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If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,”

and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead,

you will be saved.

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For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified,

and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith

and are saved.

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– Romans 10:9-10 (NIV)

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REFLECTION…

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In order to live by faith,

external profession of faith is required

– we need to express our inner convictions externally.

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When the honour of God or the good of one’s neighbour requires it,

we have an obligation to profess our faith externally.

Any silence on our part

will lead people to suppose that we do not believe

or that we did not hold our faith to be the true faith,

and our bad example would cause others to fall away from the faith.

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External profession of faith is an obligation in all situations – ordinary or exceptional –

and God will always help us to confess our faith boldly.

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TODAY’S PRAYER…

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Lord Jesus Christ, my King,

thank You for granting me the true faith that saves.

May I be ever-faithful to You

embracing, living and proclaiming Your Truth,

as I totally abandon my mind, heart and will to You.

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Lord, fill me to overflowing with faith

so that my hope in You will flow on to others.

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Lead me, my God, through the hurdles of this life

towards an everlasting life in the world to come

– in Your holy and glorious presence.

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Jesus, You are Lord!

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Amen. .

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YEAR OF FAITH 2012-2013

FROM THE CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH…

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Faith is an entirely free gift that God makes to man.

We can lose this priceless gift, as St. Paul indicated to St. Timothy:

"Wage the good warfare, holding faith and a good conscience.

By rejecting conscience, certain persons have made shipwreck of their faith."(1 Tim 1:18-19)

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To live, grow and persevere in the faith until the end

we must nourish it with the Word of God;

we must beg the Lord to increase our faith;

it must be working through charity,

abounding in hope,

and rooted in the faith of the Church.

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[CCC 162]

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Faith makes us taste in advance the light of the beatific vision,

the goal of our journey here below.

Then we shall see God "face to face", "as He is". (1 Cor 13:12; 1 Jn 3:2)

So faith is already the beginning of eternal life:

When we contemplate the blessings of faith even now,

as if gazing at a reflection in a mirror,

it is as if we already possessed the wonderful things

which our faith assures us we shall one day enjoy.(St. Basil)

[CCC 163]

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