Faith is not a notion, but a real strong essential hunger, an

Host:
The chapel stood alone at the edge of the village — a small stone building, weathered but enduring, its roof bowed with moss and memory. Inside, the light came from a hundred candles trembling against the stained glass, where faded saints looked down like quiet witnesses.

It was late. The world outside had already fallen asleep, but inside, something still breathed — the soft hum of faith or doubt or both.

Jack sat near the back, a man lost in the silence that faith always seems to create before it answers. His hands were folded, not in prayer but in thought. The flicker of the candles painted his face in gold and shadow, a soul in negotiation with its own hunger.

Jeeny entered quietly, her coat damp from the rain. She moved down the aisle with a stillness that seemed practiced, like someone who knew the language of silence.

Jeeny: (softly) “You picked an interesting place to disappear to.”

Jack: “It’s quiet here.”

Jeeny: “Too quiet for most.”

Jack: “That’s the point. I’m trying to hear something.”

(She sits beside him, not too close, the sound of the wooden pew creaking softly beneath her weight.)

Jeeny: “And what is it you’re trying to hear?”

Jack: “Faith.”

Jeeny: “Faith doesn’t always speak, Jack. Sometimes it just waits.”

Jack: “Then maybe I’m the one who stopped listening.”

(He stares at the candles. Their reflections shimmer in his eyes like small constellations.)

Jeeny: “William Law once said, ‘Faith is not a notion, but a real strong essential hunger, an attracting or magnetic desire of Christ, which as it proceeds from a seed of the divine nature in us, so it attracts and unites with its like.’”

(Her voice is gentle, but her words drop like stones into water — rippling, unshakable.)

Jack: “Hunger. That’s a dangerous word.”

Jeeny: “Why?”

Jack: “Because hunger is longing. And longing means something’s missing.”

Jeeny: “Or it means something’s alive.”

Host:
A draft of wind moved through the open door, and the nearest candles wavered. The flames seemed to bow and rise again, like worshippers caught between surrender and persistence.

Jack: “You really believe faith is a hunger?”

Jeeny: “What else could it be? You don’t reason yourself into faith — you ache into it.”

Jack: “But hunger hurts.”

Jeeny: “Yes. And that pain draws you toward what can feed you.”

Jack: “And what if you’re not sure what that is anymore?”

Jeeny: “Then the hunger itself becomes your prayer.”

(He lets out a slow breath, the sound of it blending with the quiet hum of the chapel air.)

Jack: “When I was a kid, I thought faith was certainty. You either believed, or you didn’t.”

Jeeny: “That’s not faith. That’s math.”

(He smiles faintly — a shadow of humor, but real.)

Jeeny: “Faith isn’t about knowing. It’s about desiring something so deeply that it changes your nature in the wanting.”

Jack: “So belief is attraction?”

Jeeny: “Exactly. The divine in you reaching toward the divine beyond you.”

Host:
The candles hissed softly, their wax pooling into small lakes of light. The walls of the chapel held centuries of prayers, layered and unspoken, and tonight they seemed to lean in to listen again.

Jack: “You think that’s what Law meant — that faith is magnetic? That we’re drawn toward God like metal to fire?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Not because we’re forced, but because something in us recognizes what it’s made of.”

Jack: “And what are we made of?”

Jeeny: “Dust and divinity. Both always fighting, both always longing for home.”

(He turns to her — not skeptical, but searching.)

Jack: “And you? You still believe?”

Jeeny: “I still hunger.”

(A silence follows, full and fragile. The kind of silence that has weight, as if Heaven itself is leaning closer.)

Host:
The rain outside quickened, tapping against the windows in a rhythm that felt almost like a heartbeat. Inside, the flickering light made every face carved into the stained glass seem alive — saints flickering with color and compassion.

Jack: “You know, it’s strange. I’ve prayed for answers my whole life. Lately, I think I should’ve been praying for appetite instead.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. The danger isn’t doubt. It’s indifference. Doubt still hungers.”

Jack: “But indifference…”

Jeeny: “Kills slowly — without anyone noticing.”

(He leans back, his eyes fixed on the crucifix at the front of the chapel — Christ’s figure carved in shadow and mercy.)

Jack: “Faith as hunger. That means it’s never satisfied.”

Jeeny: “It’s not meant to be. Satisfaction ends the search. Hunger keeps you alive.”

Jack: “So God wants us restless?”

Jeeny: “No. He wants us reaching.”

(She pauses, her voice softer now, almost trembling with reverence.)

Jeeny: “You see, faith doesn’t start in the head. It starts in the soul’s stomach — that part of you that can’t be filled by reason or success or pleasure. Only love deep enough to make you ache can fill that.”

Jack: “You talk about faith like it’s desire.”

Jeeny: “It is. The holiest kind.”

Host:
The camera would pan slowly upward, tracing the beams of the chapel where cobwebs shimmered like threads of eternity. Outside, thunder rolled softly — not in menace, but in reminder.

Host: Because William Law was right — faith is not a notion.
It is not a philosophy, not an agreement with dogma.
It is a hunger — sacred, persistent, magnetic.

Host: It begins as a whisper in the depths of a weary soul —
the ache that says, there must be more.
And that ache, that longing,
is not weakness.
It is the proof of the divine nature still alive within us.

Host:
Faith is not knowing where to find the bread.
It’s knowing you’re starving,
and still believing the feast exists.

Jeeny: (quietly) “You feel it, don’t you?”

Jack: “What?”

Jeeny: “That pull. That gentle weight in your chest — the wanting that never leaves.”

Jack: “Yeah.” (He swallows hard.) “Sometimes it hurts.”

Jeeny: “That’s how you know it’s real. God doesn’t call us with thunder. He calls us with hunger.”

(He looks at her — really looks — and in that moment, the restlessness in him becomes something softer, something luminous.)

Jack: “Then maybe I’m finally listening.”

(She smiles, small and radiant, the way light looks right before dawn.)

Host:
The final candles burned low, their flames bowing but unextinguished. The rain slowed, and the chapel filled with that rare kind of peace that feels earned, not granted.

Host: Faith is not about certainty.
It is about attraction — the divine magnetism of the human soul reaching toward the infinite.

We are drawn by what we desire,
and in that yearning,
we discover who we truly are:
not empty,
but endlessly being filled.

(The last shot lingers on a single candle, its flame trembling — alive, hungry, reaching — and utterly unafraid to burn.)