Faith, Hope and Charity are the tree theological virtues,
they are the foundation of the entire Christian life.
They do not directly concern morality, as morality
has to do with behaviour.
Theological virtues means that they have God as object.
The object of a theological virtue is God, and God alone.
The moral virtues has to do with our own actions.
The theological virtues has to do with being connected
to God.
The word religion means to be reconnected.
Faith is a purely supernatural virtue and it is
fundamental for a Christian life.
Whereas the moral virtues can be both natural and
supernatural in character,
e.g. prudence can be natural;
I take care when I cross the street in order to not be
run over by a car, but it is supernatural when I take
care to live in God's grace in order to save my soul.
With the 3 theological virtues of Faith, Hope and
Charity it is not a question of natural or supernatural,
they are always purely supernatural;
they exceed the force of nature.
And why so?
Because God is only accessible as a free gift from
Him. It is He that grants the ability to come to
Him, it is not something that can be earned.
We can arrive at the certainty that God exists,
we can gain the knowledge that He exists through
philosophical studies, but that is not what we call
Faith in the theological sense. What we are talking
about is handing ourselves over to God, to throw
ourselves into His arms with every aspect of our lives,
to trust in Him. That is Faith.
"I have been crucified with Christ, it is no longer I who
live, but Christ lives in me, and the life which I now live
in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved
me and gave Himself up for me."
Galatians 2:20
We could say that we do not believe in God
when we have faith in the existence of God, we do
no longer believe, because we know.
It is not the same thing.
These virtues can be lost, due to our own negligence,
or by turning our back to Him, but if we keep them,
they will continue to grow, because when God gives
a gift He never takes it back.
"For God's gifts and his call can never be withdrawn."
Romans11:29
The virtue of Faith is located in the Intelligence,
whereas Hope and Charity are located in the Will.
The seat of Faith is Intelligence, because it is a
knowledge of God and God's mysteries.
And for humans, the capacity for knowledge is in
the Intelligence.
Faith is an accession to a truth: the truth of God and
the truths that God makes known, it is therefore the
Intelligence that has the faith.
Hope is in the Will, because to hope is wanting to hope:
it is a decision.
Faith is a supernatural virtue by which we firmly believe
all the truths that God has revealed and which the Church
teaches. We believe in revealed truths. All the revealed
truths, and nothing else.
We do not believe by Faith in what our intelligence
is capable of guessing, to know e.g. that God exists,
we do not need Faith to know that, we can arrive at that
by intellectual and philosophical work.
We believe in the things that God has revealed, and
which the Church teaches.
By ourselves it would be impossible
know that there is 3 Persons in God,
that God sent His Son,
that His death on the Cross has redeemed
us from our sins,
that He resuccitated from death and that
He ascended up to Heaven where He is seated
at the right hand side of Divine Majesty.
All those things has been revealed.
We believe in what God has revealed,
the role of the Church
is only to certify to us what God has revealed.
We do not believe in what the Church teaches,
we believe in what has been revealed by God which
is what the Church teaches.
The Church teaches, passes on, truths revealed by God,
by her Magisterium, similarly to a schoolteacher who
shows the teachings on the board to his students, it is thus
all about what is shown on the board, and it is not really
about the teacher at all.
However we do believe in what the Church teaches,
but only because that what she teaches are the things
that God has revealed. They are the same thing.
But fundamentally and ultimately it isn't even the truths
that God has revealed that we believe, it is God we believe.
We believe that Jesus is present in the Eucharist; Body,
Blood, Soul and Divinity; because the Church teaches it,
but ultimately it is God's authority we believe.
It is God we believe.
It is the same faith regardless of how much knowledge
we have of it, because the level of knowledge is very
variable. We are however bound to cultivate and deepen
our faith.
Faith is in the Intelligence, it makes us know.
The fuel of human intelligence is evidence.
As we do not start off equipped with evidence, the
role of the Will comes into play.
The Will, by a supernatural grace, pushes the human
intelligence to accept truths which are not evident to
start off with.
The good Will wants to be fair and just and adhere to
God from whom all good comes.
We believe God.
