CBCP

Catholic Bishops’ Conference

of the Philippines

Catechism
for
Filipino Catholics
New Edition with expanded
Subject Index and Primer

ECCCE
WORD & LIFE PUBLICATIONS
MANILA
PHILIPPINES

from the beginning of the Christianization

of the Philippines to the end of the 20th Century:

Four Centuries of Catechesis in our Country.

One uninterrupted effort to remain faithful to

God, to Man, to the Church.

One continuous endeavor to make the

Catholic Faith relevant to the culture
and the lives
of our Filipino People.
 Vatican City, 6 March 1997

Prot. N. 97000707

Your Excellency,

The Episcopal Conference of the Philippines, at the appropriate time, sent to this Dicastery the
Catechism for Filipino Catholics developed by the same Episcopal Conference, requesting the approval of
the Holy See.

The Congregation for the Clergy, after having examined the text and obtained on the first day of
March, 1997 the positive opinion (Prot. N. 64/94-03884) rendered by the Congregation for the Doctrine of
the Faith, does hereby grant the requested approbation, according to the requirements of canon 775 § 2.

This Dicastery wishes to congratulate the Bishops of the Philippines for providing an instrument
that is truly suitable for transmitting the faith among Catholic Filipinos and hopes that the Catechism will
have the widest possible circulation.

I take this opportunity to express to Your Excellency and to the entire Episcopal Conference my
sentiments of esteem and with every best wish, I remain,

Sincerely yours in Christ,

His Excellency
Most Reverend OSCAR V. CRUZ, D.D.
President of the CBCP
470 General Luna Street
Intramuros, Manila 1002
P.O. Box 3601 Manila, 1099
PHILIPPINES
 Part Two
Christ, Our Way

Christian Faith is centered on Jesus Christ who is himself

“the Way, the Truth, and the Life.”
( cf. Jn 14:6)

INTRODUCTION

Part II presents Catholic Moral Life, or Christ our Way, the Way that “leads to [eternal] life”
(Mt 7:13; Jn 17:3). For the Gospel of Christ is something not only to be believed, but to be lived. It’s a
“faith that expresses itself through love” (Gal 5:6).

By “following Christ” in our daily moral acts, through the power of the Holy Spirit given us in
Baptism and Confirmation, we grow gradually into authentic and mature disciples, “grasped by Christ
Jesus” (Phil 3:12). We thus become living members of his Body, the Church.

For us Filipino Catholics, then, moral life means living out the Faith. It is a “living out”
grounded in Christ’s Truth, received from the Church and professed in the Creed (Part I: Doctrine). It
is a “living out” made possible only by the grace of sharing in Christ’s Life, especially through prayer
and sacramental celebration, which unite us to the Risen Christ in His Church (Part III: Worship/
Sacraments).

The main purpose for introducing Catholic Morality here, immediately following the Creed’s
article on Jesus Christ, is to stress the fact that living morally for Catholics cannot be reduced to a
series do’s and don’ts. Rather, it centers on our daily following of Jesus Christ as his disciples. with
all the difficulties, challenges, and ambiguities of moral life today, “the following of Jesus Christ” may
be the best single expression for catching the core of “the good life.”

Chapter 13

Living as Disciples of Christ

“What I just did was to give you an example: as I have done, so
you must do.”
( Jn 13:15)

But only God, who created man to His own image and
ransomed him from sin, provides a fully adequate answer
to [man’s basic] questions. . . revealed in Christ His Son
who became man. Whoever follows after Christ, the
perfect man, becomes himself more of a man.
( GS 41)
 OPENING

674. For Christians, moral living is simply “following Christ.” Yet when “morality” is mentioned,
the first thing we often think about is laws, commandments, a series of don’ts, and dire punishments if
we fail. But Christian Faith is more than a set of truths to be believed; it is the way of Christ
which leads to life (cf. CCC 1696). It is the Gospel of Christ believed and lived which will decide our
destiny as Christians. Fullness of life here on earth means that, in all the innumerable actions, events
and problems of daily life, we walk with Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ, who is “the Way, the
Truth, and the Life” (Jn 14:6).

675. Christian moral life, then, is about the Gospel. It is about growing in love and holiness. It is
the process of becoming authentically human (cf. RH 14). The Christian moral person is one who
experiences the liberating and transforming presence of Christ, through the grace of his Spirit (cf. 2
Cor 3:17; Jn 8:32). From this experience, Christians commit themselves, in their moral attitudes,
decisions, and acts, to the ongoing process of liberating and transforming men and women into
disciples of Christ. For Christ is he “from whom we go forth, through whom we live, and toward
whom our journey leads us” (LG 3). Thus “the world may be filled with the spirit of Christ and may
more effectively attain its destiny in justice, in love and in peace” (LG 36). This is developed in the
PCP II in terms of “social transformation” ( cf. PCP II 256-74, 435-38).

676. But we soon find that this “following of Christ” is not easy __ life is full of challenges. “From
the very dawn of history human beings, enticed by the evil one, abused their freedom. They set
themselves against God and sought to find fulfillment apart from God. . . . Their senseless minds were
darkened and they served the creature rather than the Creator” (GS 13; cf. CCC 1707).

677. Left to ourselves, we have no power to fulfill Christ’s command: “Be perfect, just as your
heavenly Father is perfect” (Mt 5:48). Yet God strengthens us by letting us share the life of Christ
Jesus, through the Holy Spirit received in Baptism (cf. Rom 6:4). This Spirit, in uniting us to Christ,
our risen Savior, as members of his Body, the Church, liberates and empowers us with new life to
respond in our daily words and deeds to God’s love (cf. CCC 1742). Thus, as disciples of Christ,
mutually supporting one another through the grace of the Holy Spirit, we come to exercise
responsible freedom according to God’s loving design, as grasped by our gradually formed Christian
conscience.

678. This chapter proposes the constitutive elements of personal Christian moral living: the moral
agent, human persons; our basic dignity in freedom and in personal moral responsibility; governed
by our conscience, the inner guide for moral growth in virtue, through the example of Christ, the
grace of the Spirit, and the Father’s loving mercy (cf. CCC 1700-9).

CONTEXT

679. We, Catholic Filipinos, constituting more than 82% of our population, are rightly proud of
our Christian faith. We are especially fond of religious processions, novenas and numerous devotions
to Christ our Savior, to Mary and the other Saints. Our churches are crowded on Sundays and special
fiestas. Moreover, recent religious movements in our country such as the Cursillo, the Charismatic
renewal, the Focolare, and the like, have clearly shown a widespread yearning for closer union with
Christ. A great number of Filipinos are seeking ways to draw closer to Christ their Lord.

680. Yet this yearning for spiritual intimacy with Jesus often does not seem to touch the daily
words and actions of some devotees. Their piety frequently fails to produce acts of loving service,
forgiveness and sacrifice. How can many pious Church-members continue to act as abusive landlords,
usurers, oppressive employers, or unreliable employees? Why do many graduates of our best Catholic
schools turn out to be corrupt government officials, unfaithful husbands and wives, or cheating
businessmen? There seems to be a serious gap between external ritual expression of Christian
Faith, and authentic discipleship: following Christ in action.

681. Genuine Christian piety, of course, inspires true Christian witness and service. But in the
Philippines today, the challenge of authentic Christian witness demands two things: a) interiorly, that
Filipino Catholics break through external ritualism and social conformism to interiorize their
devotional prayer and sacramental worship deeply into their very selves (kalooban); b) exteriorly, to
commit themselves to Jesus Christ and to all he stands for, in daily practice of the faith according to
Catholic moral principles and the guidance of the teaching Church.

EXPOSITION

I. MORAL AGENT: THE HUMAN PERSON

682. Christian moral life is simply the call to become loving persons, in the fullness of life-
withothers-in-community before God, in imitation of Jesus Christ. The key to moral life, then, is the
human person, considered in the light of both reason and faith. All human rights, personal and social,
all moral duties and responsibilities, all virtues and moral character __ all depend directly on the
answers we give to the questions: who am I as a person in community? as a disciple of Jesus Christ, in
his Church? In the words of PCP II: “How to live as Filipino Christians in our situation of lights and
shadows”? ( PCP II 35)

683. This “sense of the dignity of the human person has been impressing itself more and more
deeply on the consciousness of contemporary man” (DH 1). “The inviolable dignity of every human
person. . . is the most precious possession of an individual, [whose] value comes not from what a
person ‘has’ as much as from what a person ‘is’ ” (CL 37). “Hence the pivotal point of our total
presentation will be the human person, whole and entire, body and soul, heart and conscience, mind
and will” (GS 3). But just who or what IS the human person according to reason and Christian Faith?
684. Persons in Christ. For Christians, the answer can only be grounded on Jesus Christ himself. “In
Christ and through Christ, we have acquired full awareness of our dignity, of the heights to which we
are raised, of the surpassing worth of our own humanity, and of the meaning of our existence” (RH
11). “For by his incarnation, the Son of God has united himself in some fashion with every person”
( GS 22).

685. Christ reveals how the essential dignity of all persons is grounded directly on their origin,
meaning and destiny. We believe all persons are created by God in His image and likeness (cf.
Gen 1:26) through our Lord Jesus Christ, “through whom everything was made and through
whom we live” (1 Cor 8:6). We believe all are redeemed by the blood of Christ (cf. Eph 1:7;
 Col 1:14), and are sanctified by the indwelling Holy Spirit (cf. Rom 8:14-16; 1 Cor 6:19). We
believe all persons are called to be children of God (cf. 1 Jn 3:1), destined for eternal life of
blessed communion with the Father, His Risen-Incarnate Son, and their Holy Spirit ( cf. CCC
1692).

686. But, despite their firm belief in these basic truths of the Christian Faith, many Catholics do not
realize how these truths touch their day-to-day moral attitudes, acts and choices. Only if these
credal truths are linked directly with the Filipinos’ experience of themselves as persons, will
they influence their moral living. Hence, we have to relate these Christian truths to the common
experience of “being a Filipino person.” Although we tend to take these characteristics of our
own person for granted, we nevertheless need to become more conscious of them to gain a true
knowledge of self and of our relationships to others and to God.

II. PERSONS IN EXPERIENCE

687. Persons are open and relational by nature. No man is an island; we grow into our full selves as
persons only in relating to others. We Filipinos are outstanding in this regard: it is said
“Filipinos are never alone.” We realize being a person means being by others (our conception,
birth, upbringing), being with others (our family, friends, neighbors, business associates), and
being for others (love, service). This is how we have been created by God __ as social beings.
This is how we have been redeemed by Christ __ as a people. This is how the Holy Spirit works
not only within but among us as the people of God, journeying toward our common destiny in
God.

688. Persons are conscious beings, aware of themselves in their outgoing acts. We possess this
selfawareness through our knowing and free willing (cf. CCC 1704-7; GS 14-17). Thus we
“image” in our small way the Creator’s infinite knowing and loving. This is the basis for our
moral life.

689. Persons are embodied spirits. This stresses the unity between our “body and soul.” Our bodies
are an essential part of our being human, not merely an “instrument” we “use” according to our
whims. Contrary to those who look down on the body, and make it the source of all evil,
Christian Faith regards the body as “good and honorable since God has created it and will raise
it up on the last day” (GS 14). Moreover, God the Son further dignified the body through his
Incarnation __ “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (Jn 1:14). And St. Paul
admonishes us: “You must know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is within __
the Spirit you have received from God. . . . So, glorify God in your body” (1 Cor 6:19-20). All
our relationships with others and with God are expressed through our bodies, which are the
“natural sacrament” of our spiritual depth.
690. Persons are historical realities. We are pilgrims on-the-way, who gradually, through time,
become our full selves. In exercising freedom, we decide for ourselves and form ourselves; in
this sense we are our own cause. We develop as persons in discernible stages, described in great
detail by modern psychology. Salvation history narrated in the Bible shows the dynamic
interplay between good and evil, success and failure, within the lives of the great biblical
figures. It recounts how God progressively brought His Chosen People to a clearer
understanding, and higher moral vision, of their own being and of God Himself.
691. Persons are unique, yet fundamentally equal. Despite physical differences as well as differing
intellectual and moral powers, we instinctively realize that as persons, in some basic way, we
are all equal. This is what our Faith explains: “All men are endowed with a rational soul and
are created in God’s image; they have the same nature and origin and, being redeemed by
Christ, they enjoy the same divine calling and destiny; there is here a basic equality between all
men” (GS 29). Yet, each of us is called to “image” God in a unique way __ no one can “take
our place,” as it were. To each of us Christ says: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have
called you by name: you are mine” (Is 43:1). Thus, within the fundamental equality of all
persons, we recognize the unique identity of each person.

692. This fundamental equality of all individual persons also grounds the participation and
solidarity of all peoples. “Since God the Father is the origin and purpose of all people, we are
all called to be brothers. Therefore, if we have been summoned by the same destiny, which is
both human and divine, we can and should work together to build up the world in genuine
peace” ( GS 92).

III. HUMAN FREEDOM

693. Throughout the world today there is an unprecedented drive for freedom, for breaking out of all
the old structures of political oppression, racial prejudice, economic injustice, and constricting
cultural mores. “The demand is increasingly made that men should act on their own judgment,
enjoying and making use of a responsible freedom, not driven by coercion but motivated by a
sense of duty” (DH 1). Since “the Gospel of Jesus Christ is a message of freedom and a force
for liberation” (ITL), we recognize here “an authentic sign of God’s presence and purpose . . .
for authentic freedom is an exceptional sign of the divine image within man” (GS 11, 17).

694. But it is so easy to confuse human freedom with simply “doing what I want.” Authentic
freedom is not “the right to say and do anything,” but to “do the good” (cf. CCC 1740). It is not
my own individual private possession, but a shared freedom with others in community. It is not
found in prejudice, deceit, or ignorance, but in truth. Christ’s words, “the truth will set you free”
(Jn 8:32), set truth as both the condition for authentic freedom and a warning against “every
kind of illusory freedom, every superficial unilateral freedom, every freedom that fails to enter
into the whole truth about man and the world” (RH 12). “Lovers of true freedom [are those]
who come to decisions on their own judgment and in the light of truth, and govern their
activities with a sense of responsibility, striving after what is true and right” (DH 8). The
pillars of this freedom are “the truth about Jesus the Savior, the truths about the Church, and
the truth about man and his dignity” ( ITL, XI, 5).

695. Freedom from Authentic human freedom has many aspects. Ordinarily we become sharply
aware of the value of our freedom only when we are forced to do something against our will.
Then we realize how much we long to be free from things imposed on us. But this “freedom
from” all restraints can often result in following selfish inclinations or blind prejudices rather
than seeking what is truly good. So St. Paul warns us:
It was for liberty that Christ freed us. So stand firm, and do not take on yourselves the yoke of slavery a
second time! My brothers, remember that you have been called to live in freedom—but not a freedom that
gives free rein to the flesh. Out of love, place yourselves at one another’s service. My point is that you
should live in accord with the Spirit and you will not yield to the cravings of the flesh (Gal 5:1,13,16).
And St. Peter adds: “Live as free men, but do not use your freedom as a cloak for vice. In a word, live
as servants of God” (1 Pt 2:16).

696. Authentic freedom, therefore, involves first of all freedom from everything that opposes our
true self-becoming with others in community. Such, for example, are interior obstacles like
ignorance, or our disordered passions, fears, personality defects, bad habits, prejudices or
psychological disturbances, and exterior forces, such as violent force or even the threat of
violence. These impediments to authentic freedom are commonly traced to three sources:
biological, which include inherited handicaps and defects as well as external substances like
drugs; psychological, or interior compulsions, including those originating in the unconscious;
and social pressures such as the many economic, political, and cultural obstacles which impede
the right to freedom (cf. ccc 1740) All these factors diminish our freedom and thus moral
imputability and our responsibility (cf. CCC 1735). But the greatest single obstacle to
authentic freedom is SIN. Liberation to true freedom means “first and foremost liberation from
the radical slavery of sin” (Instr. on Christian Freedom and Liberation 23).

