Faith is that disposition of our minds which makes us ready to accept all that God has revealed simply because He has revealed it. It is an assent to that which comes to us with God's authority because it comes with His authority, and not because in itself it commends itself to our reason. It is quite satisfied that God has said that this or that is true, and it gives its adherence to what He has said without any further question. It thus earns the benediction of those "who have not seen but have believed." (John 20:29) Have I this simple, unquestioning faith?
Faith is never opposed to reason. It is above and beyond reason, but never contrary to it. What God has spoken can never be in contradiction with what our reason tells us is true. It may contradict our ordinary experience, as in the case of miracles; it may seem to set aside the testimony of our senses, as in the case of the Blessed Eucharist; it may require our acceptance of what is beyond the power of reason to grasp, as the doctrine of the Blessed Trinity; but it never requires us to believe in an absurdity. Thank God for your faith in the Catholic religion, since all others are ultimately in contradiction with reason.
Yet faith requires us to believe many things that are difficult of belief, and that we cannot believe without the help of God. Faith is a gift of God. No amount of searching or inquiry will obtain it. I must humbly pray to God, "Give me a strong faith; increase my faith; make me loyal in my readiness to believe," if I wish my faith to be that of a true child of the Catholic Church.
- text from Beautiful Pearls of Catholic Truth; it has the Imprimatur of Archbishop Michael Augustine Corrigan, Diocese of New York, 6 October 1897