the enemy is not persecution as much as complacency.

When Jesus told the disciples how difficult it is to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, they threw up their hands in frustration and asked, “Then can anyone be saved?” Jesus gives us the key today. Be persistent in your prayer to the point of annoyance. Pray always and everywhere, pray constantly, make your entire life a prayer, never stop asking your Father for what you need, never stop praising him, never stop asking for forgiveness, never stop thanking him for his mercy.

And if you tire, get your friends to help you. Like Moses in the first reading, when you just can’t keep doing it, when the battle seems lost, when there is no hope, surround yourself with people who will hold up your hands for you. Stay faithful together around the common goal of your salvation, and help each other get to heaven. That’s what religion is all about. Religion is people helping each other be faithful. Every person is given faith to some degree or other; religion is only what we do with that faith. And faith cannot be experienced or lived outside of a community of believers. One person is not an army. You cannot be saved alone.


And, you know, things are not as bleak as they may seem, both in Jesus’ day and in ours. Yes, most of his friends abandoned him, but eleven didn’t. And look what they ended up doing. And yes, Catholics are only 20% of the population, but that’s still over 66 million people in the US alone. Did you know that the Catholic population of Africa has grown 7000% since 1975? For centuries Christian missionaries have been going to Africa to try to spread the gospel for their salvation. Now, and it seems all of a sudden, African missionaries are coming here and spreading their enthusiasm for the Lord and His church with us. 

And then there’s the amazing growth of the church in South Korea, Vietnam, and even China. In communist China, with an atheistic population and such a repressive government, the population of Christians continues to rise. In the most recent internal surveys, Christians make up only 2.3% of China’s population, which translates to over 31 million people. It’s a small percentage but it’s still 31 million people. The church continues to live out the mission given to it, by loving God and our neighbor. We lift up the poor, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and spread the hope of the risen Jesus, both collectively as church and in our own daily lives.

Jesus left us with the great commission to go and make disciples of all the nations, and we have. Christians inhabit every nation on earth, and millions are being added to the church every year. The problem is the lack of faith in the West. The place where Christianity began and flourished for over two thousand years is where the faith is dwindling the fastest. We have abandoned the very foundation of our civilization, and what have we replaced it with? We have nowhere to look but to ourselves. We have placed our faith not in God but in ourselves, in the very people who have proven themselves to be the most unfaithful to one another.

When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith in the United States of America? More specifically, will he find his church here?

God calls each-and-every human being ever created to Him. He reaches into the heart of every man, woman and child and draws them to himself. He has placed a hunger for Him in each human soul that cannot be satisfied with anything else. We can try to drown that hunger with all the world has to offer, but it will not be enough. Jesus promised that he would not leave his church -us- orphan. He would send His Spirit to strengthen and guide us through his church. He promised that the gates of hell will not prevail against us. And they won’t.

The question is not God’s faithfulness to us, it is our faithfulness to him.

Jesus never forces anyone to follow him. He never imposes, he proposes. He calls each-and-every one of us, but it’s ultimately up to each-and-every one of us, individually, to answer that call. We are called to love our neighbor, but we cannot force him or her to love. You will be judged on your answer to the call. When it all comes down to it, it’s really just about you and your faithfulness. How you run the race. How you live your commission as a disciple, the commission given to you at your baptism.

When the son of man comes again will he find any faith…in me?

So, I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus,
who will judge the living and the dead,
and by his appearing and his kingly power:
proclaim the word;
be persistent whether it is convenient or inconvenient;
convince, reprimand, encourage through all patience and teaching.

Amen.