Easter Sunday: We believe

		Living the Scriptures  with St. Paul University  Catholic Center  Matt Nicolai

We are a people of faith. Although none of us lived in first century Israel under Roman rule, or actually saw the Resurrection, we believe what is written in this Sunday's Gospel.

When I read that John, the disciple Jesus loved, entered the tomb, the words that strike me are ". . . he saw and believed." John believed even when confronted with an empty tomb.

Knowing that in the end it all came down to faith for the disciple encourages me in my faith journey and makes me reflect on its essentialness to who I am and to who we are as a people.

Easter Sunday (April 11, 2004) Acts 10:34a, 37-43 Ps 118:1-2, 16-17, 22-23 Col 3:1-4 or 1 Cor 5:6b-8 Luke 24: 13-35 or Jn 20:1-9

It is our faith, not our knowledge, that makes us Christians, and in that distinction lies the beauty of Christianity.

The richness of Catholicism is its foundation in faith. I can know how to make unleavened bread, but I must have faith that it can become the body and blood of God's only Son.

Being people of faith helps us in our quest for truth. A good friend of mine once said, "Faith is our access to the truths we do not know."

This has been a source of inspiration for me in my walk of faith. It helps express the challenge that faith lays before us that knowledge never can.

The disciple at Jesus' tomb could know just by looking that the burial wrappings were on the floor. But he had to fight past all the reasoning which said that dead people don't come alive again. John's Gospel says "he saw and believed," not, "he saw and knew."

	Reflection questions • How can I come to rely more fully on my faith? • How does my faith help me understand God's truths?

Faith is a life-long journey that challenges us to persevere as knowledge cannot. It is through our faith in God that we struggle and doubt, but it is through the same faith that we are built up and sustained.

It is through faith that we grow in understanding of the Truth. In the end, we have faith, just as the disciple at Jesus' tomb, not so we can know, but so we can believe.

Matt Nicolai is a junior majoring in religious studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He works as a peer minister at St. Paul's University Catholic Center.

St. Paul's Web site is www.stpaulscc.org

Faith Alive!

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