Christian Morality According to the CatechismWe can best grasp the essential understanding of Christian morality as set forth in the Catechism of the Catholic Church by focusing attention on the following issues: (1) the moral life as a dynamic endeavor on the part of human persons to become fully the beings God wills them to be; (2) our absolute dependence upon God to enable us to become fully the beings he wills us to be; (3) the God-given authority of the Church as Mother and Teacher; and (4) what we must do in cooperation with God’s grace in order to become fully the beings God wills us to be.
1. The Moral Life as an Endeavor on the Part of Human Persons to Become Fully the Beings God Wills Them to Be The first chapter of the first section of Part Three of the Catechism focuses on the dignity of the human person and in its first article takes up the theme that man is indeed the image of the all-holy God. The very first paragraph of the first article (no. 1701) of this chapter begins with a beautiful citation from Vatican Council II’s “Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World,” Gaudium et spes (no. 22), one constantly on the lips of Pope John Paul II, namely, that “Christ….makes man fully manifest to man himself and brings to light his exalted vocation” (cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, no. 1710). This chapter then develops the truths that human persons, created in the image and likeness of God, are gifted with intelligence, whereby they can come to know the truth, and with free choice, whereby they can determine their own lives by their own choices (nos. 1704-1706, 1711-1712, 1730-1748). In addition, it reminds us that, because of original sin, we are inclined toward evil and subject to error (nos. 1707, 1714), but that God, in his great mercy, has sent us his only begotten Son to redeem us from sin and to enable us, dead to sin through baptism and made new creatures in Christ, to live worthily as children of God, called to be members of the divine family and to life eternal in union with him (nos. 170801709, 1715). Indeed, the Catechism centers attention on the beatitudes, the “blessings,” spoken by Jesus in his Sermon on the Mount (Mt 5:3-12), emphasizing that these great promises of our Lord make clear to us the actions and the attitudes that should characterize Christian moral life (nos. 1716-1717, 1725-1726). Along with the Decalogue, the “ten words” of God himself so central to salvation history and to the apostolic catechesis, the beatitudes of our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount describe for us the path leading to God’s kingdom (no., 1724; cf. nos. 1728-1729). Indeed, as Christoph Cardinal Schönborn, who was responsible for the final drafting of the Catechism, has said: “Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount is the great guidebook to living happily. The eight Beatitudes address ways that make man ‘blessed,’ bring him a happiness that is more than being cheerful….The life experience of so many Christians, saints both known and unknown, testifies that a life led according to the Sermon on the Mount means even now—in the midst of many sorrows and sufferings—incomparable happiness, an anticipation of eternal joy (cf. Catechism, no. 1723).” [1] The first three articles of the first chapter of section one of Part Three, in short, portray the Christian moral life as a dynamic endeavor on the part of human persons to become fully the beings God wills them to be: his own children, brothers and sisters of Jesus, the one who was obedient to death and whose only will was to carry out the wise and loving plan of his heavenly Father for human existence. 2. Our Absolute Dependence Upon God to Enable Us to Become Fully the Beings He Wills Us to Be As already noted, the initial articles of the first chapter of section one of Part Three remind us of the truths that, as beings made in God’s image, we are endowed with intelligence, whereby we can discover the truth, including moral truth, and with freedom of choice, whereby we determine our own lives and selves. They likewise remind us that, because of sin, we are prone to evil and to error and that it is only by participating in the redemptive death and resurrection of Jesus that we are enabled to live worthily as God’s children and in this way become fully the beings he wills us to be. These great truths are developed in greater detail in the second article of chapter three of this section, the article devoted to justification and grace. There it is made clear to us that we do not justify ourselves, but that it is God in his goodness who reconciles sinful men and women to himself by the gift of the Holy Spirit, poured into the hearts of all those who, through baptism, participate in the saving death and resurrection of Jesus (cf. nos. 1987ff). It is only through the gift of the Holy Spirit, which Christ merited for us by his life of obedience and his self-sacrificing death on the cross, that we are able to share in his redemptive act, to be converted from sin to accept—freely—God’s gift of justification (nos. 1968-1993). By the power of the Holy Spirit sanctifying grace—a sharing in God’s divine nature—is poured into our hearts so that we are made holy and enabled to live worthily as God’s very own children (nos. 1996-2000; cf. nos. 2017-2027). Precisely because we are now truly God’s children, who share in the divine nature just as his Son shares fully our human nature, we are called to a life of perfection, of holiness (nos. 2012-2016; cf. nos. 2028-2029). Our responsibility is to cooperate with the grace freely given us by the most merciful God. We can do nothing of our own to merit eternal life, to merit membership in the divine family. But God made us to be the kind of beings we are, intelligent and free, precisely because he willed that there be beings to whom he could give his own life. He freely offers us this life in Jesus through the Holy Spirit, and inwardly moves us freely to accept his offer, but he will not force himself upon us. We are free to sin, to choose death rather than life, but as our best and wisest friend God is always with us with his never-failing offer of grace, to enable us to become, freely, the beings he wills us to be. This is the core message of the second article, “Grace and Justification,” of the third chapter of section one of Part Three. 