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Thoughtco. "Charity: The Greatest of The Theological Virtues." Learn Virtue-542117. by Thoughtco
Thoughtco. "Charity: The Greatest of The Theological Virtues." Learn Virtue-542117. by Thoughtco
Thoughtco. "Charity: The Greatest of The Theological Virtues." Learn Virtue-542117. by Thoughtco
By ThoughtCo
Updated March 14, 2018
Charity is the last and the greatest of the three theological virtues; the other two
are faith and hope. While it is often called love and confused in the popular
understanding with common definitions of the latter word, charity is more than a
subjective feeling or even an objective action of the will toward another person. Like the
other theological virtues, charity is supernatural in the sense that God is both its origin
and its object. As Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J., writes in his "Modern Catholic Dictionary",
charity is the "infused supernatural virtue by which a person loves God above all things
for his [that is, God's] own sake, and loves others for God's sake." Like all virtues,
charity is an act of the will, and the exercise of charity increases our love for God and
for our fellow man; but because charity is a gift from God, we cannot initially acquire this
virtue by our own actions.
Charity depends on faith, because without faith in God we obviously cannot love God,
nor can we love our fellow man for God's sake. Charity is, in that sense, the object of
faith, and the reason why Saint Paul, in 1 Corinthians 13:13, declares that "the greatest
of these [faith, hope, and charity] is charity."
Love of God
God, as the source of all life and all goodness, deserves our love, and that love is not
something that we can confine to attending Mass on Sundays. We exercise the
theological virtue of charity whenever we express our love for God, but that expression
does not have to take the form of a verbal declaration of love. Sacrifice for God's sake;
the curbing of our passions in order to draw closer to Him; the practice of the spiritual
works of mercy in order to bring other souls to God, and the corporal works of mercy to
show the proper love and respect for God's creatures -- these, along with prayer and
worship, fulfill our duty to "love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy
whole soul, and with thy whole mind" (Matthew 22:37). Charity fulfills this duty, but also
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transforms it; through this virtue, we desire to love God not simply because we must but
because we recognize that (in the words of the Act of Contrition) He is "all good and
deserving of all of my love." The exercise of the virtue of charity increases that desire
within our souls, drawing us further into the inner life of God, which is characterized by
the love of the Three Persons of the Holy Trinity.
Thus, Saint Paul rightly refers to charity as "the bond of perfection" (Colossians 3:14),
because the more perfect our charity, the closer our souls are to the inner life of God.
with the proper charity, caring for both body and soul.