A Sunday thought for the day:
By "faith" is understood not the upholding of one's own--much less other people's--ideas as true, but the grasping of a growing reality of the supersensible world, and making it the concern of one's own will. That which is already there can be either known or not known--but that which lives as a possibility in this world and a reality in a higher can (in the sense of the Gospels) be only believed or not believed. . . . Such a purposeful grasp of the future is called "faith" by Christ Jesus. . . Whereas the world as it is already created is known through knowledge, faith shapes it anew. . . . For, in reality, Faith, as the word is used in the Gospels, is nothing else than knowldge, which is not only thought and felt, but also willed. . . . Faith is therefore nothing other than knowledge which has taken hold of the whole man. When a man knows not with thoughts alone, not with thoughts and feelings alone, but with his faculties of thinking, feeling, and willing, then he has faith in that which is known. What the whole man has come to know--that , in the Christian sense, is Faith. --Valentin Tomberg
Here's the point: empirical knowing is only a knowledge of the surfaces of things. Faith, true faith, is a mode of cognition that penetrates to the core of things. It is the lamp by which the mystery at the heart of the world can come into view, and without it the mystery remains in impentrable darkness. And so therefore faith is not about intellecutal assent, It is not a question of believing or not believing a set of propositions, but of learning how to see and trust one's cognitions and in the inclination of one's will. The intellectual part comes in evaluating and testing these cognitions, and the only proof of whether your trust has been foolish or wise will come in the fruits. The measure of our faith in the long run is the measure of our fruitfulness.
And the reverse logic also applies. Where you are most fruitful in your life is where your faith lies, whether you think of using the word 'faith' or not. To what ends is your will already inclined? Hitler had a profound faith in his mission and bent his will toward the establishment of the Third Reich. His fruits were in the nightmare world he created, and ultimately so much dust when it all crumbled.
So obviously you are free to believe in whatever you want, but it is not a matter of indifference. Be careful what you believe in, for surely you will produce its fruits--not just for yourself, but for the rest of us as well.