Homily for Wednesday, 28 May 2014‒ Wednesday of the Sixth Week of Easter

This homily was given at the convent of the Holy Child Sisters, Oxford, United Kingdom

Readings of the day: Acts 17:15, 22-18:1; Psalm 148:1-2, 11-12, 13, 14; John 16:12-15

St. Paul speaks in our first reading today from the Areopagus to the people of Athens who, according to Paul, were worshiping “an unknown God.” Have any of us ever known someone to worship “an unknown God”? Among worshipers of “an unknown God” I include those who may not know they are worshiping any god at all.

Have any of us ever heard someone say, for instance, “I’m not religious, but I’m spiritual”? In my experience, people who say this usually mean that they do not identify with any organized religious tradition; almost as often they do not want to. Their lack of desire to be associated with an organized religion may be based on an objection they have to a particular religious tradition or to organized religion in general, or they may perceive that religion limits their freedom to think and to believe as they wish. But I wonder if there are “spiritual but not religious” people who describe themselves this way because they do not know at enough depth what a particular religious tradition practices and teaches.

It is difficult to judge whether the Athenians to whom Paul speaks at the Areopagus worshiped “an unknown God” in the sense that the “unknown God” of their altar inscription was actually unknown; whether they wanted no association with any organized religion (unlikely, since the pagan Greek understanding of the divine was somewhat sophisticated); or whether some had rejected Christianity in favour of their own religion.

Paul’s audience in Athens may have included all these types of people. We hear from the Acts of the Apostles that, upon listening to Paul, some Athenians genuinely accepted the Christian faith. Others “scoffed” at Paul and immediately rejected the faith he was preaching. I doubt that many among Paul’s hearers, if any, truly rejected any and all religion whatsoever. This stance of “spiritual but not religious” is, I think, a more modern and even contemporary phenomenon, but I will leave this question to philosophers…

Nevertheless, in our time we still know people who are “spiritual but not religious.” We know people who have built spiritual places of worship “to an unknown God.” We know people who have, for a variety of reasons, perhaps anger or simple indifference, rejected religion altogether; rejected Christianity; rejected the Catholic Church. I find it fascinating that the University of Oxford is home to both Blessed John Henry Newman who, by his own writings, grew from worship of “an unknown God” toward embracing Christianity, and to Richard Dawkins, the biologist and vehement atheist of our own time. This university is also home to (I suspect) a majority of people who stand between the likes of Newman and Dawkins in their approach to religious faith.

May our mission as Church be to act with special kindness and to pray for those who reject religious faith. May we respect and uphold the freedom of religion of people of other faiths; and may we encourage and also pray for those genuinely searching for a religious home; those who build their altars “to an unknown God.”