This was the urgent, heartfelt prayer of the disciples. They too wavered. How often we find in the Gospel that Jesus is reprimanding them for their little faith! (see Mt 8:26; 16:8; 17:20). Peter himself, \u201cthe rock\u201d on which Jesus would build his Church, was admonished: \u201cOh you of little faith\u201d (Mt 14:31). Jesus had to pray for him so that his faith would not fail (see Lk 22:32).
This request for an increase in faith is really a prayer for each Christian because faith can fluctuate in the life of each one of us. Even St. Theresa of Lisieux, who throughout her lifetime had a very profound, filial relationship with God, was assailed by \u201ca trial against faith\u201d during the last year and a half of her life. She described it as if a wall raised up all the way to the heavens that even hid the stars (The Story of a Soul, Ms. C).<\/p>\n
\u00abIncrease our faith!\u00bb<\/p>\n
The fact is that although we know that God is Love (see 1 Jn 4:8), we often live as if we were alone on this earth, as if we did not have a Father who loves us and who watches over us, who knows all about us, who even counts the hairs of our head (see Mt 10:30), who makes all things \u2013 the good we do and the trials we go through \u2013 work together for our good.
We should be able to repeat with the Evangelist John: \u201cWe have come to know and to believe in the love God has for us\u201d (1 Jn 4:16).
To believe, in fact, is to feel that we are looked upon and loved by God, it is knowing that each of our prayers, every word, every move, every sad, joyful, or indifferent event, every illness, everything, everything, everything \u2013 from the things we consider important to the most insignificant actions, thoughts, and sentiments \u2013 everything is known to God.
And since God is love, complete trust in him is the only logical response. Because of this confidence we can speak with him often, tell him about our concerns, our intentions, our plans. We can abandon ourselves to his love knowing that we will be understood, comforted, helped.<\/p>\n
\u00abIncrease our faith!\u00bb<\/p>\n
To this prayer of the disciples, Jesus replied: \u201cIf you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you would say to [this] mulberry tree, \u2019Be uprooted and planted in the sea,\u2019 and it would obey you\u201d (Lk 17:6). \u201cThe size of a mustard seed.\u201d Whether great or small is not the most important aspect. Jesus wants our faith to be authentic, founded on him from whom we expect all things, without counting solely on our own abilities.<\/p>\n
If we believe, and we believe in a God who loves us, nothing is impossible. We are then able to believe that indifference and selfishness, which we often find around us and in our own hearts, can be uprooted; that situations of disunity in the family can be resolved; that our world will start building unity among generations, among social levels, among Christians divided by centuries; that a worldwide fraternity can blossom among the faithful of different religions, among races and among peoples. We can also believe that humanity will one day live in peace. Yes, everything is possible if we allow God to act. For him, the all-powerful, nothing is impossible.<\/p>\n
\u00abIncrease our faith!\u00bb<\/p>\n
How can we live this Word of Life and grow in faith?
First of all, by praying, especially when difficulties and doubts arrive: faith is a gift of God. \u201cLord,\u201d we can ask, \u201chelp me to remain in your love. Grant that I may not live a single moment without feeling, without being aware, without knowing through faith, or even through experience, that you love me, that you love us.\u201d
And then, by loving. By our efforts in loving, our faith will become firm and steadfast. We will not only believe in God\u2019s love, but we will tangibly feel it in our soul, and we will see \u201cmiracles\u201d take place around us.
A girl from Great Britain experienced this: \u201cWhen my mother told me that she had decided to leave my father and to move to another apartment, I was shattered by the news and almost desperate, but I didn\u2019t say anything to her. In the past I would have searched for a means of escape; I would have locked myself in my room and listened to music. Instead, now that I had decided to live the Gospel, I felt drawn to remain there in the midst of that suffering and to say my \u2018yes\u2019 to the cross. The time had come for me to go beyond the events in themselves and believe in his love.
\u201cI tried to put aside my own opinions and to listen with love to my mother as she poured out all that she had to say about my father. I looked for a way to stay close to my father as well.
\u201cA few months later, when my parents were already on their way to re-building their relationship, I was touched by something my mother said: \u2018Do you remember when I told you that I wanted to leave? Your reaction made me think that I was making the wrong decision.\u2019
\u201cI hadn\u2019t said anything, only a \u2018yes\u2019 to Jesus in silence, confident that he would take care of everything.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chiara Lubich<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00abIncrease our faith!\u00bb (Lk 17:5).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1,92],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-290894","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-non-categorizzato","category-word-of"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290894","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=290894"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290894\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=290894"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=290894"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=290894"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}