The columnist visited the Seoul Arts Center to see the exhibition of works by “Caravaggio, the Master of Light & Faces of the Baroque.” He was excited to see the works of Caravaggio, who left a significant mark on Baroque art, and the painters influenced by him.
In particular, the work he wanted to see the most this time was “The Doubt of Saint Thomas,” which depicts a scene from Chapter 20 of the Gospel of John.
The work on display is not Caravaggio’s original but a copy from the Uffizi Gallery in Italy, completed by a later artist influenced by him. “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will never believe” (John 20:25).
Thomas doubted the resurrection of Christ, and heard the words of Jesus: "Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Do not doubt but believe" (John 20:27). This passage depicts Thomas poking the wound in Christ’s side with his finger.
The intense contrast of light and darkness and the hyper-realistic expression of St. Thomas were too shocking to try to express in words. “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (John 20:29).
Christ’s voice telling Thomas resonated deeply within the writer, and he found it difficult to leave. He reflected on his attitude toward life as a Catholic, recalling the words of St. Augustine: “Faith is believing in what you have not yet seen, and the reward for believing is seeing what you believe.”
In this world, there are things that you must believe without seeing, and on the contrary, there are things that you must see with your own eyes and believe. The former is faith regarding religious beliefs, and the latter is social phenomena and news we encounter in our secular lives.
South Korea is in an uproar due to sharp political and group conflicts. This results from political beliefs and actions based on them, which has polarized the country.
Who is right? Humans tend to commit the error of confirmation bias, seeing only what they want to see and believing only what they want to believe. The formation of beliefs that modern brain science has revealed so far are not the product of an analytical and rational process, but rather the result of a complex network of individual experiences, memories, and emotions, and different areas that perform various functions in the human brain are connected to complex neural networks.
The brain is only about 2% of the human body's weight, but it consumes 20% of the energy consumed during the day. Therefore, rather than consuming energy and processing information analytically and critically, it operates according to efficiency, looking at phenomena based on subjective beliefs already within itself and drawing conclusions it wants.
This is why it is easy to be deceived by fake news and agitators. In times like these, we must ask God for wisdom so that we are not immersed in superficial phenomena but can keep our center and seek to see what is. Do I believe what I see about the world now, or am I seeing what I believe?
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