Article — Noldin, Summa of Moral Theology
Article Second. On the Necessity of Charity of God
58. On the necessity itself of charity. Habitual charity, which is inseparably joined with sanctifying grace, is necessary for all, both adults and infants, by necessity of means unto salvation: for no one can come to God without sanctifying grace and the habit of charity. But here the question concerns the necessity of eliciting an act of charity.
- Actual charity in the New Testament is not necessary by necessity of means unto justification and salvation except in defect of a sacrament: for if an adult first acquires justification through the sacrament of baptism or penance, the act of charity is not equally necessary as the act of faith and hope, since the disposition through attrition suffices for obtaining justification through the sacrament.
Yet an explicit or implicit act of charity in contrition, which in the Old Testament was absolutely necessary for justification and salvation, in the New Testament is hypothetically necessary by necessity of means, namely for those who cannot receive the sacraments of baptism or penance: for outside the sacrament, except in the case of martyrdom, there is no other means of arriving at justification.
- Actual charity is necessary by necessity of divine precept: for there exists a special precept of charity by which we are bound to love God above all things with appreciatively highest charity, but not necessarily also with intensively highest charity.
a. Christ the Lord enjoins upon us the great commandment of charity in these words: You shall love the Lord your God from your whole heart, and in your whole soul, and in your whole mind. This is the greatest and first commandment.1 And indeed, since God is the ultimate end of all things, supremely lovable for His own sake, the order of things requires that God be loved by a creature capable of love for His own sake and above all things; therefore He could not fail to command this act of charity. Besides this, the very nature of man is of such perfection that it cannot be quieted and fully beatified except in charity of God, the highest good, whence the well-known words of St. Augustine: Thou hast made us for Thyself, and our heart is restless until it rests in Thee.2
b. The precept of charity is a special precept distinct from the others; therefore it is not satisfied by the mere observation of other precepts, but must be fulfilled by the act itself of charity. Certainly there exist three propositions condemned by Innocent XI, from which we especially gather this: that there exists a special precept, distinct from the others, of eliciting an act of love of God above all things.3
Nor let it be said that from Sacred Scripture effective charity suffices and affective charity is not required, since it says: He who keeps His word, in this man the charity of God is perfected.4 For since this testimony cannot conflict with the other words of Sacred Scripture which prescribe affective charity, it must be explained thus: he who keeps the commandments has perfect charity, internal and external, because observation of the commandments is the effect and sign of internal charity. Besides, he who does not elicit an act of charity does not keep His, God's, word, because he neglects the first and greatest commandment, which concerns affective charity of God.
c. To fulfill the precept of charity there is required perfect charity, which is love of benevolence: for the charity by which we ought to love God is an act of love from the whole heart, from the whole mind, from the whole soul, from all the powers; therefore it is love of the most perfect species. But charity by which we love God for His own sake is more perfect than charity by which we love God on account of goods coming to us from Him.
d. Above all things: If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother ... and besides this even his own soul, he cannot be My disciple.5 And indeed we ought to love God in that manner which corresponds to the divine goodness on account of which we love God; but this infinitely surpasses all other things.
e. Appreciatively highest, because the infinite goodness of God demands that we prefer God to all created goods. Not intensively, because the intensity of love corresponds not so much to the dignity of the object as to the vividness of apprehension and the natural disposition of the subject. Yet it is especially fitting that love of God even intensively be greater than love of a creature.
Therefore he does not sin who loves a son, friend, or bride more intensely and more sensibly than God, provided he is prepared in soul rather to lose all things than God and His friendship, because intensively highest love is not required. But he would sin who were so disposed in soul that he would not love God if there were no hope of reward or if hell were not to be feared, because he would constitute not God, but himself or his own beatitude, as the ultimate end.
1 Matt. 22:37-38. Cf. Mark 12:30; Deut. 6:5.
2 Confessions, bk. 1, c. 1.
3 We do not dare to condemn as sinning mortally him who would elicit the act of love of God only once in life (5). It is probable that the precept of charity toward God does not rigorously oblige of itself even in single five-year periods (6). It obliges only then when we are bound to be justified and do not have another way by which we can be justified (7). Cf. also proposition 1 condemned by Alexander VII (n. 45).
4 1 John 2:5.
5 Luke 14:26. Cf. Matt. 10:37.
59. When the precept of charity obliges. The precept of loving God is affirmative and negative; insofar as it is negative, it prohibits hatred of God and love of creatures appreciatively greater than love of God; insofar as it is affirmative, it prescribes an act of love of God. Since affirmative precepts oblige at certain times, it is now asked how often and when an act of love of God must be elicited. Further, sometimes it must be elicited per se, or by reason of charity itself, sometimes accidentally, or by reason of another precept to be fulfilled.
The precept of loving God obliges per se: a. After man has attained the use of reason, that is, when man, sufficiently instructed concerning God and His goodness, apprehends the obligation of loving God above all things; yet this is to be taken not mathematically concerning a determinate time or day, but morally, that is, in such a way that after the use of reason has been acquired the act of charity cannot be deferred for a long time without sin.
b. Several times in life. From proposition 6 condemned by Innocent XI, it is certain that the precept of loving God obliges at least within five years; but whether it urges more often and how often cannot be determined.