3. The God-given Authority of the Church as Mother and Teacher This matter is taken up in the third article of chapter three of the first section of Part Three. The Catechism first notes that it is in the Church, the communion of all the baptized, that Christians fulfill their vocation, one that requires them, as St. Paul says (cf. Rom 12.1), to offer their bodies as holy and acceptable sacrifices to God (nos. 2030-2031). The Catechism, following the teaching of Vatican Council II, emphasizes that the magisterium of the Church, invested in the college of bishops under the headship of the Roman Pontiff, has the God-given authority and responsibility to teach in Christ’s name the saving truths of faith and morals (nos. 2033-2034). Moreover, it affirms that the charism of infallibility extends to those elements of Catholic doctrine, including those concerning the moral life, without which the saving truths of the gospel cannot be safeguarded, faithfully presented, and observed (no. 2035). In fact, the Catechism insists, the authority of the magisterium extends to specific precepts of the natural law insofar as the observance of these precepts is required by our Creator and is necessary for our salvation. In proclaiming these truths of natural law the magisterium exercises a truly prophetic role for humankind (no. 2036). The faithful, the Catechism teaches, have the right to be instructed according to the mind of the magisterium, and they have the duty to shape their lives in accordance with its authoritative teaching (no. 2037). All the faithful should have an attitude of filial love for the Church, their Mother and Teacher (no. 2040). 4. What We Must Do in Order to Become Fully the Beings God Wills Us to Be The Catechism insists that human persons, precisely because they are endowed with freedom of choice, are, as it were, the mothers and fathers of their own acts (cf. no. 1749). They are obliged to choose in accordance with the truth if they are to be fully the beings God wills them to be. Article one, “The Moral Law” (nos. 1950-1986) of the third chapter of Part Three, is devoted to an articulation of the great truths of the moral order in accordance with which good moral choice can be made. Here the Catechism, following Vatican Council II (and St. Thomas and the Catholic tradition), insists that God’s divine and eternal law, his wise and loving plan for human existence, is the highest norm of human life and action (no. 1950; cf. no. 1975). But God has enabled his rational creatures, men and women, to participate actively in this wise and loving plan through the natural law (no. 1954; cf. no. 1978). The natural law is universal and immutable (nos. 1956, 1958). Although the application of the natural law can vary according to circumstances (no. 1957), this law is nonetheless one that unites human persons and imposes upon them common principles and norms that always retain their substantive value (no. 1958). Moreover, it is no easy task to grasp the precepts of the natural law in a clear and immediate way; in our actual condition, as persons wounded by sin, God’s grace and revelation are necessary for sinful human persons to come to know rightly the religious and moral truths needed for an upright moral life (cf. no. 1960). The natural law is fulfilled and perfected by the new law or evangelical law (no. 1965). In essence this law consists in the grace of the Holy Spirit poured into the hearts of the faithful through faith in Christ (no. 1966). The faithful, who are called to develop within themselves (with the help of God’s never-failing grace) the dispositions marked out by the beatitudes of the Lord’s Sermon on the Mount (no. 1967), must likewise keep God’s commandments (no. 1968). By reason of their union with Christ, Christians are summoned to love even as they have been and are loved by God in Christ, with a healing, redemptive, sacrificial love (nos. 1970-1972). In discussing the morality of human acts in the fourth article of chapter three of the first section of Part Three, the Catechism makes it clear that the sources for the morality of a human act are the object chosen (what one is doing here and now), the end for whose sake the object is chosen, and the circumstances in which the action takes place (no. 1750)—and that all of these elements must be morally good, i.e., in accordance with moral truth, if the whole human act is to be morally good (no. 1755). The Catechism clearly identifies the object as the subject matter of the human act as willed and chosen by the agent (e.g., freely chosen intercourse with one’s wife [the marital act], freely chosen intercourse with one’s daughter [incest]) (no. 1751). It insists that a good intention, in the sense of the intention of the end for whose sake an object is chosen (and intended as an object of one’s free choice) cannot justify the means chosen if this means is evil (immoral) by reason of its object (no. 1753). It likewise clearly affirms that there are specific kinds of acts, specified by their freely chosen objects, that are always wrong for one to choose, e.g., fornication, precisely because the willingness to choose an object of this kind displays a disordered will, i.e., moral evil (no. 1755). In other words, the Catechism clearly teaches that there are some kind of human acts, specified by the object of choice, that are intrinsically evil and that, corresponding to such acts, there are absolute moral norms, admitting of no exceptions. In the second section of the Third Part of the Catechism, devoted to a consideration of the Ten Commandments, various kinds of intrinsically evil acts, proscribed by absolute moral norms, are clearly identified: the intentional killing of innocent human persons (cf. no. 2273), as in infanticide (no. 2268), abortion (no. 2281), mercy killing or euthanasia (no. 2277), and suicide (no. 2281); masturbation (no. 2352); fornication (no. 2353); rape (no. 2356); homosexual acts (no. 2357); adultery (no. 2380-2381). The Catechism clearly proclaims, along with Pope Paul VI, that contraception, described as every action which, either in anticipation of the conjugal act, during its accomplishment, or in the development of its consequences, proposes either as end or means to impede procreation, “is intrinsically evil” (no. 2370) There can be no doubt that the Catechism firmly upholds the Catholic tradition that there are some kinds of human acts, specified by the objects freely chosen, that are intrinsically evil and proscribed by absolute moral norms. A willingness to do acts of these kinds is utterly incompatible with Christian life, with the life of God’s very own children. More positively, Christians are called, as we have seen already, to love with the redemptive, healing, and reconciling love of Jesus, a love utterly at odds with a willingness to do evil so that good may come about, and to shape their whole lives in accordance not only with the Ten Commandments but also with the internal dispositions marked out by the beatitudes. To choose in accordance with the truth and to be unwilling freely to do evil is what we must do if we are to become fully the beings God wills us to be and enables us to be through the grace of the Holy Spirit, won for us by his Son’s life of obedience to the Father’s holy will. Endnote [1] Christoph Cardinal Schönborn, Living the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Vol. 3. Life in Christ (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2001), pp. 17-18.. |
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