697. Freedom for. But this freedom from is obviously directed towards a second freedom, the more
important “freedom for.” Beyond being liberated from all the obstacles to authentic freedom is
the freedom for growing as full persons and children of God, sharing in the life of Christ our
Liberator through his Spirit. It is the freedom found in authentic love. Of this many-sided
freedom we treat only of the personal dimension here; its social dimensions are explained in the
next chapter.
Two levels of the individual person’s “freedom for” stand out: 1) the freedom of choice by
which I direct my moral acts, and 2) the fundamental freedom of my very self. In the first level, we
have the freedom to choose to act in this or that way, to do good or evil. But by consistently choosing
to do the good, we gradually become free loving persons, the second level (cf. VS 65-68). This shows
how our personal “freedom for” is both a process and a task. Through our free choices, striving to
overcome the obstacles from within and without (task), we gradually grow (process) towards
authentic, mature fundamental (self) freedom.

698. Freedom of the Children of God. The goal of this process and task of personal freedom is “to
be set free from slavery to corruption and share in the glorious freedom of the children of God”
(Rom 8:21). Christ has freed us by giving to everyone the power to conquer sin and to recover
the meaning of our freedom and so attain the good and accomplish our calling as children of
God (cf. CCC 1741). Freedom “to attain the good” simply means to “act as Jesus did” __ to
“mirror in life the Fatherhood of
God as the Father’s adopted sons and daughters in Jesus, the Son, and through Jesus’ indwelling
Spirit. Promised by Christ, the Holy Spirit is within us creating space for our freedom and making us
alive. “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Cor 3:17; cf. CCC 1742).

699. Thus it is the power of Christ’s Spirit within us that liberates us from sin, the law and death (cf.
Rom, chap. 5), for a life of loving service of our fellowmen, wherein we find our true selves by
imitating Christ Jesus, our Lord. For “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience,
kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” ( Gal 5:22f ).

700. Exercise of Responsible Freedom. But how do we learn to exercise our freedom responsibly?
As Christians, we come to know what is moral good in the light of the Gospel and human
experience.
“For faith throws a new light on everything and manifests God’s design for our total vocation, and
thus directs the mind to solutions that are fully human” (GS 11). This “new light” regarding our moral
life works through our conscience, “the most secret core and sanctuary of a man, where he is alone
with God, whose voice echoes in his depths” (GS 16). Moral conscience is the expression of the
divine law, defining what is good and what is evil. It impels us to do the good and to avoid evil. It
judges our behavior, approving what is good, condemning what is evil” (cf. Rom 1:32; CCC 1778).
Thus, it is our conscience that indicates for us how, in our daily thoughts, words and deeds, we are to
love God and our neighbor.

IV. CONSCIENCE

701. For most Filipinos, conscience is understood as a kind of inner voice (tinig ng budhi) which
guides us in our moral life. This can mean our basic tendency toward the good, the “voice
always summoning us to love the good and avoid evil.” More concretely it refers to applying
objective moral norms to our particular acts: “the voice of conscience can, when necessary,
speak to our hearts more specifically: do this, shun that.” As such, conscience acts as “the
proximate norm of personal morality” (VS 60) for discerning good and evil (cf. CCC 1796).

On our part, we perceive and acknowledge the imperatives of the divine law through the mediation of
conscience. In all our activity we are bound to follow our conscience faithfully, in order to come to God,
for whom we were created (DH 3).

To obey conscience is “our very dignity; according to it we will be judged” ( GS 16; cf Rom 21:15f ).

702. A common misunderstanding arises here. How can I be free if I am “bound,” morally obliged,
to follow the moral law and dictates of conscience? This complaint is based directly on the
misconception of freedom as “doing what I want.” Our built-in tendency toward self-centered
use of freedom is so deep that only the liberating grace of God can help us work against this
abiding inner effect of original sin (cf. GS 17).

703. The truth is that freedom of conscience carries with it a corresponding duty to respect the
same freedom in others. Each person has the right, original in human nature, to be recognized
and respected as a free and responsible being (cf. CCC 1931; GS 27). Moral obligation, then, far
from destroying authentic freedom, pertains only to our free thoughts, words and deeds, and
guides them toward true, genuine freedom. Whenever we try to free ourselves from the moral
law and become independent of God, far from gaining genuine freedom, we destroy it.
Vatican II admirably captures this apparent paradox of freedom and moral obligation coexisting:
“God calls us to serve Him in Spirit and in truth. Hence we are bound in conscience but stand under
no compulsion . . . we are to be guided by our own judgment and to enjoy freedom” (DH 11).

704. Formation of Conscience. But our conscience is not something “automatic.” It is gradually
shaped through all the many and complex factors that enter into our growth to Christian
maturity. Family upbringing, basic education and catechesis in the Faith, our cultural attitudes
and values, the friends we grow with in school, and the larger social environment of the
community __ all influence the development of conscience. Crucial to correct understanding of
our conscience is its essential relational dimension. Our ongoing moral experiences, within
which our consciences gradually take shape, are never isolated, but rather always involve
countless interactions with parents, guardians, relatives, friends, neighbors, teachers, religious
and priests, within the social groupings of family, school, parish and community.
705. When the circumstances of life challenge us with difficult choices, we become more aware of
the need to form a right conscience. In complex modern conditions, with new sensitivities
(e.g., solidarity, social justice, peace), new demands and hopes (equal rights, liberation
movements, feminism), moral judgments are more difficult and less certain. In such cases,
where there are often legitimate differences among Catholics, we must be careful not to identify
our opinion with the authority of the Church (GS 43). Rather, our conscience therefore needs to
be both enlightened and informed ( cf. CCC 1783-85).

706. Levels of Conscience. We realize that “the education of conscience is a lifelong task. From the
earliest years, it awakens the child to the knowledge and practice of the interior law recognized
by conscience” (CCC 1784).

Due weight being given to the advances in psychological, pedagogical and intellectual sciences. Children
and young people should be helped to develop harmoniously their physical, moral and intellectual
qualities. They should be trained to acquire gradually a more perfect sense of responsibility. . . . Children
and young people have the right to be stimulated to make sound moral judgments based on a well-formed
conscience and to put them into practice with a sense of personal commitment (GE 1).

707. Forming a Christian Conscience. But to form the conscience of a disciple of Christ, the key is
obviously Christ and his Spirit, experienced within Christ’s community, the Church. The
formative process takes place in faith and through prayer, by attending to the Word of God and
the teachings of the Church, and by responsiveness to the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Critical
reflection on the events and experiences of our life helps us in forming moral judgements. It is
in living out the faith that we form our Christian consciences. Two types of formative factors,
are stressed: 1) “heart” factors such as reading and reflecting on Jesus’ teaching and actions,
and our affective prayer and sacramental life wherein we encounter the Risen Christ; and 2)
“mind” factors __ attending “to the sacred and certain doctrine of the Church, whose duty is to
authoritatively teach that Truth which is Christ himself, and also to declare and confirm those
principles of the moral order which have their origin in human nature itself” (DH 14).

708. Types of Conscience. St. Paul distinguishes good people from the bad, according to their faith
and good or bad consciences. He admonishes Timothy: “Hold fast to faith and a good
conscience. Some, by rejecting the guidance of conscience, have made shipwreck of their faith”
(1 Tim 1:19). He warns against “the hypocrisy of liars with branded consciences” (1 Tim 4:2),
and “those defiled unbelievers . . . [whose] minds and consciences are tainted” (Ti 1:15). This
manifests the critical importance of conscience for becoming an authentic person and disciple of
Jesus Christ.

709. But even within sincere believers, conscience at times can be erroneous __ we mistakenly judge
something that is really evil to be good, or something good to be evil. “Conscience frequently
errs from invincible ignorance without losing its dignity” (GS 16; cf. CCC 1791-93). Forming a
Christian conscience, therefore, includes correcting any errors in conscience by instruction in
the relevant moral values and precepts which provide a correct vision of Christ’s moral witness.
“The more a correct conscience prevails, the more do persons and groups turn aside from blind
choice and try to be guided by the objective standards of moral conduct” (GS 16).

710. At other times we experience feelings of guilt __ when we are bothered by having acted against
some norm or rule. These guilt feelings can be a result of an authentic Christian conscience __
when we have acted contrary to the Gospel. But the guilt feelings could also be the result
merely of shame over breaking some social or cultural “taboo.” Formation of an authentic
 Christian conscience here means clarifying the difference between true moral guilt (a true
“guilty conscience”) and psychological guilty feelings which do not necessarily involve any
moral fault. “The [genuine] sense of sin disappears when it becomes identified with morbid
feelings of guilt or with the simple breaking of rules or precepts of the law” ( RP 18).

711. Work of Conscience. Chapter 15 takes up moral norms which our consciences use in
discerning good from evil. Here we wish to treat only of what makes our acts good or evil.
What does conscience have to decide on?
Traditionally three dimensions of every moral act have been highlighted: 1) the act chosen, 2)
the intention, and 3) the circumstances (cf. CCC 1750-56). The three are dimensions of the one
moral act; hence they must always be considered together to make an adequate moral judgment. For
to focus only on the “act chosen” would forget the personal agent and the context. To stress only the
“intention” neglects the objective nature of the moral act: a good intended end does not justify using
means that are evil. Finally, considering only the circumstances would be to close one’s eyes to the
objective nature of the act chosen, and all moral norms.

INTEGRATION

712. The doctrines grounding the intrinsic dignity of every human person, and thus of the Christian’s
whole moral life, were sketched above (cf. # 684-91). We Filipinos naturally think of God as
Creator, and in some way as the final destiny of all. Yet for many of us, both truths seem very
“far away” from the hustle and bustle of everyday moral activity. A more direct and personal
experience and motivation is needed. For this, something like Paul’s personal experience of the
Risen Christ in his moral life is needed: “I speak the truth in Christ: I do not lie. My conscience
bears me witness in the Holy Spirit” (Rom 9:1). If the truths of the Creed are allowed to remain
abstract and impersonal, they will prove powerless to motivate the constant personal effort
needed to follow Christ faithfully as an authentic disciple — one who has gradually learned
how to “love in deed and in truth, and not merely talk about it” (1 Jn 3:18).

713. This essential need for motivation brings out the intrinsic place of prayer and sacramental
worship for Christian moral life. Knowing what is good and evil is not the same as doing good
and avoiding evil. Again Paul is our example: he clearly showed that the Law was incapable of
giving the power to be faithful to it. Only Christ through his Spirit can free us from sin and
death, for true life. Hence without a personal relationship to Christ our Lord — begun,
nourished, developed, and sustained through prayer and sacrament — we have no power to live
as “children of God.”

714. This chapter has presented the basic dimensions of the follower of Christ in the light of reason
and of Faith. To live as a disciple of Christ is to respond to God as:
a) a human person: a conscious, historical, unique, relational embodied spirit with innate dignity
__
created, redeemed, graced now for eternal life hereafter;
b) a free self, called from all enslavements to an authentic Christian vision and character,
responsible in pursuing true good, as discerned by
 c) a Christian conscience, formed by directing one’s freedom to the person and message of Jesus
Christ, the center of the Christian’s self-becoming and identity.

Chapter 14
The Challenge of
Following Christ

Jesus appeared in Galilee proclaiming the Good News of

God: “. . . The kingdom of God is at hand! Reform your
lives and believe in the Gospel!”
( Mk 1:15)

The joy and hope, the grief and anguish of the men of our
time, especially of those who are poor or afflicted in any
way, are [shared] by the followers of Christ. For theirs is a
community composed of men who, united in Christ and
guided by the Holy Spirit, press toward the Kingdom of
the Father and are bearers of a message of salvation
intended for all men.
( GS 1)

OPENING

729. The preceding chapter sketched the disciple of Christ as a person with innate dignity shown
in responsible use of freedom according to conscience. This chapter presents the social context of the
moral life of the Christian.
We live in a world changing at an ever faster pace, where traditional moral values and ways of
acting seem to disappear overnight. It is a world of sharp contrasts, where mass media flood mind and
heart with images of “success” in opulent luxury and power on one hand, and of “failure” in
unspeakable suffering, destitution and oppression on the other. These sudden upheavals put in question
not only our daily behavior, but more basically our whole Christian vision of life and fundamental
moral attitudes and values. For amidst all the incredible advances of today, we often find ourselves
strangely confused, paralyzed by uncertainty about the most basic things in Christian moral living.

730. In such a situation, the Church has the “duty of scrutinizing the signs of the times and of
interpreting them in the light of the Gospel” (GS 4). God’s Word brings the light of Christ to bear on
those “anxious questions about the current trends of the world” (GS 3) which so mark our times. To
bring the commandments fulfilled by Christ to bear on a concrete situation is an act of prophetic
interpretation. In so acting, the Church “is interested in one thing only __ to carry on the work of Christ
under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, for he came into the world to bear witness to the truth, to save
and not to judge, to serve and not to be served” (GS 3; cf. Jn 18:37; Mt 20:28). Thus this chapter
treats of what constitutes the social context of following Christ in today’s world, namely, Christian
Faith and Morality, developed through Christ’s image of the Kingdom of God, which calls us to
personal conversion from sin in following Christ, as members of his people, the Church.

CONTEXT

731. Dramatic changes in Philippine life have occurred in the past decades. Some of the traditional
Filipino ways of relating to one another have quietly faded away. New heightened expectations have
roused formerly dormant people to actively espouse various causes for: a) liberating the many
oppressed; b) defending the human rights of the exploited; c) improving working conditions, raising
salaries, and d) promoting better living conditions among the less fortunate. The Catholic Church in
the Philippines has consistently exercised a major influence on this new “social awareness” and
concern for justice and the poor. PCP II calls for renewal as a “Church of the Poor” (cf. PCP II 125-
36), courageously addressing the causes and conditions of poverty and social injustice (cf. PCP II
165, 247-49, 256-61, 290-329, etc.).

732. Yet Philippine society continues to present glaring contradictions which, far from “passing
away,” have so successfully defied all efforts thus far to remove them, that they have actually grown
in depth and intensity. Never has the gap between rich and poor Filipinos been so wide, so tangible
(conspicuous) and so shameless. Striking too, despite all the public outcry, the government stress on
value education, and the many religious groups calling for high moral integrity and reform, is the
alleged persistence of widespread political graft and corruption, and the continued ruthless
destructive exploitation of our natural resources. The enduring spectacle of such national social ills
has contributed to the apparently widespread confusion over the role of Christian Faith in moral
matters.

733. Most Filipinos naturally link their belief in God with their ideas of good and evil. They pray
for guidance and inspiration of the Holy Spirit when they have serious problems, or must make an
important decision. They make novenas to gain certain favors. This speaks much of the Filipino
Catholics’ conviction of being close to God in their personal lives. Unfortunately, in many cases,
these practices remain enclosed within their own private prayer life, with little relationship with
others. “The split between the faith which many profess and the practice of their daily lives is one of
the gravest errors of our time” ( GS 43).

EXPOSITION

I. FAITH AND MORALITY

734. We begin with the most general theme of all __ the influence of Christian Faith on morality.
Every human person, Christian or not, is called to live a moral life. Therefore, Christian faith and
moral life are not identical. But for Filipino Christians, their Faith makes a radical difference in their
moral lives in two basic ways:
1) by providing a distinctive Christian meaning to life; and
2) by strengthening moral motivation with uniquely Christian motives.

735. The Christian meaning for the individual person was detailed in the preceding chapter: how
Christ gives new practical meaning to the innate dignity of human persons, to what it means to
be authentically free, with a good and true conscience. For the broader vision of this personal
meaning within the real world context, with all its problems, evils, and suffering, Faith brings
further meaning. In the words of Vatican II:

736. In the Christian vision, the world is the whole human family, the theater of human history — its travails,
its triumphs and failures __ this world has been created and is sustained by the love of its Maker, [it] has
been freed from the slavery of sin by Christ, who was crucified and rose again in order to break the
stranglehold of personified Evil, so that it might be fashioned anew according to God’s design and
brought to its fulfillment ( GS 2).

737. The motivation with which Faith inspires the moral life of Filipino Christians flows from this
new meaning Christ gives, and from the Spirit of Truth who guides us to all truth (cf. Jn 16:13).
Motives are gradually formed by the many symbols, stories, personages, ritual ceremonies,
customs and prayers through which the Faith is handed on from generation to generation. Thus,
not only the mind but the imagination, affections, heart and will of the Filipino Christian are
deeply touched by Faith in Christ. PCP II emphasizes this motivation by beginning its vision of
a Church renewed with “The Way of Jesus,” and “The Call of Jesus Today” ( cf. PCP II 37-
85).