Authors establish diverse things concerning this matter: for some say that an act of charity must be elicited on each Sunday and feast day; others with St. Alphonsus, bk. 2, n. 8, once a month; others once a year; others finally every three years; but nothing certain can be established. Therefore the faithful are to be earnestly exhorted and admonished to elicit acts of the theological virtues frequently, but it must not be said that they are obliged to this either each week, or each month, or each year, because this obligation is not determinately established.
c. In a temptation of sinning against charity by hatred of God, which can happen in adversities: for if an act of charity is the only means without which the temptation cannot be overcome, it must be elicited from the precept of charity; but it will rarely happen that an act of charity is the only means by which the temptation is repelled.
For the rest, since satisfaction can be made to the precept of charity, as also to the precept of faith and hope, by a virtual act of charity, it is not necessary that penitents be asked whether they have fulfilled the precept of charity of God. For those who live as Christians frequently elicit acts of charity, even if they do not advert that they elicit them, for example while they keep the precepts and avoid sins lest they displease God; while they desire that all may worship God; while they pray that His name be hallowed, His kingdom come, His will be done, etc. But those who live impiously do not advert to the obligation itself, and therefore they sin only materially.
Note. There are some who add that an act of charity must be elicited:
a. In the article of death. St. Alphonsus calls this obligation most probable, because then "the safest way must be chosen"; but this obligation exists only for those who are in mortal sin and cannot receive the sacrament. For the rest, it is not necessary that the safest way be chosen, but it suffices that one simply secure and safe be chosen.
b. When man through mortal sin has lost the habit of charity. Yet the obligation by which the sinner, who has been justified through attrition in the sacrament of penance, would be bound immediately or soon after he has obtained justification to elicit an act of charity, cannot be demonstrated by any probable argument. Indeed, those who urge this obligation too much seem to affirm, against the Council of Trent,1 that attrition with the sacrament does not suffice for true justification, or without sufficient motive they establish a special precept of referring all our actions to God from the motive of charity.2
2 Cf. On Principles, n. 85.
60. Accidentally the obligation of eliciting an act of charity urges: a. When someone needs the state of grace and cannot receive the sacrament, as when one existing in mortal sin must administer a sacrament or receive a sacrament of the living, or when someone is placed in danger of death and there is no supply of a confessor: for he cannot arrive at the state of grace unless he elicits an act of charity or of perfect contrition, in which an act of charity is contained.
b. When someone is found in a grave temptation against another virtue, and this temptation cannot be removed unless an act of charity has been elicited, as if someone must either deny faith or undergo death.
Note. 1. Parish priests, teachers, and parents ought to take care that children and the unformed are aptly instructed in eliciting the theological virtues. Wherefore not only are revealed truths to be explained, but at the same time it must be added that those truths have been revealed by God and that we ought to believe God revealing. In a like manner they ought to be instructed concerning the end for which they have been created by God, and that they may be more easily stirred up to love of God, God must be proposed to them under that respect under which He provokes more efficaciously to love (n. 55).
- Nevertheless Lugo judges that even those faithful to whom it is only said that the Son of God was incarnate, that Christ died for us, without its being added that God revealed these things, "regularly elicit acts of divine faith," because they conceive this doctrine confusedly as something superhuman and divine.1
1 Cf. Lugo, De virtute fidei divinae, disp. 1, n. 126.
61. Moral value of the theological virtues. 1. The theological virtues, as acts, are of the highest dignity and excellence; for since their immediate object is God Himself, man through the theological virtues is intimately joined by intellect and will with God and His perfections.
If they are compared with one another by reason of origin, the first is faith: for unless knowledge of the highest good precedes, neither desire nor love of it is possible; the second, ordinarily, is hope: for he who knows that the highest goods in heaven have been proposed to him tends trustingly toward them, that he may be beatified from them; the third is charity, which embraces God with love of benevolence on account of His highest lovableness. By reason of dignity the first is charity: a. by its nature it is an intimate and most pure union with the highest good; b. it immediately disposes for receiving sanctifying grace and accompanies it by an inseparable bond; c. when charity is lost, faith and hope are unformed virtues, which must be informed by habitual charity that they may make man simply good and his virtues meritorious; besides this, it perfects faith and hope, because it confers singular dignity and splendor upon virtues which are done from charity; d. faith and hope are virtues of the state of the way; charity is the virtue of the fatherland; therefore in the state of the term faith passes into vision, hope into possession, and charity alone remains.1
If they are considered in themselves. Faith is the full service of intellect and will exhibited to God revealing: for the will, reverently obeying the Creator commanding faith, determines the intellect to embracing the truth, which in itself is indeed obscure, yet elevates man above that which can be known by natural light.2 Hope, insofar as it is desire, tears man away from earthly pleasures and directs him to the spiritual beatitude of the other life; insofar as it is trust, man through it rests, fully trusting in the goodness of God and His grace. Charity embraces the highest good in the most perfect way and intimately joins man with God; it constitutes Christian perfection, and since charity cannot be sluggish and idle, it moves and stirs man to exercising virtues diligently; but the fullness of the law is love.3
1 1 Cor. 13:8.
2 Cf. Vatican Council, constitution De fide, c. 3.
3 Rom. 13:10.