Roaring Lions and Silent Faith

Discipline yourselves, keep alert. Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour. Resist him, steadfast in your faith, for you know that your brothers and sisters in all the world are undergoing the same kinds of suffering.

—1 Peter 5:8–9

Across the world today, the roar of the lion grows louder. We hear it in angry speeches, in cruel legislation, and in the deliberate turning away from compassion. In many nations, political movements have wrapped themselves in the language of faith, but have abandoned the teachings of Christ. They claim to defend “Christian values,” yet their actions betray them—stripping away healthcare, rejecting immigrants, targeting transgender people, and punishing the poor.

The recent government shutdown in the United States is just one example. Those responsible profess to follow Christ, yet their decisions starve children and deprive families of basic needs. They wield faith as a weapon while ignoring Jesus’s words in Matthew 25:40–45: “Just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.” The true test of faith is not in the power we hold, but in the mercy we show.

Peter’s warning calls us to be watchful—not only for spiritual temptation but for moral corruption disguised as righteousness. The lion prowling in our world today takes many forms: greed, indifference, cruelty, and arrogance. These are the forces that devour empathy and seek to silence compassion. Isaiah spoke against such hypocrisy when he declared, “For my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples” (Isaiah 56:7).

In the face of all this, we are reminded of a simple but profound story—Aesop’s fable of The Lion and the Mouse. In it, a mighty lion spares a tiny mouse, and later, when the lion is trapped in a hunter’s net, the mouse returns to gnaw through the ropes and set him free. Strength and power meant nothing without mercy, and the smallest act of kindness became the source of salvation. The story endures because it teaches a truth we so often forget: compassion is never weakness. Mercy, not might, is what ultimately redeems us.

Christ showed us that same truth. He healed the sick without judgment, fed the hungry without question, and embraced those whom society cast aside. True Christianity does not roar; it listens. It does not dominate; it serves. It remembers that every person—rich or poor, gay or straight, cisgender or transgender—is a beloved creation of God.

We must therefore remain vigilant—not against one another, but against the false prophets who twist the Gospel to justify harm. The adversary still prowls, but we resist by standing firm in faith, by loving as Christ loved, and by living with humility and courage. We resist through kindness, justice, and inclusion. The lion may roar, but it is the quiet courage of the mouse—the compassion of Christ within us—that sets the world free.

So let us stay alert and steadfast, answering every roar of hatred with an act of love. Let our faith be steady, our mercy unshaken, and our hearts open to all whom God calls beloved. For in every gentle deed, every word of kindness, and every act of justice, we proclaim that Christ’s love is stronger than fear—and that no roaring lion can ever silence it.