The cure for the “spiritual amnesia” so prevalent in the world is “self-identification with the eternal qualities of God,” the Rt. Rev. William S. Thomas, suffragan bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh, said today.
“Who Am I?” he asked at the noon Lenten service in St. Paul’s Cathedral. He answered with the promise of God, the Creator, that “we are the children of God.”
Bishop Thomas said: “The only answer we have to the hundreds of problems and questions which haunt us, and apparently will increasingly haunt us, is to fix our thinking solidly by the authority of God.”
He emphasized the need “to know who we are in the world” and said:
“Identifying yourself physically is only a part of the necessary orientation. The persons who fail to go beyond this are suffering from lack of proper identification and are groping in a haze of spiritual amnesia.”
Recalling the story of St. Thomas Aquinas, who answered, “Lord, give me yourself,” when he looked at the Cross and it spoke to him, asking, “Thomas, what will you have?” Bishop Thomas said:
“In our present-day thinking, this reply is an expression of Thomas’ desire to identify himself with eternal qualities.”
Bishop Thomas will speak at the St. Paul’s service tomorrow noon. His topic will be “Why Am I?”
