Something Else I stole from someone else.
What follows comes from someone who happens to have grown up in a different denomination from me, but their message, I believe, is for people of all faiths. I found it helpful. I hope you do too.
" Brothers, sisters…
I speak to you, especially to those who no longer believe, no longer hope, no longer pray, because they think God has left.
To those who are fed up with scandals, with misused power, with the silence of a Church that sometimes seems more like a palace than a home.
I, too, was angry with God.
I, too, saw good people die, children suffer, and grandparents cry without medicine.
And yes… There were days when I prayed and only felt an echo.
But then I discovered something:
God doesn't shout. God whispers.
And sometimes He whispers from the mud, from pain, from a grandmother who feeds you without having anything.
I don't come to offer you perfect faith.
I come to tell you that faith is a walk with stones, puddles, and unexpected hugs.
I'm not asking you to believe in everything.
I'm asking you not to close the door. Give a chance to the God who waits for you without judgment.
I'm just a priest who saw God in the smile of a woman who lost her son... and yet she cooked for others.
That changed me.
So if you're broken, if you don't believe, if you're tired of the lies...come anyway. With your anger, your doubt, your dirty backpack.
No one here will ask you for a VIP card.
Because this Church, as long as I breathe, will be a home for the homeless, and a rest for the weary.
God doesn't need soldiers.
He needs brothers and sisters
And you, yes, you are one of them."
Robert Prevost (Leo XIV)