The entrance way to Catherine McAuley’s home, now the Congregational Centre for the Sisters of Mercy.
Faith Facts during Term 2 are quotes from Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, aka Pope Francis, on the theme of Porta Fidei, the Door of Faith. He says, “Whereas a closed door harms us, paralyses us, separates us, the image of an open door has always been the symbol of light, friendship, joy, freedom, confidence. How we need to recover these things! … What does crossing the threshold of faith challenge us to do?”
In the words of Pope Francis…
Crossing the threshold of faith challenges us to discover that although it seems today that death reigns in its various forms and that history is ruled by the law of the most powerful or the most cunning, and although hatred and ambition operate as driving forces of so many human struggles, nevertheless we are absolutely and decisively convinced that this sad reality can change and must change, because “if God is for us, who can be against us?” (Rom 8:31, 37).
Crossing the threshold of faith means not being ashamed to have the heart of a child who, because he/she still believes in impossible things, can live in hope—the one thing that is capable of giving meaning and transforming history. To ask for it without ceasing, to pray without fainting and to adore so as be transfigured by what we contemplate.
Crossing the threshold of faith leads us to beg for each one of us the “mind… which was in Jesus Christ” (Phil 2:5), so that we may experience a new way of thinking, of communicating, of being in the family, of planning the future, of living out the virtue of charity and our vocation.
Crossing the threshold of faith is acting, trusting in the power of the Holy Spirit present in the Church and who is also manifest in the signs of the times; it is accompanying the constant movement of life and of history without falling into the paralyzing defeatism that regards any time in the past as being better; it is a sense of urgency to think of something new, to contribute something new, to create something new, kneading into life “the new leaven of justice and holiness” (cf. 1 Cor 5:8).