A while ago, there was a panel of atheists interviewed on the radio. One claimed that we were all non-believers at birth, born to believe in nothing. I asked myself, how did he know that? Was he able to ask a newly born infant if it believed in God? Wouldn't it be more reasonable to say that an infant believes in its mother? The baby trusts its life to her. The child does not ask if God exists. It intuitively knows it through her. The mother is the spiritual, emotional, and material life source for her child.
This model was given to us as a paradigm for all of life. In the Orthodox Church the Virgin Mary holding the Christ child is the symbol of the incarnation, the Word of God made flesh. In the Gospel according to St. John we hear, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him, and without Him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in Him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines into darkness and did not overcome it” (John 1:1-5).
The entrance of the Son of God into the world was therefore, the entrance of a new life. The incarnation is the symbol of that new life - a recreation. The child discovers who God is through its mother. We are born to believe that there is a higher power. The mother, therefore, becomes that higher power to the child.
Why does the Lord give us this paradigm? God could have just as easily created us void of a mother where we would not even need her at birth or in development as are so many animals. He could have created us as He pleased. Why then do we go through this process of life? Why do we struggle with our childhood, adolescence, and adulthood? Where does the joy and exhilaration of life originate? Why the learning and strife? Why ask so many questions? Well, because we want answers. They are the great commodity of this information age. Everyone has answers but answers are usually led by questions. So to get the right answers we need to ask the right questions.
These atheists touted themselves to be free thinkers. One panel member was even a pastor of the "Church of Free Thought" in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The implication being, of course, that no one who is a free thinker can possibly believe in God. That is pretty free. Right? However, Scripture tells us that God gives us free will. In other words, God gives us the freedom to act, believe, or think in whatever way we choose, even to not believe that He exists. We can ask any question. The Lord wants us to be free thinkers. So then where is the discrepancy between what God wants for us and what the atheists say? The believers and non-believers each call themselves free thinkers. Each asks a different question. The atheists ask, how can you be a free thinker and believe in God? The faithful ask, how can you be a free thinker and not believe in God? The discrepancy here is that there is no value in free thought unless we are set free by it. There is a painting depicting the imprisonment of John the Baptist. The scene shows King Herod's face from the view point of St. John. Herod looks into the jail cell holding the bars as if he himself were the one being incarcerated. The artist begged to ask the viewer to think about who was really behind bars. Christian free thought in the midst of tribulations is as a candle lit in darkness. As darkness is overcome so are the tribulations turned to a deeper spiritual meaning. Who was freer than St. Paul? Who, while locked in his jail cell, he wrote the most beautifully sublime letters to the Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians?
A man once passed by my former parish in Florida and happened to see me standing outside. He drove into the driveway and asked me what time it was. I thought he was going to ask for money but he seemed just to show an urgency to simply talk. Standing with just shorts in front of his beat up car he told me all the things he did wrong in life. It reminded me of the icon of the man who, at confession, regurgitated a dragon out of his mouth in front of his father confessor. Within a matter of twenty minutes I found out that he was abused as a child, he was a fugitive from the law, clean from heroine for at least a week, couldn't keep a job and was currently living out of his car because his girlfriend had kicked him out. I asked if he believed in God. He replied, "no" but yet he sought me out, a priest, in front of the Church. He complained that a black cloud seemed to follow him around and he didn't know what to do. Before he left we prayed that the Lord would forgive his sins and with God's help he could put his life together. This pitiful jailed soul was seeking peace of mind. Did he understand that real peace could only come from God?
Freedom is peace through love. If we do not feel peace and love for Christ, we confine ourselves to the most oppressive prison. As adults, we continue to have the same need for protection. St. Paul tells us to put on the whole armor of God because we are continually fighting spiritual warfare. As infants, our earthly mother protected us and shielded us from harm while simultaneously nurturing our spiritual development giving us a model from which to transition into adulthood. From August 1st through the 15th, we contemplate the wonder and the love of the Virgin and Child relationship as a paradigm for life and salvation. Let us keep the fast these fifteen days and participate in the services which culminate to the celebration of the Dormition of the Holy Virgin Mother of God. Mother and Child is the paradigm for life.