738. Christian Faith radically influences the moral life of the Filipino, then:
a) By giving reasons for acting in a Christian way. The Christ of the Gospels provides a new
perspective which helps us to interpret the relevant moral aspects of our daily life situations. He is the
“light” that illumines our consciences with the truth, so we can “judge what is God’s will, what is
good, pleasing and perfect” (Rom 12:2). “God’s Word is living and effective, sharper than any
twoedged sword. . . it judges the reflections and thoughts of the heart” ( Heb 4:12).
b)By developing the attitudes and dispositions of Christ. Christians grow up with the Gospel
stories of Christ’s care for the poor, his fidelity to his Father, his sacrificial love. We honor Mary and
the Saints for their heroic virtues in following Christ through the power given them by the Holy Spirit.
Thus Christ-like attitudes are built up which “test and interpret all things in a truly Christian spirit”
( GS 62).
c) By inspiring “Christ-like” affections. The Christ of the Gospel naturally attracts us. As
Filipinos, our natural affective nature is formed under the sacramental influence of our Baptism,
Confirmation, Confession, and weekly Eucharist celebrations. Our parish liturgy is a “school” which
helps form our affections on the model of Christ’s own affectivity. But most of all, it is through the
grace and power of the Holy Spirit whom our heavenly Father sends us, that our affections are ever
more closely conformed to the image of His Son (cf. Rom 8:29).
In summary, faith gives rise to and calls for a consistent life commitment. Through moral life,
especially our works of charity, our faith becomes a confession, a witness before God and our
neighbors of our gift of self, like that of Jesus, the Source, Model and Means of our moral life (cf. VS
89).
A. The Kingdom of God

739. Having sketched the general relationship between Christian Faith and Morality, we now focus
on the essentials of Christian moral living. They are neatly summarized in the “Kingdom of
God,” the central image of Christ’s teaching in the Gospels. Jesus opened his public ministry by
proclaiming: “The Reign of God is at hand! Reform your lives and believe in the Gospel!” (Mk
1:15). In this basic proclamation, there is, first, the condition for entry into the Kingdom:
repentance. As sinners, our first step must always be reform of life. Second is the nature of
membership in the Kingdom: discipleship, or the following of Christ. Third is the life
characteristic of the Kingdom: love. Fourth, the Kingdom’s norm, is the New Law of the Spirit.
Lastly, the charter of the Kingdom is set forth in the Beatitudes.

740. Repentance. In our praying for the coming of the Kingdom in the Lord’s Prayer, we ask
“forgive us the wrong we have done . . . deliver us from the Evil One” (cf. Mt 6:9-13). John the Baptist
prepared for the kingdom by “proclaiming a baptism of repentance which led to the forgiveness of
sins” (Lk 3:3). The repentance needed for the Kingdom demands a total personal conversion, a change
of life-style and of priorities. “I assure you, unless you change and become like little children, you will
not enter the Kingdom of God” (Mt 18:3). As Nico-demus learned, this is impossible “without being
born of water and Spirit” (Jn 3:5). Thus we who are “baptized into Christ Jesus are baptized into his
death . . . so that we might be slaves to sin no longer . . . but dead to sin, alive for God in Christ Jesus”
(Rom 6:3, 6, 11).
Conversion is the first and perduring condition for Christian moral living. However, as PCP II
makes plain, it cannot be merely a private, individualistic turning to God, but must entail commitment
to “social transformation” ( cf. PCP II 271-76).

741. Discipleship. The preceding chapter dealt with the personal factors in following Christ: the
human person, responsible freedom, conscience. But what does this “following Christ” entail?
PCP II stressed the theme of “discipleship”: responding to the Call of Christ, in his Community,
the Church (cf. PCP II 64-153). Perhaps the sharpest Scriptural description is contained in
Christ’s “Gospel Paradox,” found in all four Gospels: “Whoever wishes to save his life will lose
it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and for the sake of the Gospel will save it” (Mk 8:35).
At the Last Supper Christ told his disciples: “Let the greater among you be as the younger, the
leader as the servant. I am among you as the one who serves” (Lk 22:26f). Christ commissioned
his disciples to carry on his work (cf. Mt 28:19f), allowing no interference: “Let the dead bury
their dead. But you, go and proclaim the Kingdom of God. . . Whoever puts his hand to the
plow but keeps looking back is unfit for the Kingdom of God” (Lk 9:60-62). Personal
commitment to being Christ’s disciple is the key to all Christian morality.

742. Love. The life that is love in the Kingdom of God is first of all “not that we have loved God, but
that He has loved us and sent His Son as an offering for our sins” (1 Jn 4:10). The basis for
moral living, then, is not our good intentions or efforts, but rather the incredible fact of God’s
love for us. Now, since “God has loved us so, we must have the same love for one another” (1
Jn 4:11), a love that is “forgiving” (cf. Eph 4:32), universal, “for all” (cf. 1 Thes 3:12), and
necessary, for without love we are merely “a noisy gong, a clanging cymbal” (cf. 1 Cor 13:1).
Two direct effects of this love are fellowship (koinonia) and service (diakonia). Fulfilling the
commandment “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Rom 13:9) creates community fellowship, the
“fellowship of the Holy Spirit” (2 Cor 13:13). So too we bear one another’s burdens and serve “in all
humility” (Acts 20:19), “in the newness of the Spirit” ( Rom 7:6).

743. New Law. Before the New Law of the Kingdom, the Christian cannot have a legalistic attitude,
but must have a filial one. He acts neither out of fear, like a slave, nor out of calculation, like a
businessman; but out of love like a child. He knows he must do everything possible to respond
to the love of the one who “loved us first” (1 Jn 4:19). The rule of the Kingdom interiorized the
old prescriptions, forbidding not just killing, but even anger; not only adultery, but even lustful
looks; not just false oaths, but even swear words (cf. Mt 5:22, 28, 34). It is not external show
but the “quality of the heart” that matters. “What emerges from within a man, that and nothing
else, is what defiles” (Mk 7:20). The “weightier matters of the law __ justice and mercy and
fidelity” (Mt 23:23) are what count for Christian moral living. The norm is: “seek first the
Kingdom of God and his righteousness and all [other] things will be given besides” ( Mt 6:33).
744. The Beatitudes. At the start of the Sermon on the Mount, Christ laid down the charter or
“marks” of the Kingdom — a new, mysterious life-giving vision (cf. PCP II 272, 276). The
beatitudes are not a series of commands: be merciful! act as peacemakers! Rather they picture
for us the face of Christ in sketching the vocation of every disciple of Christ, drawn to share in
his Passion and Resurrection. They spotlight the essential qualities, actions, and attitudes of
Christian living; they offer the paradoxical promises which sustain hope in our tribulations; they
announce the blessings and reward already obscurely experienced by the faithful and manifested
in the life of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the saints ( cf. CCC 1717).

745. The blessings of the Kingdom are promised to the poor and the powerless; to the gentle and the
afflicted; to those who seek eagerly for a righteousness beyond external observance; to the
compassionate and the pure-hearted; to those who turn from violence and seek reconciliation.
To these Jesus promises a unique type of happiness: to inherit God’s Kingdom, to possess the
earth, to be a child of God, to receive mercy, to see God. This sharp contrast with the secular
values of the world will be taken up in the next chapter.

B. Response to the Kingdom

746. Christian moral life has often been presented in terms of a Call-Response pattern. The
Kingdom of God just described has provided a particularly good picture of God’s call. In similar
fashion, the response to the Kingdom can be sketched as three dimensional: respect for the worth of
others; solidarity with all; and fidelity to God and to one another.

747. First, respect for one another (cf. CCC 1929-33). As members of God’s Kingdom our
dignity and intrinsic worth comes from God. Therefore Paul exhorts us: “Love one another with the
affection of brothers . . . Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. Have the same
regard for all; do not be haughty but associate with the lowly” (Rom 12:10-16). “Do nothing out of
selfishness or out of vainglory; rather, humbly regard others as more important than yourselves, each
of you looking to others’ interests rather than his own” ( Phil 2:3-4).

748. Second, solidarity, “the firm and persevering determination to commit oneself to the good of
all and of each individual because we are all really responsible for all” (SRS 38). This means that we
cannot even offer true worship to God unless we “go first to be reconciled with your brother” (cf. Mt
5:24). This solidarity “helps us to see the ‘other’ __ whether a person, people or nation __ not just as
some kind of instrument, . . . but as our ‘neighbor,’ a ‘helper’ to be made a sharer on a par with
ourselves in the banquet of life to which all are equally invited by God” (cf. SRS 39; CCC 1939-42).

749. Third, fidelity to God and to one another. It is to the faithful disciple that the joy of the
Kingdom is granted: “Well done my good and faithful servant . . . come share your Master’s joy” (Mt
25:21). But this fidelity demands watchfulness and prayer:

Stay sober and alert. Your opponent the devil is prowling like a roaring lion looking for someone to
devour. Resist him, solid in your faith, realizing that the brotherhood of believers is undergoing the same
sufferings throughout the world” (1 Pt 5:8-9).

750. The life-or-death importance of this fidelity or trustworthiness is portrayed in the biblical
stories of the two gardens. In the Garden of Eden, the serpent sows the seed of distrust, and Adam and
Eve prove unfaithful to God and to each other (cf. Gn 3). In the other garden, Gethsemane, betrayed
by
Judas, Christ remains faithful to his Father and to his mission of saving all by the blood of his Cross
(cf. Mk 14:3242; Col 1:20). However, our human experience of fidelity is not a once-and-for-all
reality, but a continuing challenge with consequences. The betrayals of Judas and Peter clearly
illustrate this dimension: Judas’ infidelity led him to suicide (cf. Mt 27:5), while Peter’s opened him to
repentance, forgiveness and renewed commitment ( cf. Jn 21:15-19).

751. Filipinos schooled in the traditional catechesis have been taught to view this fidelity to God
and neighbor in terms of VIRTUES. Today great stress is placed on VALUE FORMATION. Both
come to much the same thing, if our moral values are recognized as “fruits” of the Spirit: love, joy,
peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (cf. Gal 5:22f).
Moreover the basic human values of prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance (the “cardinal
virtues”) are strengthened by the grace and Gifts of the Holy Spirit: wisdom, understanding, counsel,
strength, knowledge, piety and fear of the Lord (cf. Is 11:2), and grounded and purified by the
“theological virtues” of Faith, Hope and Charity ( cf. CCC 1804-32).

752. PCP II adds an important note in emphasizing the need to study “how the values that we have
from our Christian faith can strengthen the good in our cultural values or correct what is excessive in
them and supply for their deficiencies” (PCP II 22).

C. Parables of the Kingdom

753. We conclude this section on the Kingdom of God and Christian moral life with two of
Christ’s parables. In comparing the Kingdom to a treasure buried in a field and to a pearl of great
price (cf. Mt 13:44-46), Christ indicated something of the structure of the moral response called for in
the Kingdom. Both parables manifest the same threefold pattern: first, discovery; second, divesting
oneself of everything (selling); thirdly, action (buying). This sketches a moral response of:
a) An alert open-mindedness that discovers where the Spirit is at work building up God’s
Kingdom. [“The Kingdom of God is at hand!”]
b) A metanoia or conversion that transforms the whole person. [“Reform your lives!”]
c) Responsible attitudes and actions, cooperating with God’s grace for the common good of all.
[“Believe in the Gospel!”] ( Mk 1:15).
 II. THE CHURCH AND MORALITY

754. Church as Context. The response to the Kingdom is not made alone. The task of becoming
authentic disciples of Jesus Christ in word and deed can only be accomplished in community. The
Church, the Christian community, supports us with the ministry of God’s Word and of the Sacraments
(cf. CCC 2030). Christian moral teaching looks to God’s abiding word as its unfailing source and
guide. The Word of God, including Scripture and the living Tradition of the Church, is a fount of
constant inspiration and new life.

755. Moreover it is within the Church that we Filipino Catholics, baptized into the death of Christ
Jesus, to live a new life (cf. Rom 6:3-4), encounter the Risen Christ sacramentally __ forgiving us in
Penance, strengthening us in Confirmation and Anointing, sanctifying our life’s vocation in
Matrimony and Orders, and most of all, nourishing us with his own Body and Blood in the Eucharist.
Through these saving sacramental encounters, the Holy Spirit inspires and empowers us as Christ’s
followers, with infused virtues to strengthen us for the moral combat in the service of others.
756. Church as Communal Support. The Church provides the communal support absolutely
necessary to be faithful in following Christ in our moral living. The next chapter takes up the specific
role of the Church’s Magisterium, or teaching function, as norm for our consciences in moral
reasoning and the process of moral deciding (cf. CCC 2032-37). Here we summarize the broader
mission of the Church in regard to the moral lives of her members in terms of three functions: a) to
help form Christian moral character; b) to carry on and witness to Christian moral tradition; and c) to
serve as the community of Christian moral deliberation.

757. Active Agent in Forming Christian Character. One commendable feature of today’s moral
thinking is the shift in emphasis from individual acts and techniques of decision making to the
formation of moral consciousness or character. More important for moral living than explicit
instructions in the form of do’s and don’ts are the symbols, images, stories, and celebrations that, by
capturing our active imaginations, determine in great part how we think, evaluate, judge and decide
morally. Thus the Church helps form moral character with its epic Old Testament narratives of
Creation, the Fall, the Flood, the Sinai Covenant, Exodus, and the formation of the Kingdom of Israel
with their great heroes and figures __ Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham, Moses and David. The New
Testament follows with the “Good News” of Jesus the Christ, who redeems all by his Passion, Death
and Resurrection. Such stories are not only proclaimed by and in the Church, but also embodied in its
ritual ceremonies, and imitated in its history of saintly witnesses through the ages.
Thus does the Church help form moral character by exercising an indispensable influence on the
imaginations and moral sense of Filipino Catholics.

758. Bearer of Moral Tradition. A common complaint today among those plagued with difficult
moral decisions is the lack of “rootedness.” So many have lost the sense of who they are, their
identity, heritage and “roots.” For Filipinos, the Catholic Church can supply their solid point of
reference, where they feel at home in continuity with their family and community traditions. The
constancy of the Church’s moral tradition through changing times helps Filipino Catholics:
a) by grounding their own moral development with moral instructions, customs and ways of
acting;
b) by supplying much of the content of a Christian morality __ the Ten Commandments, Christ’s
Sermon on the Mount, the Precepts of the Church; and
c) by serving as the structure or framework for their moral accountability as disciples of Christ.
 Specifically, the Precepts of the Church include: 1) to assist at Mass on Sundays and Holy Days
of Obligation; 2) to fast and abstain on the days appointed; 3) to confess one’s sins at least once a year,
and receive Holy Communion during the Easter time; 4) to contribute to the support of the Church;
and 5) to observe Church laws concerning marriage.

759. Community of Moral Deliberation. The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines
(CBCP), and individual bishops throughout the land, have consistently brought before Filipino
Catholics the burning moral issues affecting everyone __ on violence, peace, family planning, procured
abortion and euthanasia, on voting in elections, on ecology, anti-government coups, and the like.
These directive/guidelines and the moral reasoning employed are often themselves the outcome of
prolonged serious reflection, careful research and discussion. In this, the Church is acting as a moral
community in which active and vigorous dialogue between Filipinos on serious moral matters can take
place on all levels, under the guidance of the Bishops. Typical are the moral catechetical programs for
school children, religious education for teenagers, cursillos, marriage encounter programs, and social
action seminars for adults __ just to name a few.

III. THE MYSTERY OF WICKEDNESS: SIN

760. But our common experience testifies to the fact that the full and perfect Reign of God has not
yet come. On the contrary, we are all too conscious of our shattered world in which so many moral
evils, both personal and social, afflict the human race. All too easily we can recognize St. Paul’s
descriptions of the “works” of the flesh: “lewd conduct, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery,
hostilities, bickering, jealousy, outbursts of rage, selfish rivalries, dissensions, factions, envy, drinking
bouts, orgies and the like” (Gal 5:19-21). “The mystery of evil is already at work” (2 Thes 2:7). So we
must face the reality of SIN which obstructs the coming of Christ’s Kingdom.

761. The Mystery of Sin. But beyond the stark factual reality of sin, we must recognize that sin is
not simply “doing something wrong,” or “making a mistake” which we can easily rectify at will. John
Paul II describes it as follows:

Clearly sin is a product of man’s freedom. But deep within its human reality there are factors at work
which place it beyond the merely human, in the border-area where human conscience, will, and sensitivity
are in contact with the dark forces which, according to St. Paul, are active in the world, almost to the point
of ruling it ( RP 14).

