“Jesus addressed this parable to those who were convinced of their own righteousness and despised everyone else.” – Luke 18:1
St. John Paul the Great called out ‘practical atheism’ in 1989. He said practical atheists claim there is a God but live like there isn’t. The practical atheist are those who say they are Christian but live as if God does not exist. Pope Benedict XIV says this is a greater threat than actual atheism.
While actual atheists often think deeply about God before rejecting belief, practical atheism “is even more destructive … because it leads to indifference towards faith and the question of God,” the Pope stated.
Christian witness is always hard, he said, because people are prone to “being dazzled by the glitter of worldliness,” but in the Western world sharing the faith is even harder today.
The Christian faith was the everyday reality for most people in what used to be called Christendom. The burden was on non-believers to justify their disbelief.
But today the tables have turned following a long slide into atheism, skepticism and a secular worldview that was ushered in by the Enlightenment.
This, in turn, has paved the way for moral and spiritual disaster in the Western world. People have become confused about ethics once commonly held, making room for relativism and fostering “an ambiguous conception of freedom, which instead of being liberating ends up binding man to idols,” the Pope said.
Faith concerns the truth about mankind and our eternal destinies.
“Faith … is an encounter with God who speaks and acts in history and which converts our daily life, transforming our mentality, system of values, choices and actions,” he said. Faith is “not illusion, escapism, a comfortable shelter, sentimentality, but involvement in every aspect of life and proclamation of the Gospel, the Good News which can liberate all of man.” – Pope Benedict
So, are you living as an unproclaimed practical atheist? Can you look in the mirror and honestly see a working Christian? Or are the right words there without the heart? Are even the deeds present without the Holy Spirit?
Do your prayers and movement to action sound like these two men?
“‘I thank you, God, that I am not like other people—greedy, dishonest, adulterous—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and pay tithes on all my income.’” – Luke 18:11-12
“‘Even though I neither fear God nor have any respect for people, yet because this widow keeps pestering me, I will see to it that she gets justice. Otherwise, she will keep coming and wear me out.’ ” – Luke 18:4-5
Or, are you beating your breast as you say, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner.’” – Luke 18:13.
Do you believe Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior? Do your actions give witness to this yes?