I used to think that atheists were the most dangerous creatures on earth. After all, the creature that disavows its creator is a pretty wretched thing. Lately, though, I’ve been thinking down a different path.
Is it possible that the most dangerous thing on earth is the believer who doesn’t trust God?
Someone who doesn’t believe in God is capable of doing great harm to himself, his family, and his community. Ultimately, he has no morals, despite his protestations. An atheist cannot act morally, any more than an anarchist can act politically. But in his denial of God, the atheist must also deny Satan. As he denies good, he must deny evil. His world view is corrupt, unintelligent, ignorant, and sad, but it is, in the end, pitiable. The atheist has not received graces. Not even the first grace.
Now, though, we face an even more hideous creature: the untrusting believer. Why is this thing so frightening? Because he believes in God. He believes that God created him and everything else in the universe. He may believe that God sent his only Son to become a man, to teach us to love, and, as His reward, to be tortured, humiliated, spat upon, and crucified by His creation. Still, this person doesn’t TRUST the thing that made him out of nothing.
When Jesus Christ spoke to St. Maria Faustina, He told her to add these words to the image she was to have commissioned: Jesus, I trust in you. Belief without trust is dangerous because God is dangerous. Anyone who needs only forget about us for us to have never happened is dangerous. But German Shepherds, too, are dangerous. If I trust my Shepherd, all is well. When I lose my trust in such a powerful dog, though, I must get rid of it. My own fear of him is enough to turn him.
How much more dangerous, then, is distrust of God? Immeasurably more. If I believe in God the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and earth, but I don’t trust Him, I better find someone I do trust who will give me a fighting chance against the Creator of the universe. Who would that be? The dark prince. Lucifer. Logically, if God’s promises cannot be trusted, and God calls Satan the master of lies, then God must be the actual liar. That would make Satan my protection against this dangerous God.
I don’t think there are many true atheists out there. But I think there are a lot of people who don’t trust God. Even in the church, we find priests who read the Bible but don’t believe it. They tell us it’s the inspired, infallible Word of God, but then they tell us not to trust it. I’ve heard them do so in back-to-back sentences. We find people who believe Jesus established the Church and gave Peter the keys. They believe that Jesus promised that whatever the bishops bind on earth is bound in Heaven; whatever they loose on Earth is loosed in Heaven. Yet these same believers turn around and believe that the bishops' teachings on everything from confession to penance to abortion to birth control, while bound on Earth, remain loosed in Heaven. How silly. How dangerous. How distrustful.
Now, I know as well as anyone how difficult it can be to trust in Him. After all, He let my beautiful seven-year-old daughter drown. He let creditors damage me financially with accounting tricks illegal in most states. And I have a lot of reasons, so I thought, to trust myself more than Him. I could get good jobs that paid lots of money, at least by my South St. Louis standard. I could attract beautiful women. (You should see my wife.) I can play sports–hockey, baseball, basketball, and football.
Oh, if only I could do any of those things. I cannot. God can, and He uses my imperfect body and selfish mind to do them for His purpose. I know this, yet I still fight against Him. I fight Him tooth and nail. I fight Him the way a fish fights the hook. But I’m not alone.
Among the mainstream Protestants, distrust in God but faith in Satan runs rampant. The Anglicans, a once-great church, have lost trust, not faith. They trust the world, as the Archbishop of Canterbury said in 1992: “What will the _world _think of us if we don’t ordain women?” And now, the American Anglicans, who have already ordained gays, refer to gay unions as “sacred.” (See RomanCatholicBlog.)
At a meeting in Nottingham of Anglican leaders from around the world, delegates from the US said the blessing of same-sex unions constitutes a