A Mustard Seed Is Enough| National Catholic Register

How did everything come into being? How did anything come into being?

We are blessed with silence. More importantly, we are blessed by silence. 

In his book, The Power of Silence: Against the Dictatorship of Noise, Cardinal Robert Sarah offers us the following words of whispered wisdom: “Through silence, we return to our heavenly origin, where there is nothing but calm, peace, repose, silent contemplation, and adoration of the radiant face of God.”

With these words in mind, I realize how blessed I am by the silence in my life. My office looks out over a meadow and a creek and the woods beyond. My desk is set up by the window so that every time I raise my eyes from my work, I can look out at the silent beauty of the landscape. Such silence invites us to the contemplation of the radiant face of creation, seeing in it the radiant face of the Creator.  

Thinking of the words of the Gospel in which Christ admonishes us that faith the size of a mustard seed can move mountains, I am reminded that a fact the size of a mustard seed can remove mountains of doubt. 

The very existence of one solitary mustard seed is a mystery beyond the ken of the human mind. How did anything come into being? The speck of dust is a thing, something. How did this something come into being?

But this mystery is nothing compared to the existence of a mind that can perceive the existence of the thing. What is a mind? Who am I? How can I perceive the mustard seed? How can I think about it? 

And then there are the existence of other minds with whom I can share my thoughts about the mustard seed. And those minds can communicate their thoughts to me. They enable my mind to understand how others perceive the mustard seed. They enable my mind to be ennobled by theirs.

The existence of one single mustard seed and of minds capable of perceiving it and communicating that perception to others are enough to lead the contemplative mind and soul to a knowledge of God’s existence and to the adoration of his radiant face. Why should I doubt that faith the size of a mustard seed can move mountains when I know that reason in the presence of a mustard seed can remove the mountains of doubt?

This essay was first published by Aleteia and appears here with permission.