Have You Mastered the Basics of Your Faith?

Fr. Mike makes the case that, before you claim a certain “style” in
practicing the faith, you have to master the basics. He tells a
story about when he was learning guitar. The teacher told his
students to hold their guitar on an angle with their left knee
higher than their right. This way they could play all kinds of
music. Some of the students decided they wanted to hold the guitar
their own way. This limited what they could play. Living the Faith
is the same way. If you’re told to do something and don’t, is it
because you can’t do it, or because you won’t? When practicing the
Faith, you may say you’re not into prayer, or service, or
witnessing about Jesus, but all these things are essential to
growing in holiness. The saints are all different, true. Their
fruit was unique, but the soil where they flourished is the same.
Every saint started with prayer. They all did service, they all
talked about Jesus. Fr. Mike recommends that we take advantage of
all the riches our Catholic Faith gives us: the Rosary, Ignatian
meditation, lectio divina, charismatic prayer, and so on. Let’s not
limit our experience of God by saying some tradition is not our
style.