The mystery of sin “hates the light” (cf. Jn 3:19; 1 Jn 2: 9f), and we, sinners all, are often ashamed to
take it seriously. But we need to reflect deeply on sin: 1) to truly appreciate God’s everlasting merciful
love, and 2) to correct common distorted ideas of God, the Church, conscience, law and the Sacrament
of Reconciliation.

762. In summary fashion, with St. Augustine, we can define sin as “an utterance, a deed or a desire
contrary to the eternal law” (cf. CCC 1849). We can sketch the essence of sin in a few broad strokes
as:
• refusing to follow our own conscience’s call towards the good;
• rejecting God, our Creator and Lord, and our own true selves and others, by turning away
from God, our true end; and
 • breaking God’s loving Covenant with us, shown forth in Jesus Christ, dying and rising for
our sake.
What must be stressed these days is the inner link between rejecting God and rejecting
ourselves. In refusing God and wishing to make a god of ourselves, we deceive and destroy ourselves.
We become alienated from the truth of our being. Hence, to acknowledge oneself a sinner, is to know
oneself guilty — not only before conscience, but before God our Creator, Lawgiver, and Savior (cf.
CCC 1849-51).

763. The “Sense of Sin.” Our Christian faith alerts us to the basic fact that we are “not well,” that
all of us have an urgent need for a physician to “cure us.”

If we say, “We are free of the guilt of sin,” we deceive ourselves; the truth is not to be found in us. But if
we acknowledge our sins, he who is just can be trusted to forgive our sins and cleanse us from every
wrongdoing. If we say, “We have not sinned,” we make him a liar, and his word finds no place in us (1 Jn
1:8-10).

764. Moral life, then, requires that we recognize in ourselves the tendency to sin and acknowledge
ourselves as sinners when we have done evil. PCP II presents Jesus’ mission to “liberate from
sinfulness” (cf. PCP II 53-54), as well as his call to us for “overcoming the reality of personal sin and
sinful structures (cf. PCP II 81-86, 266-70). Today this sense of sin seems to have been radically
weakened by secularism: we are caught up in the flagrant consumerism that surrounds us. We are
unconsciously influenced by the modern behaviorist psychologies that identify sin with morbid guilt
feelings or with mere transgressions of legal norms (cf. RP 18). And through radio, TV and the
cinema, we continually face so many examples of bribery and corruption in business and government,
cheating in family life and lying in personal relationships, that we often end up rationalizing for our
own misdeeds: “Anyway, everybody does it,” or “I had to do it because. . . .”

765. Even within the thought and life of the Church, certain trends contribute to the decline of this
basic sense of sin. Exaggerated attitudes of the past are replaced by opposite exaggerations: from
seeing sin everywhere to not recognizing it anywhere; from stressing the fear of hell to preaching a
love of God that excludes any punishment due to sin; from severe correction of erroneous consciences
to a respect for individual conscience that excludes the duty of telling the truth. Some conclude: “the
sin of the century is the loss of the sense of sin” (RP 18). Despite the “natural piety” of the Filipino, an
authentic Christian “sense of sin” is gradually being eroded due mainly to religious ignorance and the
consequent secularistic set of attitudes and values. A true sense of sin is a grace as we perceive in the
saints, who (paradoxically) manifested, without exception, a far keener sense of sin than the “ordinary
sinner.”

A. Sin in Sacred Scripture

766. The Old Testament presents three basic notions for what we call sin.
a) “Missing the mark” focuses on the offense inflicted on another by failing to meet one’s
covenant obligations. Since the first law of the Covenant is worship of Yahweh, idolatry is its
clearest expression. “The worship of infamous idols is the reason and source and extremity of
all evil” (cf. Wis 14:27).
b) Depravity and perversity refer to the defect of character or disorder that weighs the sinner
down. “For my iniquities . . . are like a heavy burden, beyond my strength” (Ps 38:5).
 c) Rebellion and transgression picture sin as a conscious choice which destroys positive
relationships. “See what rebellious Israel has done! She has . . . played the harlot” ( Jer 3:6).

767. More importantly, the Old Testament manifests certain shifts of emphasis in its conception of
sin. A more primitive, less morally developed idea of sin pictures it as defilement or “stain,” the
sense of being unclean before the face of God, the All-Holy. “You shall warn the Israelites of
their uncleanness, lest by defiling my Dwelling, their uncleanness be the cause of their death”
(Lv 15:31). Strong in its sense of God’s holiness, this “stain” image manifests a rather primitive
ethical sense by: 1) missing the inner evil of sin in not seeing the difference between responsible
free acts and involuntary evils; 2) fixing on sexual taboos and ritual cleanliness, but ignoring
interpersonal and societal justice; and 3) being motivated by a self-centered fear that shuts out
authentic faith in the transforming merciful forgiveness of God.

768. A more ethical view of sin is presented in the Old Testament prophets and “covenant”
narratives. Sin is seen as a crime, an internal, willful violation of Yahweh’s covenant
relationship. Isaiah warns: “It is your sins that make Him [Yahweh] hide His face,” and lists
their sins: their works are evil, their lips speak falsehood, their hands are stained with innocent
blood, their feet run to evil, and their thoughts to destruction, plunder and ruin on their
highways. Crooked have they made their paths, and the way of peace they know not (cf. Is
59:2-8). Viewing sin as crime emphasizes its juridical aspect, with its concern for determining
the nature of the crime, the culpability of the sinner, and the appropriate punishment.

769. A third model of sin is personal rejection of a love relationship. It draws on the Bible’s
covenantal language of personal vocation, discipleship and conversion, to reduce the fire and
brimstone emphasis of the more juridical “crime” image. The evil of sin in this basically
personalist model is located not in the violation of an extrinsic law, but rather in the free,
responsible malice of the sinner and the harm inflicted on other persons. Sin is seen as truly
interpersonal: the personal malice of the sinner offending the persons of God and neighbor. By
sin, sinners alienate themselves from their neighbors, all creation, God, and from their own true
selves.

770. Today, perhaps more important than the different models of sin, is the loss of the sense of sin
and its link with conscience. John Paul II quotes Pius XII: “the sin of the century is the loss of
the sense of sin.” He explains how

this sense of sin is rooted in our moral conscience, and is, as it were, its thermometer. . . Nevertheless it
happens not infrequently in history, for more or less lengthy periods and under the influence of many
different factors, that the moral conscience of many people becomes seriously clouded. . . . It is inevitable
in this situation that there is an obscuring also of the sense of sin which is closely connected with moral
conscience, the search for truth, and the desire to make a responsible use of freedom. . . . [This] helps us
to understand the progressive weakening of the sense of sin, precisely because of the crisis of conscience
and the crisis of the sense of God (RP 18).

771. New Testament authors identified Christ as the suffering Servant who has come to “justify
many, bearing their guilt” (Is 53:11). Christ calls all to a radical conversion from the power
and deadly evil of sin, to the Kingdom of his Father. To all entrapped in the snares of sin, he
offers forgiveness: “Your sins are forgiven” (Lk 7:48). “Sin no more!” (Jn 5:14; 8:11) In St.
John we meet the contrast between many “sins” (plural) or conscious acts against the Kingdom,
and “sin” (singular) meaning the “world” as hostile to God and to God’s word (cf. Jn 1:29).
This contrast is repeated today in our Eucharistic celebrations in the Gloria and the Lamb of
 God prayers. Much like “world” in John’s Gospel is St. Paul’s notion of “flesh.” As contrasted
with “Spirit,” it stands for the power of sin that permeates the human condition and grounds all
individual sinful thoughts, words, and deeds ( cf. 1 Cor 5:5; Rom 7:5, 18).

B. Church Teaching on Sin

772. The Church’s doctrine of original sin was taken up in Part 1, Chap. 8, as were the seven “deadly
[capital] sins” of Christian tradition. Original sin also appears briefly below in Part III, Chapter
25 on
Baptism. The distinction between mortal and venial sin is treated in Chapter 27 on the Sacrament of
Reconciliation. But two more recent approaches to sin that add considerably to a fuller pastoral
understanding of sin must be briefly treated: the different dimensions of sin; and “social sin.”

773. Sin can have different dimensions. It can be described as a spiral, a sickness, addiction. 1) As a
spiral that enslaves us in a contagious, pathological habit of vice that acts like a virus, infecting
social attitudes and structures such as family, social groups and the like. 2) As sickness,
drawing on St. Luke’s trait of linking healing with forgiveness of sin (Lk 5:18-26). 3) As
addiction, a process over which we become powerless as it becomes progressively more
compulsive and obsessive. Sin as addiction leads to a pattern of ever deeper deception of self
and others, ending in the inevitable disintegration of all our major personal and social
relationships. Examples given of sin as addiction are consumerism and militarism.

774. Due consideration of these dimensions of sin helps to have:

• a more realistic appraisal of the sinner’s actual operative freedom;

• a positive orientation toward a process of healing and forgivness; and
• a stress on the over-riding importance of the social and structural dimensions of sin.
775. “Social sin,” stresses complicity in evil by showing how members of the same group are
mutually involved. It can refer to:

• sin’s power to affect others by reason of human solidarity;

• sins that directly attack human rights and basic freedoms, human dignity, justice, and the
common good;
• sins infecting relationships between various human communities such as class struggle,
or obstinate confrontations between blocs of nations; and
• situations of sin, or sinful structures that are the consequences of sinful choices and acts,
e.g., racial discrimination, and economic systems of exploitation (cf. RP 16).
Regarding the last meaning, PCP II urges Filipinos “to reject and move against sinful social structures,
and set up in their stead those that allow and promote the flowering of fuller life” (PCP II 288).

INTEGRATION
776. This chapter has focused on Faith and Morality, Christ’s central symbol of the Kingdom of
God, the Church’s role in Christians’ moral life, and the reality of Sin. These themes have
described the social context of “following Christ.” Doctrinally, they are based solidly on the
correct understanding of original sin and especially of grace. For the life of grace in the Holy
Spirit is constantly working to build up the kingdom of God. It is the Spirit within and among
Christ’s disciples that enlightens and strengthens their life of Faith in the Christian community
against the power and alienation of sin.

777. As regards the worship dimension of these moral themes, the Sacraments of Reconciliation and
of Anointing are directly concerned with healing and strengthening the disciples of Christ in
their spiritual combat against the malice and evil of sin. These two Sacraments, then, act as a
remedy for sin, particularly in its relational dimensions. Moreover, without an ever-deepening
prayer life which alone can inspire and animate a personal relationship to Jesus Christ our
Savior, this spiritual combat will never be sustained. And it is within the ecclesial context of the
Church, the Christian community, that this sacramentally nourished prayer life of the follower
of Christ can grow and develop by the grace of God.

778. This chapter has sketched in broad lines the key dimensions constituting the context of
following Christ. First, the Catholic Faith influences Filipinos’ moral living by offering the
distinctive perspective of the Gospel, while developing Christ-like attitudes and affections.
Second, within Christ’s great symbol of the Kingdom of God, with its call to repentance and
discipleship, Filipino Christians are called to exercise a new life of mutual respect, solidarity
and fidelity. Thirdly, in this the Church serves as their context and communal support in their
struggle against evil. Lastly, the “kingdom of sin” is described __ the mystery of evil,
experienced from within as stain, crime, and personal rejection __ a spiralling sickness and
addiction that so infects social relationships that society’s very structures are affected.

Chapter 15
The Christian Law of Life-
Giving Love

Jesus replied: “The first Commandment is this: You shall

love the Lord your God, with all your heart, with all your
soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The
second is this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
(Mk 12:29-31)

“I give you a new commandment: Love one another as I have

loved you.”
( Jn 13:34)

OPENING
790. Chapter 13 introduced Christian moral living by focusing on the moral agent: the Christian
disciple as person, endowed with the tremendous gift of freedom, operating according to conscience.
Chapter 14 took up the social context of following Christ: the role of Christian Faith and the Church
in moral living, sketched by Christ in his fundamental image of the Kingdom of God, and engaged in
the life-and-death combat with Sin. This chapter takes up the function of moral norms or laws in
Christian living. Christian morality is a response to the call of God in Christ Jesus. This response is
viewed:
a) as embracing a basic moral vision of both person (Chap. 13) and social context (Chap. 14);
b) codified in moral norms; and
c) implemented in moral acts which result from a personal decision-making process (this present
chapter) [ cf. NCDP 271].

791. The major problem with moral living is MOTIVATION. We often know what we should do,
but find ourselves oddly incapable of doing it. “The desire to do right is there, but not the power. What
happens is that I do not do the good I will to do, but the evil I do not intend” (Rom 7:18b-19). It is
very important, then, to understand properly how LOVE, which is the basic Christian motivation and
power, also constitutes its fundamental liberating moral norm. This entails reflecting on how moral
norms operate in the following of Christ, both personally in regard to our conscience, and communally
as members of society (Natural Law; culture) and of Christ’s Body, the Church (law in Scripture and
the Christian tradition). Beyond understanding the proper role of moral norms, there is the basic need
to develop the skill in making moral judgments and acting precisely as a true disciple of Christ in his
community.
CONTEXT

792. Our Filipino culture affords many traditional VALUES that are deeply consonant with the
Christian vision that grounds all its moral norms. For example, there is pagsasarili, the self-reliance
that is the first step toward moral responsibility; pakikisama, getting-along-with-others, or the
willingness to share with others; pagkakaisa, the unity of the community that supports all loving
service; and pakikipagkapwa-tao, the human solidarity with all, or “being a friend of all” that
supports Christian love of neighbor. Catholic Filipinos today are alert, perhaps as never before, to the
task of “building a truly Christian community, a genuine pagsasamahang Kristiyano with
pagdadamayan, bayanihan, pakikipagkapwa-tao, and pagkamakadiyos as building blocks” ( NCDP
28).

793. But regarding MORAL NORMS, the Filipino attitude seems ambiguous. On the one hand,
patient to a fault, the Filipino’s natural “personalism” tends to consider “impersonal” laws only in
terms of personal relations. In the absence of a traffic policeman, traffic laws are often ignored.
Overcharging in the family store is excused because money is needed for the children’s school tuition.
The kanya-kanya syndrome gravely weakens any personal commitment to law and the common good.
Obeying the law seems quite secondary in the hierarchy of Filipino cultural values.

794. On the other hand, external compliance with the law, especially with cultural mores, is
demanded to safeguard one’s amor propio and avoid hiya. The upbringing of children in the family is
frequently moralistic, tending to focus uniquely on the “letter of the law” and its external observance,
without due care for its inner spirit. This unfortunately carries over to much catechetical instruction on
Catholic moral living pictured as:
a) dominated by sin, explained solely in terms of breaking a law;
 b) motivated primarily by fear of punishment for sin; and thus
c) creating a legalistic and juridical mind-set characterized by minimalistc attitudes to morality
( How far can we go before committing mortal sin? ).

795. Recent years have shown remarkable progress in the maturing process in the Faith of many
Filipino Catholics. Primary moral motivation for many in the extraordinary events such as the EDSA
’86 Revolution, and in combatting the December ’89 coup attempt, went clearly beyond the level of
reward/punishment characteristic of “instinctive” conscience __ beyond even the strict moral level of
justice. As the letters of the CBCP on both occasions manifested, the crisis brought many to a level of
real self-sacrifice for the common good, inspired in many cases by explicit Christian love and piety.
Such “highpoints” reflect the Christian moral growth taking place everyday, among ordinary Filipinos
in the thousand and one moral challenges and tasks of ordinary life. The maturing process is
neverending.
EXPOSITION

796. Christ, Our Moral Norm. For Christians, the norm by which all their thoughts, words and
deeds are judged and evaluated morally is not some law, but the person of Jesus Christ. In the
Kingdom of God there is only one teacher: the Messiah (cf. Mt 23:10); all must listen to [his]
words and put them into practice (cf. Mt 7:24), take up his yoke and learn from him (cf. Mt
11:29). Salvation depends on one’s attitude to Jesus: “Whoever acknowledges me before men,
I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father. But whoever denies me before men, I will deny
before my Father in heaven” (Mt 10:32f). “For if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord,
and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Rom 10:9).

