What is Faith?

Hanna (199, p. 187) says that faith is an act where a spiritual truth is accepted on the basis of the authority of the Holy Tradition of the Church or the Holy Bible. Accepting spiritual truths is not like accepting scientific truth where we seek evidence or proof to remove our doubts. Instead when we believe truths about God that the Church teaches we do so out of our choice.

Hanna (1998, P. 187) says, ‘We can choose to accept God’s word as it is transmitted to us through the Church and the Bible, or we can choose to reject it. The decision we make will depend on whether we want to acquire God’s values or whether we want the values that men put in place of God: such as wealth, social position, fame, power.’

Faith is an act of our Free Will; God has given us the ability to accept God or to reject Him. We are responsible for our choices. Once we have chosen to have Faith we need to be  committed to a way of life pleasing to God. Christians are meant for communal life to work out their salvation,

‘You cannot believe that church is a pathway to God and never come near it. As soon as you have chosen to accept God, you have accepted the responsibility of trying to be like Him, of trying to love what is good, of trying to love others, of trying to follow the path of life He has laid out for us. The Church teaches us what this pathway is, and the church exists to keep us in contact with God and to keep us always in mind of our obligations. Our best example is Christ Himself who showed us the way.’ (Hanna, 1998, p. 187)

References

Hanna, A., Doctrinal Theology according to the Coptic Orthodox Church, 1998, [Online] Available from: http://www.coepa.org/downDetails.php?nav=downloads&cat_id=1&subcat_id=23&thrdcat_id=45 Accessed 18 June 2009)