Doubt and Grace

FRANCIS SPUFFORD: In some ways, the more intense your relationship with faith is, the more intense your relationship with doubt tends to be too; they’re coordinated like clothing, or they’re dancing partners, pick your metaphor. The metaphor that isn’t right, though, is that doubt is the enemy of faith – that’s much too easy. I don’t know any believers who don’t find that doubt is their frequent companion. And actually, doubt defines faith in some ways, faith comes out of struggle with doubt, faith is sometimes illuminated with doubt, faith gets its bright edges from the dark lines of doubt around it. It’s not like we say goodbye to doubt or that we don’t recognise the value of scepticism, but our questions pull back towards that core sense of being nourished from the centre of faith.