797. This is because Jesus reveals to us not only God as our Father, but who we truly are. Jesus
himself __ not only what he did and taught, but his whole life and person, climaxing in his
Paschal Mystery through which he saved us (cf. PCP II 55). Jesus embodies God’s loving call
to us, and the perfect human response of a child of God. Jesus himself IS the New Covenant
between God and all human persons, the Way and authentic norm for becoming our true
selves. Commenting on a Vatican II text, John Paul II describes this primacy of Christ as
follows:

798. In Christ and through Christ, God has revealed Himself fully to mankind and has definitively drawn close
to it; at the same time, in Christ and through Christ man has acquired full awareness of his dignity, of the
heights to which he is raised, of the surpassing worth of his own humanity, and of the meaning of his
existence” (RH 11).
“Christ, who died and was raised up for all, provides man __ each and every man __ with the light and the
strength to measure up to his supreme calling ( RH 14; cf. GS 10).

799. Today, educational psychologists stress the impact of “significant persons” on the moral growth
and development of children and youth. For the Filipino Christian, Jesus Christ is the “most
significant other.” We have already seen how Christ radically affects our moral vision of what
it means: 1) to be a person (Chapters 13, 9), and 2) to form an authentic Christian conscience
(Chapters 13, 27). We have also seen how Christ enters into our attitudes, affections, values and
intentions (Chapters 14, 8). Here we wish to focus on Christ as the basis for all moral norms or
laws and for the way we actually come to make our moral judgments and decisions.
 I. MORAL NORMS

800. Amidst today’s great stress on personal dignity, freedom, individual conscience, and moral
character, the notions of norm and “law” have become quite “unpopular.” Some consider moral
“law” as a carry-over from preVatican II moralistic times. St. Paul is quoted in support of this:
“If you are guided by the Spirit, you are not under the law” (Gal 5:18); “you are now under
grace, not under the law” (Rom 6:14). But Paul’s point is not to deny all value to law, but to
insist on Christ: “I have accounted all else rubbish so that Christ maybe my wealth and I may be
in him, not having any justice of my own based on observance of the law. The justice I posses is
that which comes through faith in Christ” (Phil 3:8-9). Paul recognizes that “the law is good,
provided one uses it in the way law is supposed to be used” (1 Tim 1:8; cf. Rom 7:12). Now just
how is the law supposed to be used? Some basic notions will help to clarify this important
dimension of Christian moral living.

801. What is a norm or law? We need some general idea of law that can give us some insight into
its meaning when applied to God’s law, the law of the Old and New Testaments and the natural
law. The standard definition is “an ordinance of reason, promulgated by competent authority for
the sake of the common good” (St. Thomas, ST, I-II, 90, 4). Each element has its importance: 1)
law is a reasonable decision, i.e., prudent and with purpose, not a capricious whim; 2)
promulgated: communicated with sufficient notice to its subjects while respecting their rights
and dignity; 3) by competent authority: i.e. by those who have legitimate power to do so; and
4) for the common good: for the social betterment of its subjects.

802. Two characteristics of law, especially moral law, help greatly in appreciating its place in
Christian moral living. First, law is based on vision, certain presuppositions. The Christian vision has
been described in detail in the two preceding chapters (Chapters 13-14), and is portrayed in Christ’s
sketch of the ideal member of the Kingdom in the Beatitudes presented below. Second, law arises
from and expresses basic values. This is clearly exemplified in the Ten Commandments: “Thou shalt
not kill” commands respect for human life; “Thou shalt not commit adultery,” respect for sexuality;
“Thou shalt not steal,” respect for a person’s possessions; “Thou shalt not bear false witness,” respect
for the truth.
Likewise, Christ’s teaching in his Sermon on the Mount manifests this: “Do not swear at all”
(Mt 5:34) commands respect for personal integrity; while “Offer no resistance to injury” (Mt 5:39)
fosters a self-respect based not on answering violence with violence, but on acting as children of the
Father. These two characteristics go far in modifying the legalistic and moralistic concept of moral
norms or laws.

803. Functions of Moral Law. But don’t laws contradict human freedom? Some compare our
freedom and law to a lake and its shore. Laws give shape to our freedom by imposing
boundaries similar to the way the shore shapes the lake within its boundaries. But moral norms
or laws do more than that. First, they provide criteria for judging who we are and how we
should act. By explicitating the moral memory and value-experience of the community, moral
norms afford us a broader basis for judging than our own limited personal moral experience.
Secondly, moral norms/laws help our moral development, especially in the formation of
conscience, by expressing typical patterns of moral behavior and human values. Thirdly, they
provide stability and consistency in our lives by acting as a constant and reliable point of
reference. Universal negative moral laws indictate the minimum below which moral acts cannot
sink. It would be humanly impossible to decide every moral issue “from zero,” i.e., with no
 precedent or guide. Lastly, positive norms/laws can also challenge us by stretching us in view
of an ideal, or correcting us by illuminating our faults.

804. But many Filipinos tend to confuse morality with legality: if something is legal, permissible
by law, they think it must be morally good. This misunderstanding ignores the difference
between positive civil law which judges crimes against the state, and authentic moral law which
is the objective norm for judging sin. Something is legal when it does not contradict any law of
the state, but it is morally good only if its nature, intention and circumstances are positively
good for the person as person-in-community, that is, according to moral norms. The functions
of moral norms can best be seen in Sacred Scripture.

II. LAW IN SCRIPTURE

805. The Old Testament. Through His revealing word, God gave to Israel, His chosen people, the
Law of the Covenant (cf. CCC 1961-64). This Law or Torah, called by various names such as
instruction, witness, precept, and word, went far beyond the limits of merely human law. It
governed the whole Covenant relationship. The priests promulgated the law to Israel (cf. Dt
33:10), instructing the people in the knowledge of Yahweh and His ways (cf. Jer 18:18; 5:4).
The prophets reproached the priests for failing in their duty to the Law (cf. Ez 22:26; Hos 4:6),
and warned: “Cursed be the one who does not observe the terms of this covenant” (Jer 11:3).
The Wisdom authors extolled the Law: “The book of the Most High’s covenant, the law which
Moses commanded us, . . . overflows . . . with wisdom” (Sir 24:22f), and the psalmist sang:

806. The law of the Lord is perfect, refreshing the soul.

The decree of the Lord is trustworthy, giving wisdom to the simple.
The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart.
The command of the Lord is clear, enlightening the eyes. . . The
ordinances of the Lord are true, and all of them just.
( Ps 19;8-10; cf. Ps 119 passim; 147:19f )

807. The Old Testament Law covered not only moral demands, and prescriptions for religious ritual,
but even legal stipulations for social behavior as well. Instructive for us are certain basic
characteristics.
a) The Law flowed directly from the Covenant relationship of Yahweh’s loving call creating His
Chosen people. This means the whole law was based on the vision and values of God’s
Covenant with His people.
b) Obedience, then, to God’s comprehensive Law was the hallmark for the believing Israelite. All
sin was viewed primarily as an offense against the Lord with whom the Israelites were
“bonded” in every aspect of their lives by the Covenant.
c) The law, then was God’s great gift, bringing great joy to His people: “In your decrees I rejoice
and in your statutes I take delight” (Ps 119).

808. But the history of Old Testament Law has also unfortunately manifested how all law is
dangerously open to the serious abuse of legalism. The Israelites “without guile” saw the actions
commanded by the law more as symbols of love of God, the Covenant Lord, than as means of
accomplishing specific tasks. Thus seemingly insignificant acts could have rich devotional potential.
But the temptation to mistake the precept for the value, the external compliance for “obedience of the
heart,” was ever present (cf. Is 29:13; Mt 13:15; Acts 28:26). Two specific abuses stand out.
a) By putting all the law’s ordinances __ moral, religious, civil and ritual __ on equal footing, an
impossible burden was placed on the people (cf. Lk 11:46), and the “weightier matter” were lost
(Mt 23:23).
b) By so extolling obedient observance of the law, it seemed that persons could save themselves
simply by perfectly keeping the law, without any need for God’s grace.

809. The New Testament. Even while they vigorously attacked these abuses, the Old Testament
prophets had prophesied the coming of a New Covenant. “I will make a new covenant with the house
of Israel . . . . I will place My law within them, and write it upon their hearts” (Jer 31:31, 33). “I will
put My spirit within you, and make you live by my statutes” (Ez 36:27). So Christ came not to
“abolish the law and the prophets, . . . but to fulfill them” (Mt 5:17). He did this, first, by inaugurating
the new law of the Kingdom. “The law and the prophets were in force until John. From his time on,
the Good News of God’s Kingdom has been proclaimed” (Lk 16:16). Secondly, Christ removed the
imperfections allowed because of their “stubborness of hearts” (cf. Mt 19:8) by proclaiming his new
commandment of love which transcends all human wisdom and all morality, and summons his
disciples to the sovereign demands of their calling. “Be perfect just as your heavenly Father is perfect”
( Mt 5:48; cf. CCC 1967-72).

810. This is possible only by the interior strength offered by the Spirit (cf. Jn 16:13; Acts 1:8). The
presence of the Holy Spirit gives an absolutely new meaning to moral life. Present in the hearts of
the baptized, the Spirit is himself in a way the New Law which is the law of LOVE. The Spirit
signifies this law because He is love. He realizes it because He is the gift of the love of the Father. He
calls to love because the whole life of the baptized should express this gift (cf. CCC 1966).

811. Thirdly, Christ perfected the dietary laws regulating eating and purity of food, so important in
Jewish daily life, by disclosing their “pedagogical” meaning, and the Sabbath Law by recalling that
the sabbath rest is not broken by the service of God or of one’s neighbor (cf. Mt 12:5; Lk 13:15-16;
14:2-4). Lastly, he set the precepts of the law in a hierarchical order in which everything is
subordinated to love of God and neighbor. His law of love which “sums up the law and the prophets”
(Mt 7:12) radically transformed the ancient ‘Golden Rule’ from a law of simple mutual give-and-take
to a law of positive love (cf. CCC 1789, 1970).

812. The Great Commandments. When asked “which commandment in the law is the greatest?”
Jesus replied: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all
your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your
neighbor as yourself. The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments” (Mt
22:37-40; cf. CCC 2055). In this reply Christ brought together two well known precepts of the Old
Testament (Dt 6:5 and Lv 19:18) in a novel fashion.
First, he brought out the inner bond between love of God and love of neighbor. This is stressed in
John’s first letter: “We can be sure we love God’s children when we love God and do what He has
commanded” (1 Jn 5:2).

813. Secondly, Christ exemplified the triple “heart, soul, and strength” of the “love-of-
Godinjunction” in his life and teaching. Old Testament interpreters had identified “heart” with our
inner and outer desires and longings; “soul” with obeying God at the risk even of one’s life; and
“strength” with all one’s resources of wealth, property and reputation. But these three dimensions
must be concretized. One necessary way is by making use of the rich Filipino cultural terms and
values so expressive of these dimensions: with “buong puso/loob/kalooban”; with “buong
kaluluwa,” and “buong lakas.”

814. Another way is to bring out their social and contextual effects, as Christ does in his teaching,
for example in his parable of the sower, depicting three groups who failed to respond to God’s word:
the “path” group had no real desire or understanding, so the devil easily steals away the word from
their hearts. The “rocky soil” group withers away under heat because it has no “soul” to risk life for
God. The “weeds and thorns” group allows other interests to divide its attention and choke out
undivided commitment of resources (strength) to God ( cf. Mt 13:4-9, 18-23).

815. But perhaps the best Scriptural concretization of loving God with all one’s heart, soul and
strength is not in Christ’s teaching, but in his very life. In his triple temptation in the desert, Christ
first refused to satisfy his own basic needs in view of an undivided heart for God’s word. Second, in
refusing divine intervention, he risked his life (soul) for God. Finally, ignoring all enticements of the
devil, Jesus committed all his strength to God alone (cf. Mt 4: 1-11).

816. These temptations were faced by Christ all through his life as is shown by the jeers at the
Cross that parallel the three temptations. 1) “If you are the Son of God, save yourself!” 2) “He relied
on God, let God rescue him now if He wants to. For he claimed ‘I am the Son of God.’ ” 3) “So he is
the King of Israel. Let us see him come down from the cross, and we will believe in him” (Mt 27:41).
The temptation “Come down from the cross” has echoed through the centuries. But so too has “Father,
. . . not my will, but yours be done” ( Lk 22:42).

817. Third, Christ gave a radically new interpretation to “neighbor.” It is now to be understood
universally, to cover everyone: those in need, as taught by the parable of the Good Samaritan (cf. Lk
10:30-37), and even our enemies (cf. Mt 5:44). Christ went further and made everyone “neighbor” by
identifying himself with them as Vatican II has pointed out, “Christ wished to identify himself with his
brethren as the object of this love when he said: ‘As often as you did it for one of my least brothers,
you did it for me’ ” ( Mt 25:40; cf. AA 8).

818. Fourth, Christ reduced the whole law and the prophets to this __ and only this __ double
commandment, because “the law of love is at the heart of each of the commandments. Love is the
source of their value and obligation” (cf. CCC 1971, 2055). “The commandments, ‘You shall not
commit adultery; you shall not kill; you shall not steal; you shall not covet,’ and whatever other
commandment there may be, are summed up in the saying: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’
Love is the fulfillment of the law” ( Rom 13:9-10).

819. PCP II focuses on “loving faith,” an active love like that of Christ, a participation in God’s
own love which comes to us through His Son” (PCP II 71). Thus, love is the summary of the whole
law because it is the reflection in human life of God’s very being. “Beloved, let us love one another
because love is of God; everyone who loves is begotten of God and has knowledge of God” (1 Jn 4:7-
8).

820. Now we are empowered to love both God and neighbor since God’s own love “has been
poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us” (Rom 5:5). In the strength
of this divine Spirit of love, Christ gave his own command: “This is my commandment: love one
another as I have loved you” (Jn 15:12). Christ thus overcame the greatest weakness of the Old Law,
namely, it showed people what sin was without empowering them to avoid it. But now St. Paul
declares, “The law of the spirit, the spirit of life in Christ Jesus, has freed you from the law of sin and
death. The law was powerless because of its weakening by the flesh. Then God sent His Son” ( Rom
8:2-3).

821. Christ’s Liberating Law. It is this new law of love through Christ’s Spirit that is liberating,
for to be conformed to the law of Christ, is to know freedom. Christ’s new law comes to us as a gift
that the Holy Spirit places in our hearts. It carries the imperatives of the law beyond the mere
external moral behavior and beyond even a sense of obligation. Christ’s law is a law of love, grace,
and liberty (cf. CCC 1972). It touches the spirit rather than the letter. It requires a change of heart from
which a change in behavior will follow. It names that self-giving openness to God and to others from
which all the commandments derive their redemptive vitality; which changes them from servile
constraints into a force which liberates our true humanity.

822. Beatitudes. Christ’s law, then, liberates from mere externalism, from being bound to the
letter of the law, endured as servile constraints, for a life graced by the Spirit’s gift of a change of
heart. By inspiring a new vitality in us, the Spirit enables us to experience our true humanity.
Positively, as inwardly transformed by grace, re-created in God’s im-age, we are enabled to gradually
establish our moral life on a different basis. The idea of simply avoiding sin, being legally “justified,”
is replaced by an ideal arising faith and love, the fruit of the indwelling Spirit. This “new basis” for
moral life is graphically portrayed in Christ’s poetic sketch of those “blessed.” The Beatitudes oppose
the wisdom of the world (cf. 1 Cor 1:20): materialism, the cult of wealth, the lust for power, ruthless
competition, the ethic of success. In God’s Kingdom, these values are reversed.

823. In the Beatitudes, Christ describes those who are truly “happy” in the Kingdom of God. Most
people, according to St. Thomas, relate happiness to: 1) sensible pleasures and satisfaction of desires,
or 2) success in undertakings and interpersonal relations, or finally 3) deep reflection and
contemplation. Christ claims that instead of sensible satisfaction and many possessions (1),
detachment (poverty of spirit), meekness and compassion bring us true happiness. Instead of
completely selfcentered activity (2), thirsting for justice for all and merciful forgiveness offer
authentic human interpersonal relationships. Instead of withdrawing from the problems and concerns
in the world to seek contemplation, those who are singleminded/clean of heart, and work for peace
among all will find God. Such a life will undoubtedly bring trials and persecutions because of our
sinful selves and the world; but it is the life of faith, hope and love of the disciples of Christ (cf.
CCC 1717).

