What is "bad faith"? "Bad faith"is a sustained form of deception which consists of entertaining or pretending to entertain one set of feelings while acting as if influenced by another. It is associated with hypocrisy, breach of contract, affectation, and lip service. It may involve intentional deceit of others, or self-deception.
In today’s gospel reading we witness how Jesus masterly unmasks his opponents’ “bad faith” by questioning them about the validity of John the Baptist’s ministry. Now, since they refused to believe in John, they should have answered that his ministry was purely of human origin - if they had been honest. But they admit among themselves, “we fear the crowd” (Mt 23:26). In other words, these religious opponents of Jesus are more concerned about their personal safety than about the truth, which shows their bad faith. They want to save their skin rather than live up to their true convictions.
The question we need to ask ourselves is this: are we willing to be honest and true to our convictions? Are we willing to call a spade a spade? Or have we become like these religious leaders, who chose to have "bad faith" instead of having "true faith" or being honest in our convictions?
