Leaps of Faith

When fall migrations begin, I'm struck by how little faith I have. Wild creatures, like the geese in this photo I took last January when we spent a weekend at Pere Marquette Park near the confluence of the Illinois and Mississippi rivers, seem to travel on instinct alone, or else they communicate in a mysterious language that we humans are not privileged to know. For them, concepts such as faith, hope, or direction seem not to matter. They do what they must; go where they are called. Even in disorganized lines of flight like this flock had, they rotate leadership without apparently ever realizing (or asking) why.

But I have to ask "Why," all the time. Part of it is a natural curiosity that started in childhood and survived the put-downs of adolescence, a curiosity that drew me into journalism and also led me to explore the shelves of the bookmobile, looking for books on birds and stars and gardening and later needlework, photography and quilting. If I had been a boy I would have been allowed to dismantle windup alarm clocks and small gasoline engines just for entertainment. As it was, my Dad helped me learn to change tires and gap sparkplugs anyway.

But there's another kind of "why" that keeps me from having the kind of spiritual certainty that many friends enjoy. I don't know why we as human beings seem bound to disagree, to fall into warring camps, to distrust each other, hurt each other. Calling it a sinful, fallen world has never made sense to me--this week for Sunday School class we are studying the Creation stories in Genesis and it seems clear enough there that God considered the creation good. I'm told the next chapter will explain it all to me, but framing all the ills of the world in terms of a sinful human desire for knowledge and experience, when this curiosity seems to be inborn, is something I've always found hard to accept. Some take it on faith, but I keep asking, why?

For a long time now, I've been inclined to tell myself that my skepticism, curiosity and even doubt are not evil or fallen in themselves, but innate traits, perhaps gifts, although such are not named as spiritual gifts in Paul's writings, for sure. I imagine that well-meaning folks reading this might take it upon themselves to point out that my doubt is a form of rebellion against my Maker. I guess I disagree with that, still. Like the apostle Thomas, I feel entitled to get my news from the Source; I want to see and touch and know. Scripture makes it clear that faith is a spiritual gift, but for me, it's still a leap--a much bigger leap than the one a teenage squirrel took today as it ran up and down the garage roof more than 20 times before launching itself upward toward a flimsy maple branch a good 12 feet above. He (or she) pawed frantically, scrambled to hold on, and eventually scampered to the main trunk of the tree. Me, I'm still pacing up and down, thinking about the questions, still wondering Why.