III. LAW IN THE CHURCH

824. Christian moral tradition has developed another type of law called “Natural Law” because it
expresses the wisdom of God in His creation and because it belongs to the very nature of human
persons. It is not imposed on them from the outside like an arbitrary restriction, but as a call
coming from their deepest selves (cf. CCC 1954). Already within Sacred Scripture, moral
knowledge is related to human “nature,” in the Wisdom literature of the Old Testament. But it is
especially St. Paul who brings this out: “When Gentiles who do not have the [Jewish] law keep
it as by instinct, . . . they show that the demands of the law are written in their hearts. Their
conscience bears witness together with that law” (Rom 2:14f). In Catholic morality, natural law
means the sum of the rights and duties which follow directly from the nature of the human
person, endowed with reason and freedom, not to be confused with social norms and
conventions, nor with public opinion, nor with civil law (cf. CCC 1954-60).
825. Three basic convictions of the natural law approach are central to Catholic morality. First, the
basis for the “natural law” is the truth that God has created everything and is the root of all
things. The natural law written in the heart of man manifests the order willed by God in
creation. Human moral life is grounded in reality __ our moral responsibilities flow from the
very structure of who we are as persons in society through history. Therefore, secondly, natural
law morality is knowable by all persons, independent of their religious faith. Engraved in the
conscience of each, the natural law is accessible to all (cf. CCC 1954). Thirdly, there are
objective moral values and teaching that can be universalized, addressed to all people of good
will. “All are required to follow its precepts” (CCC 1956). Paul VI offers a concrete description
of the natural law in life:

826. In the design of God, all are called upon to develop and fulfill themselves, for every life is a vocation. At
birth, everyone is granted, in germ, a set of aptitudes and qualities to bring to fruition. Their coming to
maturity, which will be the result of education received from the environment and personal efforts, will
allow all to direct themselves toward the destiny intended for them by their Creator. Endowed with
intelligence and freedom, they are responsible for their fulfillment as for their salvation ( PP 15).

827. But to avoid abusive rationalistic and narrowly legalistic interpretations, the natural law must
be viewed in terms of certain fundamental aspects. First, as real: morality is based on reality,
not just on commands as the legal positivists hold. Moral life means doing the good, not just
blindly following law. Second, it is experiential because it directly concerns our relationships
with ourselves, with others, and with society. Third, it is historical since our human nature is
involved in the historical process of our self-becoming growth. Fourth, it deals with the specific
nature and consequences of our free acts, and therefore, fifth, is basically personal, since it is
grounded in the human person’s nature. These features indicate how the natural law approach
can be effective in today’s moral climate.

828. Christ and the Natural Law. But what has this “natural law” got to do with God’s Law as
manifested in “Christ, our Moral Norm”? (cf. # 796) Many seem to misunderstand and think of
the natural law in purely philosophical terms, as completely separated from God’s law. In
reality they are intimately connected, for in obeying the natural law, we obey the divine law
itself __ “eternal, objective and universal” (DH 3), of which it is the expression (cf. CCC 1955).

829. We see natural law and God’s law united in Christ. First in their very being: since God creates
all persons in and through Christ (cf. Jn 1:3; Col 1:16f), Jesus is the model for both our human
nature [natural law] and all our free moral acts. Second, existentially and operationally they are
one because Christ is both our final destiny built into our human nature, and the norm for our
free moral thoughts, words and deeds by which we journey toward this destiny. Third,
historically they are united in Christ because through the historical event of the Incarnation,
Passion, Death and Resurrection, Christ manifested and actualized all the above links. In Christ
God ratified the dignity of all human persons, our unity with Him, and our path to Him through
our human world and activities. Fidelity to the human in history is fidelity to Christ’s presence.
In the end, then, “the New Law or the Law of the Gospel is the perfection here on earth of the
divine law, natural and revealed” ( CCC 1965).

IV. PROCESS OF MORAL DECISION-MAKING

830. Elements. We have seen the person as moral agent (chap. 13), the social context of moral acts
(Chap. 14), and now their structure (moral norms). What remains to be studied is what goes on
 in the actual process of making moral judgments and decisions. Here we can only treat briefly
some of the more important aspects of this ordinary yet complicated process we all go through
every time we make a moral decision of any importance.

831. Agent in Deciding. Moral acts have traditionally been described in terms of the person’s
thinking and willing. Three aspects of this thinking and willing are currently emphasized as
particularly important in making moral decisions. First, evaluative knowledge. The knowing
that influences making moral judgments is not only “head knowledge,” speculative knowledge
of quantitative facts or information, easily detached from the knower and specific occasion, and
thus ready for passing on, but also what moves us to decision. It is “knowledge of the heart,”
knowledge involving quality and values, not easily detached from the knower and the concrete
situation, and therefore more difficult to communicate. Evaluative knowledge is personal
knowledge. It is how we Filipinos know one another, especially within our family and circle of
friends.

832. Second, imagination. The power of the Christian story, images, and devotions has already been
mentioned. What is pertinent here is the influence of imagination on our moral norms: their
effectivity in our lives and their applicability. Moral norms taught us by our elders will hardly be
effective unless our own imagination draws together the universal, abstract terms of the norms
with our concrete personal experience. Finally, imagination is most needed in applying
universal moral norms to specific actual cases.

833. Third, affectivity. Strong human passions have always been recognized as limiting the moral
agent’s actual freedom. Today, however, affections are seen more broadly as influencing all our
moral judgments. Rather than an obstacle to freedom, our human affections often open us up to
deeper knowledge and understanding in our interpersonal relationships. They help us see more
truly, compassionate with others. One dimension of Christian moral education, then, is to form
true Christian affectivity __ authentic Christian ways of affectively responding to situations and
others.

834. Virtues and Character. Besides these three aspects of our acts of knowing and willing, there
are the more permanent, underlying factors of virtue and character which influence our personal
moral life. Virtues are taken up at length in Chapter 17 on Love of Neighbor. Here we only
wish to stress the current emphasis on the moral person’s character and habitual ways of acting
(virtues), rather than being overly preoccupied with detailed scrutiny of individual acts. The
interplay of our fundamental commitment and stance __ who I am __ with my freedom of choice __
what I do __ is another way of expressing this influence of virtue and character on my decision-
making process.

835. Process of Coming to a Moral Judgment. The process of deciding can be outlined in three
steps: moral discernment, moral demand, judgment or decision. First, the discerning stage
includes many elements, such as summarized in the common pedagogical “STOP” formula
(Search, Think, [consult] Others, Pray). All these contribute to the formation of a basic relevant
Vision, that will ground the decision to be made.
836. The second step of demand brings in the role of the pertinent moral norm, which our
consciences use to formulate their dictates on what we must do. Our consciences always work
on accepted moral norms. They never act as a law unto themselves. Likewise, moral norms and
commandments touch us only through our consciences. Strangely enough, many do not seem to
realize this dynamic interaction of conscience and law. By erroneously claiming freedom from
 all law by reason of their conscience, they ignore the basic relational nature of their authentic
freedom and of themselves as persons.

837. The third step, the judgment or decision stage, simply refers to the judgment of conscience we
make on the morality of any proposed action, and our consequent decision to follow this dictate
of our conscience or not.

838. Conscience and the Magisterium. As Catholics, we Filipinos decide serious moral questions
with the special help of the teaching office of the Church, the Magisterium. This is to be
expected, for in times of crisis or serious decisions, Filipinos naturally consult others for help
and guidance. It is only natural, then, that Catholics look to the moral leadership of the teaching
Church, with its long tradition and world-wide experience. But the real basis, the supernatural
reason is “the Holy Spirit’s unfailing guidance of the Pope and the college of Bishops when
they fulfill their role as authentic teachers of faith and morals” (NCDP 276). It is the distinctive
mission of the Church’s magisterium to proclaim and interpret the moral law before men in the
light of the Gospel (cf. DH 14; CCC 2036). “The faithful therefore have the duty of observing
the constitutions and decrees conveyed by the legitimate authority of the Church. Even if they
are disciplinary in matters, these determinations call for docility in charity” ( CCC 2037).

839. The interaction between Catholic Filipinos’ consciences and the teaching authority of the
Church holds no danger or restriction to “freedom of conscience.” On the contrary, obedience to
the Magisterium manifests clearly the relational and communitarian nature of conscience noted
above. The awareness of “being obliged” is experienced within one’s own call to personal
responsibility. “We discern how freedom and obedience mutually imply each other rather than
being incompatible” (NCDP 276).

840. This mutual relationship of obedience and freedom is the teaching of Vatican II. On obedience,
Catholics are reminded “in matters of faith and morals, the Bishops speak in the name of Christ,
and the faithful are to accept their teaching and adhere to it with a ready and respectful
allegiance of mind”
(LG 25). Regarding freedom of conscience, the laity are instructed that

it is their task to cultivate a properly informed conscience and to impress the divine law on the affairs of
the earthly city. . . . It is up to the laymen to shoulder their responsibilities under the guidance of Christian
wisdom and with eager attention to the teaching authority of the Church ( GS 43).

841. Christian moral maturity, then, has always included the need for reasonable interpretation of
law. Thus the traditional principle of epikeia states that a merely human law, whether civil or
ecclessiastical, (except invalidating and procedural laws), does not bind if right reason indicates
that the legislator did not wish it to bind in these particular circumstances. This happens, for
example, when the difficulty in obeying the law here and now is disproportionate to the end
which the law has in view.

842. Christian moral living offers to the world perhaps our most effective missionary witness as
Filipino Catholics. This means giving daily witness to the basic moral values which flow from our
nature as human persons and from our God-given relationship with creation. Through such witness we
not only respond to the call of holiness to all within the Church (cf. LG 39), but draw others to
personal belief in God and Jesus Christ ( cf. AA 6; CCC 2044-46).
 INTEGRATION

843. The place of moral norms in following Christ, explained at length in this chapter, rests
ultimately on the doctrinal truths of God’s creation and loving call of grace to eternal life.
Christian moral norms are grounded in the vision of fundamental values proposed by Christ in
his Sermon on the Mount. Such are the values of human life, sexuality, integrity, self-respect
and love (cf. Mt 5:2148). Guided by these moral norms, so grounded in the Christian vision, the
Christian’s conscience is enabled to discern and decide responsibly as a disciple of Christ.

844. Prayer and an active sacramental life are the necessary means not only for clarifying the
Christian vision, but especially for motivating responsible moral decisions and acts. In the last
analysis moral living is question of the “heart,” rather than of complex reasoning and
arguments. Following Christ in moral life means a heart “wedded to Christ” by his Holy Spirit,
nourished in the Eucharist celebration, and experienced in personal prayer.

Part Three

Christ,
Our Life
Our Christian living is centered on Jesus Christ who is himself
“the Way, the Truth, and the Life.”
( cf. Jn 14:6)
 INTRODUCTION

Part One, Doctrine, presents Christ as the Truth who reveals God the Father Creator, in His
own Redemptive mission. Part Two presents Moral Life as the following of Christ, the Way.

Here Part Three, Worship, presents Christ as our Life, life in the Holy Spirit. “It is the Spirit
that gives life” (Jn 6:63). In worship and prayer we experience Christ as our life, a life in the Holy
Spirit, within us and among us.

This Part Three picks up the Creed again, beginning with its final section on the Holy Spirit as
“Lord and Giver of Life.” It then takes up the Spirit’s three basic activities according to the Creed.
First in constituting the Church, the communion of saints. Second, in sanctifying us by the graced,
sacramental life of the Church. Third, in preparing us for our final destiny, resurrection to life
everlasting with the Triune God. “If the Spirit of Him [the Father] who raised Jesus from the dead
dwells in you, then He. . . will bring your mortal bodies to life also, through His Spirit dwelling in
you” (Rom 8:11).

This graced life in Christ has its source in his Paschal Mystery. When Jesus had been “lifted
up” on the Cross, from his pierced side “immediately blood and water flowed out ” (Jn 19:34). Water
is a symbol of the Spirit and of Baptism, source of Life in Christ. Blood symbolizes the Eucharist, the
redeeming sacrifice of Jesus, the new Paschal Lamb. Together, the two sacraments signify the Church
in its sacramental life and liturgical worship of the Holy Trinity.

Jesus, “lifted up” at his Resurrection clothes the disciples “with power from on high” (Lk
24:49). Their Mission is to “go into the whole world and proclaim the ‘Good News’ to all creation”
(Mk 16:15), and baptize those who believe “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Spirit (Mt 28:19).” Christ promises us: “I am with you always, until the end of the world” (Mt 28:20).
For “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, though he should die, will come to
life” ( Jn 11:25).

Chapter 22

The Holy Spirit: Giver

of Life

God has sent forth into our hearts the Spirit of His Son which
cries out: “Abba” (Father).
( Gal 4:6)

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of life,

who proceeds from the Father and the Son. With the
 Father and the Son He is worshipped and glorified. He has
spoken through the prophets.
( Nicene Creed )

OPENING

1265. In the Nicene Creed we proclaim our firm Catholic belief in the Holy Spirit, who together
with the Father and the Son is the living God, the Blessed Trinity. Now, just as the third part of the
Creed treats of the Holy Spirit and His activities, so too does this final, third part of the Catechism.
For, as the “Giver of Life,” the Holy Spirit gives life and empowers the Church, its sacramental life,
and resurrection to life everlasting. These three form the final part of both the Creed and this
Catechism.

1266. This chapter on the Holy Spirit also unites Part II on Moral life with this present Part III on
Worship. For it is only through “the love of God. . . poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit
who has been given us” (Rom 5:5) that we can both act morally and worship authentically as true
disciples of Christ. Moreover it is always within a Christian community, the local Church, that we
follow Christ in our moral lives and worship. For when the Holy Spirit “brings those who believe in
Christ to a new life. . . He gathers them into one People of God” ( AG 15).

CONTEXT
1267. We Filipino Catholics know we become Christians and enter the Church by being baptized
“in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” As children, we are taught to pray
with the Sign of the Cross: “In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” Thus,
we are early introduced to the Persons of the Blessed Trinity. Yet, for many of us the Holy Spirit
remains the “forgotten Person.”

1268. The Trinity is usually taught as a “mystery” which we cannot understand (cf. NCDP 200). It
therefore has little practical importance, even in the prayer life of the ordinary Filipino Catholic.
Unlike the great feasts of Christmas and Holy Week (Easter), both Pentecost and Trinity Sunday
arouse little spontaneous interest and devotion. The feasts of the Trinity and the Holy Spirit are
overshadowed by more “popular” celebrations such as town fiestas in honor of Patron Saints, Marian
devotions like Flores de Mayo, or the Feast of the Sacred Heart.

1269. Filipino culture is replete with all kinds of “spirits,” but there is much confusion about them
and how they act. On the one hand, Filipinos in general are curious about “faith healers” or mysterious
spiritual forces. The latest reported miraculous apparition of the Virgin or of Sto. Niño, always
arouses much excitement. But on the other hand, very little attention is paid to the “discernment of
spirits” (cf. 1 Cor 12:10), or to the advice in Scripture to “put the spirits to a test to see if they are
from God” (1 Jn 4:1).
1270. Yet in recent years many Filipinos have been rediscovering the Holy Spirit. The Charismatic
Movement, both within and outside the Catholic Church, with its “baptism in the Spirit,” its healings,
speaking in tongues, and the like, has attracted many who previously were only “lukewarm”
Christians. “Born Again” Christians actively attest to the powerful action of the Spirit in their lives.
This experience of the Spirit has strong roots in Filipino culture. There is a great felt-need for being
closely united with others, for “belonging” (“hindi tayo nag-iisa”). Filipinos are strongly attracted
and emotionally moved by common experiences expressed in song and dance. We are often described
as possessing a natural enthusiasm or optimism, a strength from within __ the Filipino’s “lakas-loob.”
Nevertheless, the questions of discernment and testing remain: Are all these happenings truly
the work of the Holy Spirit? How are we to tell?

EXPOSITION

1271. In response, this chapter first takes up the complex problem of how to discern the Spirit in
three steps:
i) where to look for the Spirit, and what the Spirit is doing;
ii) what are the major difficulties that arise;
iii) the general ways of overcoming them in order to discern the Spirit .
The second major part of the chapter develops five areas of the Spirit’s activity: creation ,
salvation history, Christ , the Church , and finally, each of us. This makes it possible in the brief third
and final section to treat the identity of the Spirit himself, especially as within the Blessed Trinity.

I. HOW TO DISCERN THE SPIRIT

First Step
1272. Where do we look for the Spirit? To learn about the Holy Spirit, we have to focus precisely
on how the Spirit is active in our total lives. This means attending to our own personal experiences on
the three basic levels. First, the “within” we experience in our own thoughts and feelings. Second, the
interpersonal experiences we have with family and friends. Third, our work and our social life in the
community and parish. It is in our actual, daily ongoing living in all these levels that we discover who
the Holy Spirit is and how He operates in our lives.

