Faith and Trust?

[Alainval]

I read somewhere that the Catholic view of faith is merely assent to the Divine truths revealed in the Revelations that God showed us. But doesn’t the Greek work of faith (“πίστις”) mean trust (“faith, belief, trust, confidence; fidelity, faithfulness”)? I’m saying this because of my Protestant background in which we believed that faith was “confidence and trust in the Divine mercy.” Aquinas seemed to say that faith was the “intellectual virtue or habit, the object of which is God.” So it would seem that Aquinas wouldn’t say that faith included trust in God’s mercy. Second, would it be heretical for a Catholic to say that faith was not only having an intellectual belief in the truth but also “the flight of a penitent sinner unto the mercy of God in Christ,”? Especially since from Sacred Scripture I see that faith also is talked about as receiving Christ for example, “But as many as received him, he gave them power to be made the sons of God, to them that believe in his name.” (‭‭St John‬ ‭1:12). As well as to have faith in the blood of Christ (Rom 3:25), which to me seems to say that although faith most assuredly includes assent, it can also be said to include trust. So in summary, can faith mean trust in God’s mercy and is it heretical to say faith includes this?

 

[1Lord1Faith]

Here are some relevant paragraphs from the CCC. Have you read these before?

143 By faith , man completely submits his intellect and his will to God. With his whole being man gives his assent to God the revealer. Sacred Scripture calls this human response to God, the author of revelation, “the obedience of faith”.

144 To obey (from the Latin ob-audire , to “hear or listen to”) in faith is to submit freely to the word that has been heard, because its truth is guaranteed by God, who is Truth itself. Abraham is the model of such obedience offered us by Sacred Scripture. The Virgin Mary is its most perfect embodiment.

150 Faith is first of all a personal adherence of man to God. At the same time, and inseparably, it is a free assent to the whole truth that God has revealed. As personal adherence to God and assent to his truth, Christian faith differs from our faith in any human person. It is right and just to entrust oneself wholly to God and to believe absolutely what he says. It would be futile and false to place such faith in a creature.

So in summary, can faith mean trust in God’s mercy and is it heretical to say faith includes this?

I think that’s part of it. What makes you think it might be heretical to say that?

 

[edward_george1]

Not only not heretical, but it’s totally grammatical (or rather, lexical) to say that. The New Testament uses the word “pistis” to mean faith, which is literally just the word for “trust.”

-Fr ACEGC

 

[1Lord1Faith]

Aquinas seemed to say that faith was the “intellectual virtue or habit, the object of which is God.” So it would seem that Aquinas wouldn’t say that faith included trust in God’s mercy

There is a similar citation, possibly even the same one if you’re paraphrasing, in the CCC from Aquinas. FWIW, all of these paragraphs from the CCC that reference faith, to me, sound a lot like trust. And the following paragraph even uses the word trust along with the citation from Aquinas.

Faith is a human act

154 Believing is possible only by grace the interior helps of the Holy Spirit. But it is no less true that believing is an authentically human act. Trusting in God and cleaving to the truths he has revealed is contrary neither to human freedom nor to human reason. Even in human relations it is not contrary to our dignity to believe what other persons tell us about themselves and their intentions, or to trust their promises (for example, when a man and a woman marry) to share a communion of life with one another. If this is so, still less is it contrary to our dignity to “yield by faith the full submission of. . . intellect and will to God who reveals”,26 and to share in an interior communion with him.

155 In faith, the human intellect and will cooperate with divine grace: "Believing is an act of the intellect assenting to the divine truth by command of the will moved by God through grace."27

26 Dei Filius 3S 3008.

27 St. Thomas Aquinas, STh II-II,2,9; cf. Dei Filius 3S 3010.

 

[po18guy]

I would suggest that you stop reading “somewhere.” Rather, read the catechism. Clear, unambiguous. True.