The Catholic Church on Charity

[Teflon93]

Charity comes up a lot around the board, but it seems to me that there are some misconceptions about how the Catholic Church treats the topic.

From the Catechism:

Charity

1822 Charity is the theological virtue by which we love God above all things for his own sake, and our neighbor as ourselves for the love of God.

1823 Jesus makes charity the new commandment.96 By loving his own "to the end,"97 he makes manifest the Father’s love which he receives. By loving one another, the disciples imitate the love of Jesus which they themselves receive. Whence Jesus says: “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you; abide in my love.” And again:** “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.”**98

1824 Fruit of the Spirit and fullness of the Law, charity keeps the commandments of God and his Christ: "Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love."99

1825 Christ died out of love for us, while we were still "enemies."100 The Lord asks us to love as he does, even our enemies, to make ourselves the neighbor of those farthest away, and to love children and the poor as Christ himself.101

The Apostle Paul has given an incomparable depiction of charity: **“charity is patient and kind, charity is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude. Charity does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Charity bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.”**102
1826 “If I . . . have not charity,” says the Apostle, “I am nothing.” Whatever my privilege, service, or even virtue, "if I . . . have not charity, I gain nothing."103 Charity is superior to all the virtues. It is the first of the theological virtues: **“So faith, hope, charity abide, these three. But the greatest of these is charity.”**104

1827 The practice of all the virtues is animated and inspired by charity, which “binds everything together in perfect harmony”;105 it is the form of the virtues; it articulates and orders them among themselves; it** is the source and the goal of their Christian practice**. Charity upholds and purifies our human ability to love, and raises it to the supernatural perfection of divine love.

1828 The practice of the moral life animated by charity gives to the Christian the spiritual freedom of the children of God. He no longer stands before God as a slave, in servile fear, or as a mercenary looking for wages, but as a son responding to the love of him who “first loved us”:106

If we turn away from evil out of fear of punishment, we are in the position of slaves. If we pursue the enticement of wages, . . . we resemble mercenaries. Finally if we obey for the sake of the good itself and out of love for him who commands . . . we are in the position of children.107

1829 The fruits of charity are joy, peace, and mercy;** charity demands beneficence and fraternal correction**; it is benevolence; it fosters reciprocity and remains disinterested and generous; it is friendship and communion: Love is itself the fulfillment of all our works. There is the goal; that is why we run: we run toward it, and once we reach it, in it we shall find rest.108

This, in my opinion, is why we are constantly called to exercise charity in this Forum, why the PMs fly whenever we miss an opportunity to be more charitable, and why it is so outrageous when someone mocks the Catholic emphasis on Christian charity.

 

[Caldera]

Teflon93:

This may be one of the most profound/important group of quotes to come to understand in one’s lifetime…

But of course, there is one simple thing i don’t understand.

1822 Charity is the theological virtue by which we love God above all things for his own sake

What is meant by “by which we love God above all things for his own sake”?

For his own sake?

In other words, God is perfect and needs nothing. What does it matter that we love God above all things? We don’t even know for sure if he exists! God is an unsolved mystery.

 

[Teflon93]

Teflon93:

This may be one of the most profound/important group of quotes to come to understand in one’s lifetime…

But of course, there is one simple thing i don’t understand.

What is meant by “by which we love God above all things for his own sake”?

For his own sake?

In other words, God is perfect and needs nothing. What does it matter that we love God above all things? We don’t even know for sure if he exists! God is an unsolved mystery.

That’s a great question—I cannot pretend to a definitive answer (others know more than I do, surely). I read “for his own sake” synonymously with 'simply because He is God"; in other words, not because we fear damnation, not because we want something from Him, but because he is the Creator.

 

[Bruised_Reed]

I don’t disagree with the above but I would add that “for his own sake” may be in contrast to the charge of wars, fighting or, on a forum, lack of charity, done in the name of God. But I don’t know that that is what is meant for sure.