I sent a copy of the article I Don’t Need Proof to my younger sister. I don’t think she’d ever heard of the Shroud of Turin. But she likes to read my writing and is happy that I’m writing again, so, I sent it to her. After reading it, she sent it to her priest and to our older sister. Evidently at last night’s Bible study at her church (New Hampshire has different ‘shelter’ regulations than say, here in Florida) and her priest had some information that he shared about the Shroud and a couple of the people in the group asked if they could get a copy of the article and so I sent her the link.
I was discussing this rather interesting (at least to me) occurrence with a very dear friend who mentioned, quite sagely (of course!), that we never know ‘who we touch’. That gave me a great deal to think upon. It’s very true; we never know who we touch with a kind act or an insight or a new thought. It led me to think of what we are told in church, about planting seeds; you tell someone about the Gospel of Jesus and you never know if they do anything about what you’ve shared with them – I don’t think we’re supposed to know, quite frankly – but you’ve ‘planted’ a seed of an idea, a direction to investigate, a single frame of a larger picture.
There are many possible scenarios. I considered this one: suppose you met an atheist and asked them to watch some of the Shroud videos – or even just to look at the Shroud. When an atheist is confronted with something state of the art, top of line science can’t dispel, would it make them reconsider their stance on Jesus, firstly, and the resurrection, secondly? What if the videos were shared with someone who had lost their faith? Would the viewing of the videos put bellows to dying spark and breathe it to life again? Would someone from a non-Christian background be effected? If they were confronted with Isa not being a ‘good teacher’ but truly God, and not Allah?
If someone had no faith background whatsoever, which would be hard to fathom but for the number of polls taken that show an abundance of people with no religious knowledge, would a person of ‘no faith’ be moved to search for Jesus? If they were so moved to search for Jesus and become a believer based on the Shroud, would they be less of a believer? I make mention again of “blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe” – would seeing the Shroud, the purported burial cloth of Christ, negate their having ‘found Jesus’? That’s a deep theological question to which I have no answer.
I’m reminded of there being only one way to God – St. John, 14:6 ” … No one comes to the Father except through me.” But there are many roads and ways to Jesus. Can one be less good than another? I don’t know.