1273. What is the Spirit doing? At the deepest level of our experience is our very identity as
persons. How is God, and particularly the Holy Spirit, involved in our very own identity? The Creed
offers a clear response by grounding:

• who we are __ our basic identity __ in God our Father who created us and adopted us as His
children;
• what we do in the divine Son sent by the Father to become one of us (cf. Gal 4:4-5), to teach us
how to love and bring “forgiveness for our sins” ( cf. Col 1:14);
• what we can hope for in the Spirit of adoption who enables us to cry out ‘Abba Father’ He gives
witness with our spirit that we are children of God. . . heirs of God, heirs with Christ” ( Rom
8:15f ).
1274. But the Spirit’s action is not confined within the broad lines of the Creed’s Trinitarian
structure. We realize, of course, that it is the Holy Spirit that animates “what we do” in following
Christ the Son. He inspires our living according to “who we are” as sons/daughters of our Father.
Basically, the Spirit unites us with the Risen Christ and with one another in Christ’s Church. The
Spirit is doing this now, and by this action is moving us daily toward the future which God promised
us __ life everlasting.
Christ is now at work in the hearts of men by the power of his Spirit: not only does he arouse in
them a desire for the world to come, but he animates, purifies and strengthens the generous aspirations
of mankind to make life more humane and render the whole earth submissive to this goal ( cf. GS 38).

1275. “What the Spirit is doing” alerts us to a twofold truth. One, that in some way the Spirit is like
the air we breathe, the sea in which we sail or swim, the atmosphere in which “we live and move and
have our being” (Acts 17:28). Two, we discover He is nevertheless a divine Person, the personal love
of the Father and the Risen Christ present within and among us ( cf. CCC 685).

Second Step

1276. Difficulties in recognizing the Spirit. But it is not always easy to recognize the Holy Spirit.
This is due, first, to the Spirit Himself because, as Spirit, He has no shape or form. Consequently, in
contrast to our many personal images of the Father and Christ our Lord, we are forced to represent the
Spirit through impersonal symbols such as water, fire, cloud, wind and breath, or the image of a dove,
white and innocent and airy ( cf. CCC 694-701).
Moreover, the Spirit always acts in a completely self-less manner, leading us not to Himself but
to Christ and the Father (cf. CCC 687). He “does not speak on his own,” but “only what He hears”
from Christ, the Word (cf. Jn 16:13). Thus, instead of praying directly to the Spirit we more often pray
in the Spirit through the Son to the Father.

1277. A second source of difficulty in recognizing the Spirit comes from our own limitations. First,
in thinking about the Spirit. Unlike Christ and the Father, the Spirit is not something objective, “in
front of us” as it were, but rather within our subjective experience. We do not so much think about the
Spirit with our “head,” making Him the object of our thought. Rather, it is more like becoming
conscious of the Holy Spirit’s presence in the deepest level of our hearts, our loob. This is where we
feel He is at work, making us aware of the Risen Christ and of God our Father alive and present to us.
Christ promised his disciples at the Last Supper the Spirit of truth whom “you can recognize because
He remains with you and will be within you” (Jn 14:17).

1278. A second “limitation” which impedes recognizing the Spirit is our self-centered tendency to
seek extraordinary spiritual gifts. We Filipinos seem especially attracted to ecstasies, miracles,
visions, and prophecies. This fascination can lead to many distorted notions of the Spirit. It also
obscures the more important “ordinary gifts” of the Spirit, especially the highest gift, divine Love (cf.
Gal 5:22; 1 Cor 13).
The practical awareness of this self-seeking tendency may be the reason behind a curious fact.
We are taught to pray “Our Father,” and we constantly refer to Christ as “Our Lord.” But we do not
presume to call upon the Holy Spirit as “Our Spirit.”

Third Step
1279. Overcoming the difficulties. Where, then, can we be sure of recognizing the Holy Spirit?
(Cf. CCC 688.) Surely, in the Sacred Scriptures, which “make the voice of the Holy Spirit resound in
the words of the prophets and apostles” (DV 21). But Scripture must be “read and interpreted
according to the same Spirit by whom it was written” (DV 12). This happens in the Sacred Tradition,
which is handed down in the Church’s ordinary teaching. It is through the authoritative teaching of
the Bishops, which is guided by the Spirit, that clarity and correct judgment are assured. For it is
“through the Holy Spirit [that] the living voice of the Gospel rings out in the Church __ and through her
in the world” ( DV 8).

1280. We experience the Spirit particularly in prayer. “For we do not know how to pray as we
ought; but the Spirit himself makes intercession for us” (Rom 8:26). We Filipinos are noted for our
many devotional practices, novenas, days of recollection and patron saints. But they are authentic
Christian prayer only if carried on “in Spirit and in truth” (Jn 4:23). The test is how these devotions
agree with the Church’s Spirit-inspired liturgical worship, and help build up and unite the local
Christian community.

1281. PCP II sees encouraging signs that by forming themselves into “little communities of faith”
Filipino Catholics are now “more able to put together the practices of popular piety with the greater
use of Scripture, real liturgical worship, the building up of a faith community and involvement in
social issues” ( PCP II 17).
It is only “in the Spirit” that we can become more truly united in authentic “Christian” prayer.
Thus in the Third Eucharistic Prayer we ask: “Grant that we who are nourished by his [Christ’s] body
and blood may be filled with his Holy Spirit, and become one body, one spirit in Christ.”

1282. A further place for meeting the Spirit is Christian witness (cf. PCP II 78). From the earliest
days of Christianity right up to the present day, the Spirit has inspired countless saints, blessed, and
simple ordinary Christians, to daily acts of charity in following Christ. Some were called even to the
extent of heroic martyrdom. Many are still called by God to dedicate themselves fully in a public way
to His service in the Church by entering religious life and proclaiming through the vows of poverty,
chastity and obedience the power of grace to effect the sacrifices which the following of Christ
crucified entails. Today we are constantly “surprised” by the Spirit. We often experience his action in
the most unexpected persons, places, times, and ways.
1283. Discerning the Spirit. But, practically speaking, how can we discover these actions of the
Holy Spirit in our lives? Many conflicting claims force us to what St. Paul calls “discernment of
spirits” (cf.
1 Cor 12:10). Scripture and Catholic tradition offer some helpful guidelines. The Spirit:
• always leads to faith in Jesus Christ whom he glorifies; acts always in keeping with Scripture
and Tradition showing unity, continuity and consistency;
• gives spiritual gifts to individuals for the service of the community: to build up the Christian
community and fellowship, and work toward overcoming dissensions and factions (cf. 1 Cor
1:10 ; 3:3);
• is known by his fruits which [Link] lists as “love, joy, peace, patient endurance, kindness,
generosity, faith, mildness, and chastity” ( Gal 5:22);
• is authoritatively discerned, and the proper use of his Gifts is judged by “those who preside
over the Church whose office is not indeed to extinguish the Spirit, but to test all things and
hold fast to what is good” (LG 12).
• is found in humility: “God resists the proud, but bestows His favor on the lowly” ( Jas 4:6).
 II. THE ACTIVITY OF THE HOLY SPIRIT

1284. We now come to the actual study of the Spirit’s manifold activity. Six areas of the Spirit’s work
are explored:
a) in the whole creation, and especially among human persons, created in God’s image and
likeness;
b) in salvation history among the chosen People, Israel; and
c) in the life, death, and resurrection of the promised Messiah, Jesus Christ.
Then we shall move to consider how the Spirit is experienced today,
d) in the Church,
e) in each of us as disciples of Christ, and finally
f) in two basic life orientations.

A. The Spirit’s Activity in Creation

1285. In creation. The most basic activity of the Holy Spirit is God’s creative power giving
existence now to all reality and life to all living things (cf. CCC 703-4). The Holy Spirit is symbolized
by the mighty wind sweeping over the waters in the Genesis creation account (cf. Gn 1:2). He is
acclaimed by the Psalmist: “When you send forth your Spirit, they are created, and you renew the face
of the earth” (Ps 104:30).
Contrary to a common misunderstanding that God’s creative action stopped in the past, we
know that it is the Spirit’s creative activity now that keeps everything existing.

1286. Within all creation, it is especially in the human person that the Spirit is especially active.
Created in God’s own image and likeness, the first human persons were vivified when God blew into
their nostrils “the breath [Spirit] of life,” making them living beings (cf. Gn 2:7). The ancient hymn
Veni Creator Spiritus encompasses the whole human race in praying:

Come, Creator Spirit, visit the minds that are yours

Fill with heavenly grace the hearts that you created.
1287. For Filipinos, God as CREATOR is by far the most popular image. PCP II indicates a new
example of God’s creative power, His Spirit, working within us. It speaks glowingly of “people
power” as “a recognition of God’s fundamental gifts of freedom and responsibility” ( PCP II 326-
29).

B. The Spirit’s Activity in Salvation History

1288. The Holy Spirit is ever active in human history, since the Fall of our first parents to the
present day (cf. CCC 705-41). In the Spirit, Abraham heard and responded to God’s call. The Spirit
brought together the twelve tribes into one Chosen People, inspiring Moses to lead the Israelites out of
Egypt, the house of slavery. Joseph was “a man so endowed with the Spirit of God” (Gn 41:38).
David’s last words claimed: “The Spirit of the Lord spoke through me” (2 Sm 23:2). In the book of
Judges “the Spirit came upon Othaniel and Jephthah” (Jg 3:10;11:29), and “enveloped Gideon” (Jg
6:34). Most of all, the Spirit spoke through the prophets to renew the Chosen People.
1289. Two prophetic lines developed. One focused on “awaiting the Messiah,” the other
“announcing a New Spirit” (cf. Is 11:1-2). Both marked the faith of the ‘remnant’, “the poor of
Yahweh” who awaited in hope “the consolation of Israel” and “the deliverance of Jerusalem” (cf. Lk
2:25, 28; CCC 711-13). Through His Spirit, God promised He would gather together the dispersed
peoples, and bring new life back to dry bones. “Thus says the Lord God to these dry bones: See! I will
bring Spirit into you, that you may come to life” (Ez 37:5). Finally, in the prophet Joel, God
promised:

“I will pour out my Spirit upon all mankind. Your

sons and daughters shall prophesy, your old men
shall dream dreams, your young men shall see
visions; Even upon the servants and the
handmaids, in those days, I will pour out my
Spirit” (Jl 3:1-2).

C. The Spirit’s Activity in Christ, the Promised Messiah

1290. This universal outpouring of the Spirit was to take place through the promised Messiah. Thus
Peter proclaimed in his Pentecostal discourse: “Exalted at God’s right hand, Jesus first received
the promised Holy Spirit from the Father, then poured this Spirit out on us” (Acts 2:33). So did
the prophetic promise of the Spirit’s outpouring find its perfect fulfillment in the life, Death and
Resurrection of Christ Jesus, our Lord and Savior.
We shall sketch briefly the Spirit’s action in Jesus in four steps: 1) the Preparation; 2) Christ’s
Public Ministry; 3) his Paschal Mystery, and 4) his Joint Mission with the Spirit.

1. Preparation

1291. The Virgin Mary. The Spirit prepared for the coming of the Savior especially in two specific
persons. The first, of course, was Mary. The Spirit had prepared her to become the Mother of
God (Theotokos) by indwelling in her from the first moment of her Immaculate Conception in
her mother’s womb (cf. CCC 722-26). At the Annunciation, Gabriel told Mary: “The Holy
Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you” (Lk 1:35).
Thus our Lord Jesus Christ, “for us and our salvation was born as to his humanity from Mary
the Virgin Mother of God” (Chalcedon, ND 614). Filled with the Holy Spirit, Mary could
exclaim to her cousin Elizabeth: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit
rejoices in God my Savior” (Lk 1:46-47).
1292. In and through the Virgin Mary, therefore, the Holy Spirit:
• realized the saving plan of the Father,
• manifested the Son of the Father before all,
• began to draw all into communion with Christ.

Thus, through the Spirit, Mary has become the New Eve, the new “Mother of the Living” (cf.
CCC 723-27).

1293. John the Baptist was the second person through whom the Holy Spirit prepared for the coming
of the Savior (cf. CCC 717-20). “Filled with the Holy Spirit from his mother’s womb,” John
was sent before the Messiah “in the spirit and power of Elijah, . . . to prepare for the Lord a
people welldisposed” (Lk 1:15,17). John was a “voice in the desert crying out: Make straight the
 way of the Lord”; a “witness to testify to the light so that through him all might believe” (Jn
1:23,7). John himself confessed: “I saw the Spirit descend like a dove from the sky and it came
to rest on him. . . the Lamb of God . . . who takes away the sin of the world” ( Jn 1:31-34;29).

2. The Spirit in Christ’s Public Ministry

1294. Inauguration. St. Luke’s Gospel introduces the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry stating:
“Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee” (Lk 4:14; cf. CCC 714). There, in his home
town of Nazareth, Jesus laid out his whole messianic program:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,

because He has anointed me.
He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the poor,
to proclaim liberty to captives,
Recovery of sight to the blind
and release to prisoners,
To announce a year of favor from the Lord (Lk 4:18f).

Thus did Jesus inaugurate his public ministry in the power of the Spirit, as the prophet Isaiah
had foretold of the Messiah ( cf. Is 61:1-2).

1295. High Points. Jesus’ empowerment by the Spirit is recorded in two preceding incidents and
confirmed in a third.
First, at his baptism by John the Baptist in the Jordan, Jesus was “anointed” by the Spirit, who
“descended on him in visible form like a dove” ( Lk 3:22).
Second, immediately after his baptism, “Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, was conducted by the
Spirit into the desert for forty days, where he overcame the devil’s temptation, no doubt in the power
of the Spirit who was in him ( cf. Lk 4:1-2, 14).
Third, confirming these two experiences was Jesus’ Transfiguration. “His clothes became
dazzling white. . . A cloud came, overshadowing them, and out of the cloud a voice: ‘This is my
beloved Son. Listen to him’” (Mk 9:2-3, 7). The cloud traditionally symbolized the presence or Spirit
of the Lord. Jesus’ very identity, then, is marked by his two unique relations: to God who addressed
Jesus as “Beloved Son,” and to the Spirit who transfigured Jesus.1
1296. “Doing Good”. The accounts of Jesus’ Baptism, Desert Temptations, and Transfiguration show
how Jesus is always directly linked with the Spirit who inspires and empowers his public
Messianic ministry. Throughout his public ministry “God anointed him with the Holy Spirit and
power. He went about doing good works and healing all who were in the grip of the devil, and
God was with him” ( Acts 10:38).

3. The Spirit in Christ’s Paschal Mystery

1 These events also indicate the three divine Persons: God the Father as Voice, Jesus as Incarnate Son, and the
Holy Spirit as cloud or dove. This confirms the action of the three divine Persons in the angel Gabriel’s
Annunciation to Mary: “you have found favor with God. You shall conceive and bear a son, Jesus, [who] will be
called Son of the Most high,” because “the Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will
overshadow you” (Lk 1:30-35).
1297. The climax came in Christ’s Passion, Death and Resurrection. Strengthened by the Spirit in his
Agony in the Garden, Jesus prayed to his Father, “not my will but yours be done” (Lk 22:42).
From the Cross Jesus “delivered over his Spirit” ( Jn 19:30; cf. 7:39; 20:22).

1298. But the Spirit’s power is seen most clearly in the Resurrection. Jesus “was made Son of God in
power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead” (Rom 1:4). “Exalted
at God’s right hand, [the Risen Christ] first received the promised Holy Spirit from the Father,
then poured this Spirit out on us” (Acts 2:33). St. Paul proclaims the Risen Christ has become a
“life-giving Spirit” (1 Cor 15:45). He describes in Trinitarian terms how Christ, the Son, works
together with the Spirit to fulfill God’s plan of salvation. For St. John, only when Christ was
risen, could the Spirit be given, and we receive new life of grace.

4. Joint Mission of Christ and the Spirit

1299. So closely do Christ and the Spirit work together that we can rightfully speak of the “joint
mission of the Son and of the Spirit” (cf. CCC 689, 702, 727). When the Father sends His Word,
He always sends His Breath: there occurs a joint mission in which the Son and the Holy Spirit
are distinct but inseparable. It is Christ who appears as the visible Image of the invisible God,
but it is the Holy Spirit who reveals him. The knowledge of the “mysteries of the Reign of God”
of which Christ is the fullness, is “given” (Mt 13:11) in the gift of the Holy Spirit (cf. CCC
729). Christ gives the form and content of salvation, while the Spirit makes present and extends
this new life.

