(Habakkuk 1: 2-3; 2: 2-4. Tm1: 6-8, 13-14. Lk17: 5-10)
As Jesus and his disciples are on the way to Jerusalem, they stop for a breather. Suddenly they say, "Lord, increase our Faith." Why did they say this? Their statement seems quite out of context with the focus of Jesus' teaching to date, which has been the poor and the sick, and the dangers of not sharing one's wealth and good fortune. Jesus chastises them with the ridiculous answer of the mulberry bush uprooting itself, which clearly would not have helped them much. The rest of the journey continues, although the reader will notice (looking forward to the 28th Sunday), that Jesus' subsequent pastoral action is the faith-founded healing of the Ten Lepers. Luke's Gospel of today and the Gospel of next week are, actually, closely connected.
Certainly being a disciple of Jesus required initial faith, and the apostles had discovered that. They would have been impressed by his wisdom and healings, and would have felt the intimacy of his relationship with God whom he called 'Father' - something they had not seen in the other Rabbis. They wanted more: but it would have been only after their own experiences of being sent out, and of 'casting out devils in his name,' that the seeds of their own faith, planted on the journey to Jerusalem, would have begun to grow and become strong.
Perhaps the disciples' desire for a greater faith represents an early excursion into the dialogue of faith and reason. Reason itself demands a measurement of truth and clarity; faith on the other hand cannot be quantified, but can only be felt in the human heart as "The assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." (Hebrews 11:1). In the life of St Augustine, his acceptance of the Greek philosophy of light as originating in a divine Being, descending upon us to illuminate our reality, enabled him to turn in a new direction, to confess his sinfulness and to embrace the Good.
In the faith journey of a disciple, it is moments of light, 'flashes of the Divine,' that convince us that there is a Being who loves and cares for us. In the parishes where I will be celebrating Masses this weekend, there will be welcoming ceremonies for young people about to be baptized. Is this the planting of seeds of faith, or is it a watering of a seed already present? Who knows? In my homily to the parents, I will praise them for bringing their children to be baptized; in my remarks to the children, I will encourage them to treasure this gift and to nourish it, then one day to hand it on to others, as Jesus did for his disciples on the way to Jerusalem.