Always More than We Know.

How bold and blazing Paul seems as he encounters one of the most sophisticated cultures of his time. He drew a line, a fine distinction that goes between the marrow and the bone of human experience. He preached that we shall be saved not because of who and what we know but because of who and what we do not know.

This ancient wisdom seems ever more true today. We are shaped by the culture of modernity, which places such emphasis on knowledge. Power is so often associated with being in the know, where personal relationships are weighed and tested through the scales of self-knowledge.

Though ignorance of the social, religious, and political realities of our day is dangerous, our worship of knowledge is too often a way of controlling life, of dominating the world we inhabit. Through knowledge we can construct a god who is very much like ourselves, very manageable and predictable, useful for political purposes and personal enrichment.

However, the real God is beyond our control and knowledge, ever mysterious, summoning us beyond the boundaries we set for ourselves and others.

The message of Jesus was consistently a call to faith and love and hope. Jesus preached that salvation and redemption would come when we recognize that life is greater and more different than we think it is. His revelation, as the Gospel today indicates, is always more than we know.

Mary Jo Leddy. Taken from Give Us This Day.

Mary Jo Leddy is director and founder of Romero House in Toronto and the author of The Other Face of God: When the Stranger Calls Us Home.