Dear People Whom God Loves,
GOD’S INTERACTION WITH THE WORLD – II
Last time we looked at God’s providence. That is: God’s care and working in our world. Now we will look at miracles. That is: God working in particular situations.
The traditional way of looking at miracles was to say that on occasion God would suspend the laws of nature to produce an effect that we could not explain. In other words God would interfere with the laws of nature. A natural question then is: why does God do it sometimes and not others. We would, if we had the power, prevent the starvation of children throughout the world. God has the power, and it doesn’t make sense for a good God to stand by and let that happen. This is one of the things that can cause people to lose faith in God.
I would like us to look at the miraculous works of God in a way that is in harmony with nature. Though it is still mysterious.
For this we must let go of the notion that our universe is like a machine. With the discovery of relativity, quantum physics, and evolution, it became apparent that our world is not as predictable as was formerly thought.
I am sure that most, perhaps all, of us have experienced coincidences that had meaning for us. We might truly say thank you, God, in a heartfelt way; for example, when we escaped a deadly accident by the skin of our teeth. There may be sometimes these were within the providence of God, but that is not what I am talking about. Carl Jung called this synchronicity or the fortuitous concurrence of causes. I personally believe that prayer is involved in some mysterious way.
When I speak of miracles, I am talking about an occurrence that is totally contrary to the way we have known about the process of nature and our world. For example, some of the cures at Lourdes are way beyond what we call the curing of psychosomatic illnesses that we can understand.
More next time.
Smile, God Loves You,
Father Clay
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