Signs of Favor

As human beings, and even for the domesticated animals, we need signs of favor from others -- a hug, a smile, an attentive listening, someone who prepares a meal for us, etc.  

As spiritual beings, we need signs even more of God's favor toward us. We pray, but we cannot read His expression to know that He is listening to us.  We ask for forgiveness but there is no hug to tell us that we are received.  For those in churches without sacramental signs, faith is all there is --- it is up to each individual to believe strongly enough to sustain them, especially when it seems God is absent.

The sacraments are great gifts to us in our need for signs.  Although the Catholic church is condemned by some who consider it idolatrous in its "smells and bells," its sacraments and sacramentals, I see all of the above as signs of God's love.

The miracles worked by Jesus, John tells us were 'signs."  God has not expected us to simply believe that He loves us, though we are expected to "live by faith" and to stand on His Word.  He has given us signs of His love and favor, "in order that we might believe," as St. John tells us.   

All of the sacraments are signs of invisible realities.  God has indeed, impossible as it sounds, accepted us as His very own children -- we have been born again of water and the Spirit, just as Jesus told us.  And Baptism is the sign of our rebirth.  We don't have to wonder if we did it right, if we are truly accepted by God -- we have a sign in truth.

In Confession, we don't have to wonder if we have been forgiven; we have the sign of the sacrament--go in peace: I absolve you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit..  We can approach God in confidence.  In the Eucharist, we are united to Christ, and in Him, one with the Father.  We have a sign -- a sacrament -- that helps us to believe.

Just as God graciously gave Moses the burning bush and his rod that changed shape as signs of His Presence and Power, He has given us the sacraments that we might believe He has accepted and chosen us to change the world, just as He is at work changing us.