CHARITY, LOVE AND THE JOYFUL MYSTERIES
Man’s highest activity is love, and there is no nobler object of his love than God. So the First and Greatest commandment is: 'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ (Matthew 22:37). Nothing is more important than that. “Would that I had as many hearts as there are grains of sand in the depths of the seas to love Thee with, O God”.
When the word agape is used in the context of vertical action (God toward man and/or man toward God), it is translated as "love." When the word agape is used in the context of horizontal actions (man toward neighbor or enemy), it is translated as "charity." The word "love," as we use it today, carries more than one meaning.
Where we have one word, "love," the Greeks had four words:
agape was the word used to identify love that was selflessly committed to the well-being of another , unconditional love; phileo was the word used for the non-sexual affection of those sharing a strong bond, like "brotherly love;" eros was the word used for romantic feelings. In the Gospel of John (22: 15-17), it is remarkable that in these three questions –“Do you love me…?” Jesus uses the verb ‘agape’, and Peter always replies using the verb ‘phileo’.
Charity means participating in tangible acts of loving-kindness toward all others (friend or enemy) in unconditional and self-sacrificial ways. St. Paul's classical description of charity is found in the New Testament (I Corinthians 13). In Christian theology and ethics, charity is most eloquently shown in the life, teachings, and death of Jesus Christ.
The dignity of the human person is rooted in his creation in the image and likeness of God; it is fulfilled in his vocation to divine beatitude. It is essential to a human being freely to direct himself to this fulfillment. By his deliberate actions the human person does, or does not, conform to the good promised by God and attested by moral conscience. Human beings make their own contribution to their interior growth; they make their whole sentient and spiritual lives into means of this growth. With the help of grace they grow in virtue, avoid sin, and if they sin they entrust themselves as did the prodigal son to the mercy of our Father in heaven. In this way they attain to the perfection of charity. (CCC #1700)
Is agape equivalent to charity?
To Be Continued …
Mary, Mother Most Amiable, Pray for us!!!
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