What is Not Seen

St. Paul wrote “we fix our eyes, not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” (2 Cor 4:18) There is a paradox regarding what I may call "modern secular thinking" The line of thinking of which many believe and are taught today goes something like this " if it cannot be proved scientifically, then it is not true." This axiom of the scientific test of validity interestingly enough was addressed by the Risen Christ when he appeared to Thomas. In fact we read that Jesus ate with his disciples, showed them His wounds, walked with them discussing Scripture and did countless things which apparently were never recorded in the Gospels. Tangible and touchable are hallmarks of God's design for our salvation. Yet that is only half the story and the paradox of believing only that which can be proven is in itself a matter of faith, which by the way cannot be scientifically proven. That is to say you cannot prove that every thing that occurs is understandable and predictable under the rules of the scientific method. It also is intellectually narrow minded to think that we can know and understand all that goes on in this vast universe of time and space. That would be turning your back on a sizable portion of it. G.K. Chesterton wrote "A holiday, like Liberalism, only means the liberty of man. A miracle only means the liberty of God. You may conscientiously deny either of them, but you cannot call your denial a triumph of the liberal idea. The Catholic Church believed that man and God both had a sort of spiritual freedom. Calvinism took away the freedom from man, but left it to God. Scientific materialism binds the Creator Himself; it chains up God as the Apocalypse chained the devil. It leaves nothing free in the universe. And those who assist this process are called the "liberal theologians." I believe that like many of the paradoxes of Christianity; "the first shall be last...dying to oneself to find eternal life..love your enemy...perhaps the greatest paradox is this: God is a mystery and we are not capable of knowing Him completely. In the mystery we discover Him, if we reject the mystery and hold to a scientific absolute then we cannot find Him. By giving up we receive, by holding on we don't.