That means that we are responsible ourselves if we do
not have Faith.
We believe because we want to believe, but that does
not mean that it is self- hypnosis, it is a grace that
comes from God, a divine intervention, that gives us
this grace in the Will .
Likewise the so-called atheisme is also in the Will.
As it is so obvious that God exists, the ones who say
that they are atheists, say it from their ill-will.
To not believe God is a sin, a sin that God will condemn.
"Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but
whoever does not believe will be condemned."
Mark 16:16
Sins against the Faith:
Doubt, Heresies and Apostasy.
Doubt: we are not talking about trouble or difficulty
in understanding some aspect or another of the Faith
that we are trying to understand.
We are talking about doubting a revealed truth; e.g.
Jesus is Really Present in the Eucharist, or that
Jesus Christ is fully God and fully human.
Those that doubt this, have lost the Faith.
Heresy; this word means choice in greek.
It concerns persons who claim that they have Faith,
but who rejects one or several truths.
In fact, that person have not got the Faith,
he has lost the Faith.
Since I could not possibly imagine or guess myself
the mysteries of the revealed truths of the Faith;
e.g. the Incarnation, The Trinity, The Eucharist, The
Redemption, they are the truths that we are obliged
to believe.
We cannot see them directly, only through and with
God can we see them, by entrusting ourself to God
through the grace of supernatural Faith, we
can see for ourselves that they are true.
Faith: trusting completely in God, living in His presence,
comes first, the evidence follows.
And it is not my own little reflections and reasoning
that gets me there.
Then you have the person who says; well, please don't
exagerate, I'm unable to believe in the existence of Hell,
God is too good for that, etc, etc, and also that the Eucharist
is the Real Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Our Lord Jesus
Christ, well sorry, I just don't believe it, etc, that person has
simply lost his/her faith altogether, (even though he might
consider himself to be a believer), because he contests the
authority of God, who revealed these truths.
Apostasy is more coherent; everything is rejected.
The Faith is like water to the fish, we live in it.
What is a "just" man ?
Is it somebody who is fair,
gives back what he owes, shares equally and is nice to
everybody?
No, a just person is somebody who lives at this level of
God, at the tuning fork of God, in and of the truth of God.
That is what makes him just.
It is the entry to the Kingdom of God.
Hope:
A supernatural vertu that makes us expect from God the
supernatural blessings in this world, and in the next world;
Glory.
Once we have Faith, and in the Faith, we understand straight
away that to join God is something that completly exceeds
human power, we see our incapacities and impotence in regard
to God, like a bird without wings.
We understand straight away that without God, we cannot join
God. So we must expect God of God.
It is from God that we must expect God. We don't just expect
graces from God, we expect God Himself, it is God that we
want to join, God that we seek, God who is the object of our search.
We understand that we are incapable to join God by our own
forces, so we hope it from God,
we have a disposition that makes us expect God from God,
and this disposition is Hope.
It is a theological virtue; it is God we hope for.
It is God that is going to give it to us, there is nothing
we can do to obtain God.
"But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who
comes to God must believe that He exists, and that He is a
rewarder of those who diligently seek Him".
Hebrews 11:6
God gives us the means to go to Him.
And from whom do we expect the means?
From God.
Just to be clear: the Hope we are talking about
here is not the hoping for good news, good weather,
good food etc,
we are talking about the quest for God.
Hope is in the Will, which says; you are
capable by God to obtain God.
It is a will to conquer God,
while as Faith is seeing the truth in God, and
also seeing that it is impossible for us to obtain
God by our own means, thus Hope.
Hope is the dynamism of all supernatural life,
it transforms Faith; knowledge, into Charity.
Hope is the necessary motor in order to go
from faith to charity.
Sins against Hope:
Presumption ("I'm sure I'll get there") because it means I
am depending on my own strenght.
Despair (I can't do it without God's help, but God is not
going to give me the help I need, He has forgotten about me)
Both of those sins cuts the person off from God, which is
catastrophic.
God says:
"I am the vine; you are the branches.If you remain in me and I in
you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing."
John 15:5
It is Hope that gives wings towards God, with the Holy Spirit
in the loving fear of God.
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