Questions about what these terms mean

[Poustinia]

In Catechism of the Catholic Church #1763 passions are movements of the sensitive appetite.

• Is the sensitive appetite a faculty like reason and will? (Are reason and will 1 faculty or 2?)
• What is the sensitive appetite and how are the passions related to it?
• Is the sensitive appetite comprised solely of the passions or does it include something else?
• Are the passions a separate faculty?
• In one of St. Ignatius’ prayers he talks about memory, understanding and will. Is memory a separate faculty?
• What are the other faculties, and how do they cooperate to produce an act?

Thank-you for in advance for your answers.
:thankyououstinia

 

[jmjconder]

**May Dad always said “seek the moment of excited interest to quench the thirst of knowledge.”

The best place to understand these terms is at Father John Hardon’s web site.**

therealpresence.org/dictionary/pdict.htm

 

[Poustinia]

Thank-you jmjconder for pointing out this really great resource.

There were some terms that it did not define and questions that it did not answer. It didn’t define sensitive appetite, nor did it talk about the superior faculty(ies) of reason and will or the inferior faculties and how these cooperated to produce an act. Are there any other resources you could suggest? I’ve pondered these things for many years and have been perplexed by seemingly contradictions and discrepancies, and major gaps in my knowledge.

Poustinia

 

[yablabo]

In Catechism of the Catholic Church #1763 passions are movements of the sensitive appetite.

• Is the sensitive appetite a faculty like reason and will? (Are reason and will 1 faculty or 2?)
• What is the sensitive appetite and how are the passions related to it?
• Is the sensitive appetite comprised solely of the passions or does it include something else?
• Are the passions a separate faculty?
• In one of St. Ignatius’ prayers he talks about memory, understanding and will. Is memory a separate faculty?
• What are the other faculties, and how do they cooperate to produce an act?

Thank-you for in advance for your answers.
:thankyououstinia

1. The sensitive appetite is a specific faculty. Intellect and will are also separate faculties (notice plurality there).
2. The sensitive appetite is an organic faculty which follows (that is, gains its data from) sense knowledge, whose functions include body and soul, which is ordered not to the intellectual “goodness” of the appetible, but rather to concrete objects which are good or pleasurable. The passions are related to the sensitive appetite in that they provide manifestation of the sensitive appetite.
3. The sensitive appetite is not comprised of the passions. It is a faculty, or “power,” which acts in some way through the passions, based upon data gained from physical sense and emotions.
4. The passions are not a faculty, but rather the motions of the sensitive appetite. They are the “manifestation” of the workings of the sensitive appetite.
5. Memory can be classed as a separate faculty.
6. Imagination and Fantasy/Phantasy can also be classed separate faculties depending on what spiritual writer you read making a list looking like: Intellect and Will (as faculties of the upper soul; i.e., spiritual faculties), and Memory (being somewhat of a cross-over faculty showing some signs of being spiritual as well as merely animal), then also including Imagination, Fantasy and the Sensitive Appetite.

They cooperate in an organic fashion, since we are made up of body and spiritualized soul, in line with their definitions to produce an act.

– Nicole

 

[Poustinia]

Thank-you so much Nicole for answering my questions so succinctly and directly. Now I have even more questions.

“2) The sensitive appetite is an organic faculty… which is ordered… to concrete objects which are good or pleasurable…”

• How does the sensitive appetite evaluate the good or the pleasurable? Such an evaluation seems only possible by the understanding or intellect or reason (I assume that these 3 terms are interchangeable).
• The CCC# 1765 “…Love causes a desire for the absent good…” Is desire one of the movements of the sensitive appetite, or does it arise from a cooperation of the different faculties?

I hope you don’t mind me asking all these questions. The forums are ideal for me to gain this knowledge. Verbal discussions go too fast and I cannot remember everything which I wish to ask or understand. Nor can I remember all the answers. It also gives me enough time to think about each question and answer, and a reference to go back to and reflect upon. (Thank-you CAF:thankyou Each question that I ask depends on the answer given from the previous question or set of questions, because I’ve been thinking about these things for some time.

Poustinia

 

[yablabo]

Thank-you so much Nicole for answering my questions so succinctly and directly. Now I have even more questions.

• How does the sensitive appetite evaluate the good or the pleasurable? Such an evaluation seems only possible by the understanding or intellect or reason (I assume that these 3 terms are interchangeable).
• The CCC# 1765 “…Love causes a desire for the absent good…” Is desire one of the movements of the sensitive appetite, or does it arise from a cooperation of the different faculties?

I hope you don’t mind me asking all these questions. The forums are ideal for me to gain this knowledge. Verbal discussions go too fast and I cannot remember everything which I wish to ask or understand. Nor can I remember all the answers. It also gives me enough time to think about each question and answer, and a reference to go back to and reflect upon. (Thank-you CAF:thankyou Each question that I ask depends on the answer given from the previous question or set of questions, because I’ve been thinking about these things for some time.

