Lumen Fidei - page 16

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know, because it is the work of our own hands.
Before an idol, there is no risk that we will be
called to abandon our security, for idols “have
mouths, but they cannot speak” (Ps 115:5). Idols
exist, we begin to see, as a pretext for setting
ourselves at the centre of reality and worshiping
the work of our own hands. Once man has lost
the fundamental orientation which unifies his
existence, he breaks down into the multiplicity
of his desires; in refusing to await the time of
promise, his life-story disintegrates into a myr-
iad of unconnected instants. Idolatry, then, is
always polytheism, an aimless passing from one
lord to another. Idolatry does not offer a journey
but rather a plethora of paths leading nowhere
and forming a vast labyrinth. Those who choose
not to put their trust in God must hear the din
of countless idols crying out: “Put your trust in
me!” Faith, tied as it is to conversion, is the op-
posite of idolatry; it breaks with idols to turn to
the living God in a personal encounter. Believ-
ing means entrusting oneself to a merciful love
which always accepts and pardons, which sus-
tains and directs our lives, and which shows its
power by its ability to make straight the crooked
lines of our history. Faith consists in the willing-
ness to let ourselves be constantly transformed
and renewed by God’s call. Herein lies the para-
dox: by constantly turning towards the Lord, we
discover a sure path which liberates us from the
dissolution imposed upon us by idols.