THEOLOGICAL VIRTUES - WHO GETS THEM AND WHO NOT?

The theological values of Faith, Hope and Charity - they are gifts from God to those who have accepted his offer of sonship.  Through the theological virtues, we get to share in God's knowledge & God's love and we desire to strive to be in union with Him.\

Transcript - 

TO BE CHOSEN

• We are not automatically God’s children by birth.
• We become His children by adoption through Baptism.
• God is God. We are creatures.
• God has graciously chosen to adopt us as His own, into His life and His love by Baptism.

WAITING TO BE A CHILD OF GOD

• There is a difference between being a child of God, and waiting to become a child of God.

Suppose a couple has visited an orphanage, chosen a child to adopt, and is in the process of filling out the paperwork and paying the fees. Of course, the couple loves that child, has chosen that child, and wants that child to be part of their family and to share in their life. But until it’s official, until the orphanage releases the child and the couple is granted rights over that child, they can’t bring that child home with them to share in their life.

• So too with the unbaptized -  they who have not been brought into God’s family. God loves them, He has chosen them, and He’s doing everything He can to bring them into His family but until they’ve received the grace of baptism, He cannot bring them into His community to share in His life.

WHY BAPTISE
There are many amazing benefits of being baptized.

The Catechism (1263) says that by Baptism all sins are forgiven, original sin and all personal sins, as well as all punishment for sin.

(1265) Baptism also makes us an adopted son of God who has become a partaker of the divine nature. God uses the sacrament of Baptism to fill our soul with Himself, the gift of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit – giving us a real participation in His divine nature so that we are not just children of God as an expression – but we really share in God’s divine life.

With God living in us we have the power to live and act as sons and daughters of God through the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit.

(CCC 1257) The Lord himself affirms that Baptism is necessary for salvation. He also commands his disciples to proclaim the Gospel to all nations and to baptize them. Baptism is necessary for salvation for those to whom the Gospel has been proclaimed and who have had the possibility of asking for this sacrament.

God has bound salvation to the sacrament of Baptism, but He Himself is not bound by His sacraments.

SHARING IN GOD'S ACTIVITY

One of the most dramatic differences that happens when we’re adopted by God through the grace of Baptism is that we get to share in God’s activity. 

We get to do things that only God could do by nature.

When a father lets his little son sit on his lap in the car and hold the steering wheel as they slowly go down the driveway, the child is being allowed to do something that’s totally beyond a child’s natural capacities.

So too, by the theological virtues, by Faith, Hope, and Charity, we can do things that are beyond our human nature.

• By the gift of faith, we share in God’s knowledge.
• By hope, we can desire God as our ultimate happiness and strive for union with Him above all else.
• By charity or love we share in God’s love, and so makes us capable of living both God and neighbor selflessly and sacrificially, for their own sake.

We don’t realize it, but by faith, hope, and charity, we’re already living as God’s children, sharing with our Father in the activity that properly belongs to Him.


THE UNBAPTISED

The unbaptised do not have a supernatural religion which can give them a share in the theological virtues.

• Faith is a share in God’s knowledge by belief in His Supernatural Revelation.
• Hope is the striving to share in the eternal life of the Trinity.
• Charity means loving God intimately, and for His own sake.

Jesus says, you can only know the Father through the Son – and for those who do not accept Jesus, they are unable to know and love the Father.



NOT TAKING OUR SONSHIP FOR GRANTED

The theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity are not virtues we have earned nor are they created in ourselves through our own efforts. 

These are the gracious gifts God has given to us, the children He has adopted out of pure love and generosity. 

And these are the gifts which, if we protect and cultivate them, will bring us to eternal happiness.

This post is an excerpt from Daily Rosary Meditation.

[https://www.dailyrosarymeditations.com/]

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