In a recent interview, Luis de la Fuente, the current coach of the Spanish national football team that recently won the 2026 Men’s World Cup, spoke about his faith. In fact, he has been frequently asked about this topic. A few years ago, he was asked whether it could be said that he felt proud to be Catholic, to which he replied: “Well, not proud, very proud.”
Perhaps from that point on, and especially because of the popularity he gained through his success in managing the Spanish national team, he has been asked many questions about his faith, to which he has always responded with interesting clarifications. For example, in the press conference before the World Cup final, a journalist, without asking a question, asserted that he had been praying a lot in the hours before the World Cup final, suggesting that he was using faith as a kind of superstition to win matches. To corroborate this, he asked: “What do you ask God thinking of tomorrow’s match?”
Luis de la Fuente, who noticed the journalist’s intention, gave a very wise response: “I pray every day, but not because I am in a World Cup or trying to win a game. I give thanks every day […] and I pray because I pray every day, not so that He will help me more, and I think it would be unfair to ask Him to help me and not help my opponent.”
In another interview, where he was discussing the importance of being Catholic, the journalist asked him: “Have you lived your faith in your family, that is, was it passed on to you by your family?” To which he immediately replied, “Yes, […] I come from a Catholic family, but” he immediately clarified, “I must also say that I later chose to be Catholic on my own, because in one’s development one goes through many vicissitudes in life. I was also young, and obviously in those moments of youth, when you think you can handle everything and you forget many things, I eventually came to realize that […] without faith I could not live, and I chose it freely. And since I chose it freely, with intelligence and with moments of reasoning about why and why not, I chose yes because it gives me much more strength and security.”
This is a very instructive clarification, because faith cannot be lived out of obligation. God’s grace helps us to freely move toward God and believe without coercion, and therefore, one must take the interior step of accepting the faith. Saint Thomas says that the act of faith is an act of the intellect moved by the will.
Since the act of faith involves an act of the intellect, the intelligence is necessary. In other words, it is our intellect that adheres to revealed faith, making an inquiry or investigation about why to accept the faith, which is what Luis de la Fuente referred to when he said “with intelligence and with moments of reasoning”. The intellect discovers the logic of the mysteries of faith, that they are not irrational, even if it cannot fully comprehend them, and it discovers the goodness behind accepting the faith.
Precisely for that reason, an act of the will is also necessary, as Luis de la Fuente wisely said: “I chose yes.” As Saint Thomas says in the act of faith, “the intellect of the believer is not determined necessarily by reason, but by the will” (II-II, 2, 1 ad 3). When the intellect understands that two plus two equals four, it is determined necessarily by reason, because it cannot deny that truth, since it is an evident truth.
Since faith deals with supernatural truths that surpass our intelligence, the intellect is not determined by those truths and needs to be determined by the will, which chooses faith upon realizing the great good for one’s own life that lies behind the revealed truths. This is precisely what moved Luis de la Fuente to believe—that is, because he realized that “without faith I could not live.” Without faith, we cannot live well; we need faith, we need God, because He is our ultimate end.