Poustinia

I don’t mind you asking……

1. I was using the term “good” loosely in regard to the sensitive appetite, trying to show that in the case of the sensitive appetite, pleasure is interchanged with “good.” This does not make the pleasure interchangeable with intellective “good.” It’s called a change in supposition. When one is talking about “good” in regard to the sensitive appetite, he is really referring to pleasure/pleasurable, but using the term “good” because there is an analogy between “good” denoting what is apprehended as pleasurable by the sensitive appetite and what is apprehended as a conformity of existence to essence by the intellective appetite.

The sensitive appetite apprehends the data from some external object, such as a rubber tyre, the rubber has a specific smell reminiscent of anise cookies baking, one likes anise cookies from past experience, therefore one does not remove himself from the locale of the tyre, but instead stays near the tyre and is now feeling the passion of pleasure. This is a play-by-play layout of what happens between the different faculties based upon an apprehension of data by the sensitive appetite. It really is an almost instantaneous process between the sensitive appetite, memory, intellect and will.

The sensitive appetite does not “evaluate” in the sense of whether an object perceived is morally good or evil. It “evaluates” in the sense that nature orders us to experience pleasure when beholding specific objects and so we do.

Typically those terms, understanding, reason, and intellect, are all used interchangeably, but there are also instances in which understanding is used to denote the end process of the faculty, and reason is used to denote the prime process of the faculty. That is why I stick to the use of the word “intellect,” since that is the proper name of the faculty.

1. The article of the Catechism of the Catholic Church which you quoted in part (1765): “Amor desiderium causat boni absentis…,” is in reference to passion. Passions are the manifestation of the workings of the sensitive appetite, but since we are organic beings, we don’t operate by one faculty alone. It takes the intellect to determine the unseen good (bonus) and that it is absent. Then, one knowing the object which is good, can begin to feel desire for the object since memory from past experience and imagination of the object can present matter for the sensitive appetite to apprehend.

All this should be covered in a primer course of psychology, that is, the study of the soul. However, since most psychology today is so diluted by Freud’s psychiatric blab, your best bet on getting this is looking at old texts. A good place to start may be the “catholic encyclopedia” at New Advent’s website. The best thing to do when taking another source as a reference, though, is to see whether what is stated is understandable and verifies to reality. Don’t assume that because another person gives you an answer that it is the right answer or automatically binding your belief. You have to discern that. That goes for my answers to your questions, too!

Take care and best wishes…

– Nicole

 

[Poustinia]

Thanks Nicole.

“Don’t assume that because another person gives you an answer that it is the right answer or automatically binding your belief.

My purpose in asking these questions is to understand what the Catechism of the Catholic Church is actually saying. The Real Presence website which was recommended by jmjconder had definitions for some of these terms but they weren’t the same definitions used by the CCC, and thus unhelpful for furthering my purpose to understand what the CCC really means. My sensus fideleum has red flagged these passages in the CCC. As I posted earlier, I have perceived seeming contradictions and discrepancies, but there are also serious gaps in my knowledge. Because of my lack of understanding, I need to learn what is really meant so that I can give my positive assent of faith to what the Church authoritatively teaches.

You and your answers are more like interpreters of what the CCC is saying. I am not so naive as to believe that everything that you say is infallible and binding. Even the pope is infallible only when speaking ex-cathedra and defining a specific dogma. The teachings presented in the CCC are binding on my belief and that is what I wish to understand. If I find that there really are contradictions and discrepancies, then I can make these things known to the Church authorities.

I am following up on the New Advent website to get more references so that I may understand more deeply.

I know very little Latin. I got a Latin grammar book last year and only succeeded in getting through a few lessons, though I can keep up with the parts of the mass in Latin if I have the words in front of me At times when I’ve read church documents and other catholic writings, the authors have used Latin and I’ve been left not understanding what was meant because they failed to give a translation. It might be best if you give me English translations to anything you write that is in Latin (though I’ve had no problems understanding what you’ve written so far because it is in context). Thank-you.

The sensitive appetite apprehends the data from some external object, such as a rubber tyre, the rubber has a specific smell reminiscent of anise cookies baking, one likes anise cookies from past experience, therefore one does not remove himself from the locale of the tyre, but instead stays near the tyre and is now feeling the passion of pleasure. This is a play-by-play layout of what happens between the different faculties based upon an apprehension of data by the sensitive appetite. It really is an almost instantaneous process between the sensitive appetite, memory, intellect and will.

To call the passions a movement of the sensitive appetite seems erroneous if the other faculties contribute to their existence as well.

If I can extrapolate on how a desire happens:

• The sensitive appetite apprehends sense data,
• the memory remembers the pleasure of past experience,
• and the intellect perceives pleasure as a good.
• This arouses a desire in the sensitive appetite to experience pleasure again
• and the will engages the appropriate mechanism to acquire the pleasurable experience.

It seems to me that desires and passions are secondary things which are produced by the cooperation of more than one faculty. How can they be solely manifestations of the sensitive appetite?

Poustinia