D. The Spirit’s Activity in the Church

1300. Pentecost. In St. Luke’s Acts, the Church is inaugurated with the spectacular outpouring of the
Holy Spirit. “All were filled with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:4). This corresponds to Jesus’
inaugurating his public ministry with his opening discourse in Luke’s Gospel, “the Spirit of the
Lord is upon me” (Lk 4:18; cf. 30). At Pentecost the large crowd were much confused upon
hearing the eleven “express themselves in foreign tongues and make bold proclamation as the
Spirit prompted them” (Acts 2:4). The people asked: “What are we to do?” Peter answered
“You must reform and be baptized, each one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, that your sins
may be forgiven; then you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” ( Acts 2:38).

1301. Thus it was the Holy Spirit, sent by the Father and the Risen Christ, that gave birth to the first
Christian community, the apostolic Church. St. Paul describes the people of this New Covenant
as “a letter of Christ, . . . written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets
of stone but on the tablets of human hearts” (2 Cor 3:3). This Spirit is the “Gift of God” who is
Love (cf. 1 Jn 4:8,16), the first gift which contains all the others, and which “has been poured
out into our hearts” ( Rom 5:5; cf. CCC 733).

Until today the Holy Spirit continues to exercise three functions: to give life to, to unify, and to
move the whole body ( cf. LG 7).

1. The Spirit Gives Life

1302. The Spirit’s role in vivifying the Church is graphically sketched in Vatican II:
 When in the womb of the baptismal font the Spirit begets to a new life those who believe in Christ, he
gathers them into the one People of God which is a ‘chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a
purchased people’ (1 Pt 2:9; AG 15).

Even the Church’s practical pastoral decisions were made under such influence of the Spirit that
the apostles could write: “It is the decision of the Holy Spirit, and ours too, not to lay on you any
burden beyond what is necessary” (Acts 15:28).

2. The Spirit Unifies

1303. Then the Spirit unifies the Church by uniting its members with Christ and with one another.
The Spirit:
• prepares us to accept Christ, and draws us to him;
• manifests the Risen Christ to us interiorly, opening our minds and hearts to Christ’s words and
deeds, especially his Passion, Death and Resurrection;
• makes Christ present especially in the Sacraments, reconciling and putting us in communion
with God;
• so we can bear much fruit (cf. Jn 15:5,8,16; cf. CCC 737).

We experience the Spirit in the preaching of the Gospel, celebrating the sacraments, and the
deepening of our faith through the new life of grace, calling us to share in building up the People of
God (cf. PCP II 428). “Throughout the ages, the Holy Spirit makes the entire Church one in
communion and ministry; and provides her with different hierarchical and charismatic gifts, giving
life to the ecclesiastical structures, being as it were their soul” ( AG 4).

1304. Both the life and unity of the Church are fostered by the Spirit’s “charisms.” St. Paul described
the charismatic gifts with which the Spirit endows individual members of the Church for the
good of the whole Body.

To each person the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. To one the Spirit gives
wisdom in discourse, to another the power to express knowledge. Through the Spirit one receives faith; by
the same Spirit another is given the gift of healing . . . but it is one and the same Spirit who produces all
these gifts, distributing them to each as he wills (1 Cor 12:7-11).

The teaching authority of the Bishops plays an indispensable role here in judging the presence
of genuine charisms of the Spirit and how they are to be used for the good of the Christian community.

3. The Spirit Moves to Ministry

1305. Finally, the Spirit moves the Church toward its mission and ministry. PCP II insists that the
Holy Spirit:
• is the principal agent of evangelization;
• continues and brings the work of Christ to perfection;
• precedes, accompanies, and fructifies the work of the Church;
• impels each individual to proclaim the Gospel, and
• causes the word of salvation to be accepted and understood in the depths of consciences;
 • shows His presence, power, and activity not only in the Church, but in the signs of the times
that mark the contemporary world ( cf. PCP II 212-15).

Vatican II declares that the Spirit inspires “in the hearts of the faithful that same spirit of
mission which impelled Christ himself” (AG 4). Thus the Church is kept focused on its primary
mission of preaching the word of God, “making her own the words of the apostle Paul, ‘I am ruined if
I do not preach it’ ” (1 Cor 9:16; cf. LG 17).
The Spirit also moves the Church to renewal and purification. “Guided by the Holy Spirit, the
Church ceaselessly exhorts her children to purification and renewal so that the sign of Christ may
shine more brightly over the face of the Church” ( GS 43).

1306. Recent Philippine History. Our own recent history reminds Filipino Catholics of the Spirit’s
role in our local Church today. The 2nd Plenary Council of the Philippines says:

The 1986 experience of solidarity in prayer and mass action preventing violence at a time of national
crisis, popularly known as the “EDSA experience,” is to be honored as an historical event with a religious
dimension that continues to call us to be a people who work for conversion, reconcillation and peace in
the way of peace (PCP II 4).

This typifies the Church’s constant effort to actively respond to the Spirit’s guidance and
inspiration. But as always, the Spirit’s work is never a substitute for our human endeavor. Rather the
Spirit inspires new “Movements” in the Church, and empowers us with new, unsuspected strengths to
grapple with the ever new problems and challenges of daily life. Besides, He often creates and “opens
up” for us surprising new possibilities for fuller and deeper human life, both personal and communal.

E. The Activity of the Spirit in Christians

1307. The Holy Spirit joins us to Christ. The Spirit joins us intimately with Christ in two basic
ways. First, the Risen Christ is present within and among us today in his Spirit. Second, the Spirit is
the inner source of our life of faith by which we accept Jesus. “No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except
in the Holy Spirit” (1 Cor 12:3; cf. PCP II 64, 68). This means that we can come to know, recognize,
and experience Jesus only because the Holy Spirit makes it possible.
Nor is this just pious talk far removed from daily life. Paul uses the very concrete matter of
sexual morality to show that “whoever is joined to the Lord becomes one Spirit with Him . . . your
body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you” (1 Cor 6:17,19).

1308. For St. Paul, to be “in Christ” and “in the Spirit” means basically the same thing. We are
justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God. We are sanctified “in
Christ Jesus” and “in the Holy Spirit.” Our righteousness is based “in Christ” and equally also “in
the Holy Spirit.” We are called to “rejoice in the Lord” and to find “joy in the Holy Spirit.” Paul
claims to speak “in Christ” and also “by the Spirit of God.” “For in one Spirit we were all baptized
into one body,” “baptized into Christ” to form “one body in Christ.” (Cf. 1 Cor 1:2,30; 6:11; 12:3,13;
2 Cor 2:17; 5:21; Rom 12:5; 14:17; 15:16; Gal 3:27; Phil 3:1.)

The Spirit’s Actions

1309. But by linking us to Christ, what actually does the Holy Spirit do? To spell out in some detail
what the Spirit does within and among us, the following paragraphs set forth six particular activities.
The Spirit: 1) adopts us as children of the Father; 2) enables us to love as Christ commanded; 3)
empowers us to bear witness to Christ, and 4) to know the truth; 5) draws us into community unity and
service; and 6) inspires us to live a truly Christian life.

1. The Spirit Adopts Us

1310. The Spirit is first of all the “Spirit of adoption” by which we become “children of God” (cf.
Jn 1:12; CCC 693). Jesus is the only begotten, God’s own Son, but through him and his Spirit we are
adopted by the Father, and are “called children of God __ [for] that is what we are” (1 Jn 3:1). We can
truly call God “Abba, Father.” “The proof that you are sons is the fact that God has sent forth into our
hearts the Spirit of His Son who cries out ‘Abba, Father!’ ” (Gal 4:6)

1. The Spirit Empowers Us to Love

1311. The Spirit thus enables us to love God, and love everybody else through His Spirit. “The love
of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us” (Rom
5:5). And “if God has loved us so, we must have the same love for one another . . . If we love one
another, God dwells in us and His love is brought to perfection in us” (1 Jn 4:11-12). St. Paul stresses
this gift of love above all charisms. “If I speak with human and angelic tongues. . .have the gift of
prophecy. . . comprehend all mysteries. . . have faith enough to move mountains, but have not love, I
am nothing” (1 Cor 13:1-2,8).

1. The Spirit Empowers Us to Bear Witness

1312. In addition, the Holy Spirit empowers us to bear witness to Jesus Christ. At the Last Supper
Jesus told the apostles: “When the Paraclete comes, . . . he will bear witness on my behalf. You must
bear witnesses as well” (Jn 15:26f). Just before his Ascension, the Risen Christ promised: “You will
receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, then you are to be my witnesses in Jerusalem . . .
even to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8). Therefore, not only are we saved by Christ and the Spirit __
God working in us __ but we share in Their redeeming work as well __ God working through us. In
sending the Holy Spirit, the Risen Christ calls us to give witness to him before others by sharing his
own triple mission of Prophet, Priest and King.

1. The Spirit Empowers Us to Know the Truth

1313. To know the truth is a further power which the Holy Spirit inspires in us. PCP II points out
that “all persons are bound to seek the truth, especially in religious matters” (PCP II 362). Jesus
promised his apostles the Spirit of truth who “will teach you everything and remind you of all that I
told you” and “guide you to all truth” (Jn 14:26; 16:13). John Paul II adds that this means “that the
Spirit will help people understand the correct meaning of the content of Christ’s message; He will
ensure the continuity and identity of understanding . . . the same truth which the Apostles heard from
their Master” (DViv 4).

1. The Spirit Draws Us into Community, Unity and Service

1314. Moreover, the Holy Spirit is the principle of unity and service in the community. “The Spirit
is for the Church and for each and every believer, the principle of their union and unity in the teaching
of the apostles and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and prayer” ( LG 13).
 PCP II explains how the lay faithful are called to “animate the temporal order with Christ’s
Spirit” (PCP II 427). This unity in loving service is made possible through the Spirit’s manifold gifts
and charisms, the same promised in Isaiah the prophet: “a spirit of wisdom and of understanding, a
spirit of counsel and of strength, a spirit of knowledge and of fear of the Lord” ( Is 11:2).

1. The Spirit Inspires True Christian Life

1315. Lastly, the Spirit vivifies us to live a truly Christian life. PCP II describes how “in the depths
of the Filipino spirit is a longing for kaayusan, . . . a longing for the life that the creative Spirit of
Jesus gives as a gift, a gift which is likewise a challenge” (PCP II 257). The Spirit not only
strengthens us in our struggle against the powers of evil, but frees us by his interior transforming
presence. “All of us, gazing on the Lord’s glory . . . are being transformed from glory to glory into his
very image by the Spirit of the Lord” (2 Cor 3:18).
But it is especially in time of temptation and trial that we Filipino Christians learn to pray for
the Spirit’s purifying and strengthening power:

A clean heart create for me, O God, and a steadfast

spirit renew within me. Cast me not out from your
presence, and your Holy Spirit take not from me (Ps
51:12-13).

When we are troubled, in doubt, or on slippery ground, we learn to pray: “May your good Spirit guide
me on level ground” ( Ps 143:10).

F. Two Basic Life Orientations

1316. Now, according to St. Paul, there are two basic, contradictory orientations among us. Either
we Live according to the flesh, turned against God and toward sin and death. Or we live according to
the Spirit of Christ, toward life and peace (Rom 8:4-6). St. Paul contrasts the two orientations:

• “the natural man does not accept what is taught by the Spirit of God, for to him it is foolishness, and
he cannot understand it, because it has to be judged spiritually.
• The spiritual man, on the other hand can appraise everything” (1 Cor 2:14f).

St. Paul assures the early Christians: “You are not in the flesh; you are in the spirit, since the Spirit of
God dwells in you” (Rom 8:9). And exhorts them: “since we live by the Spirit, let us follow the spirits
lead” (Gal 5:25).

1317. Proper Understanding. Special care is needed to be able to understand the saving, liberating
truth of St. Paul’s message. Far from rejecting material reality, [Link] is telling his Christian converts
that they no longer are merely natural, material individuals, weak and tied down to earthly things.
Rather, they are under the influence of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit who is the strength and power of God
working in and among them. The Spirit reveals the spiritual dimension within everything material,
including our bodies, since He is creatively active in everything that exists. Only through the Holy
Spirit is all matter sanctified by God’s grace. Apart from the Holy Spirit, even “spiritual things”
become carnal and dead in sin.
1318. Pope John Paul II explains that “St. Paul is concerned with the morally good or bad works,
the permanent dispositions __ virtues and vices __ which are the fruit of, or resistance to, the saving
action of the Holy Spirit” (DViv 55). Now Paul knew first-hand of suffering, poverty, and the trials
and temptations of daily life. “We ourselves, although we have the Spirit as first fruits, groan inwardly
while we await the redemption of our bodies” (Rom 8:23). Yet Paul is confident because the Spirit
“helps us in our weakness” (Rom 8:26), strengthening our spirits against the brute forces, temptations
and oppressive powers that enslave us.
In summary: Evil spirits possess; spiritless flesh enslaves; wicked powers oppress, dominate,
manipulate and exploit. But the Spirit of God and of Christ liberates. For “where the Spirit of the
Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Cor 3:17). It is in the Spirit that we get a taste of “the glorious freedom of
the children of God” (Rom 8:21).

1319. Furthermore, these two basic orientations of flesh and Spirit are far deeper and more powerful
than our individual wills and free decisions. We rashly think we can change our ways anytime we
want. But this proves to be an illusion. Rather we find that these orientations are “built into” our
human condition. John Paul II explains this: “the texts of St. Paul enable us to know and feel vividly
the strength of the tension and struggle going on in us between openness to the action of the Holy
Spirit and resistance and opposition to him, to his saving gift” (DViv 55). Hence, when our minds are
set on the things of the flesh, we are prisoners of flesh and sin. We cannot extricate ourselves from
such a condition on our own power. Only when we are transformed through the Spirit’s action can we
turn our own thoughts and actions toward the things of the Spirit.

1320. Eschatological Gift. Whenever we experience the Spirit acting in our lives, something of the
“new heaven” is already present. For the Spirit is the seal, “the pledge of our [heavenly] inheritance,
the first payment against full redemption” (Eph 1:13-14). Vatican II explains:

The promised and hoped for restoration has already begun in Christ. It is carried forward in the sending of
the Holy Spirit, and through the Spirit, continues in the Church in which, through our faith, we learn the
meaning of our earthly life, while we bring to term, with the hope of future good, the task allotted to us in
the world by the Father and so work out our salvation ( LG 48).

1321. For many Filipinos, talk of the “eschatological” can seem very far away from daily thinking
and activities. But it really is not so. It refers not to something in the far future but to an inner depth
dimension of our everyday life, now. A dimension that is inspired by the Spirit. Like the love for our
family and friends which we hold deep in our hearts when we go about our daily tasks. This is well
expressed in the Preface of the Sixth Sunday:

Father, in you we live and move and have our being.

Each day you show us a Father’s love;
Your Holy Spirit, dwelling within us, gives us on earth the
hope of unending joy.
Your gift of the Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead,
Is the foretaste and promise of the Paschal Feast in heaven.

III. THE SPIRIT’S IDENTITY

1322. In the Nicene Creed we identify the Holy Spirit as “Lord, the Giver of Life.” The life which
the Spirit shares with us is the divine life, the life of God who is love (cf. 1 Jn 4:8). Now in John’s
Gospel the Holy Spirit is called the Paraclete: literally, “he who is called to help.” Thus the Spirit is
our Advocate, Helper, Counsellor. The life He inspires in us, then, is a life that supports, strengthens,
and guides, precisely because it brings us in intimacy with Jesus (cf. CCC 692).
1323. Many times the Spirit will be comforting and consoling. At other times He will trouble us out
of our complacency, remind us of the “fire” Jesus has come to cast on the earth in calling for our
witness to justice and preferential option for the poor (cf. Lk 12:49). This is the repentance and
conversion from our sinful ways desired by Christ and our loving heavenly Father. Yet, we come to
realize that these consoling and troubling effects are just two different manifestations of the same
liberating, vivifying, and transforming life-in-the-Spirit.

1324. The Nicene Creed continues: “who proceeds from the Father and the Son.” Thus the Holy
Spirit is not created like we are, but like the only begotten divine Son “proceeds” from the Father.
John Paul II explains “that in the Holy Spirit the intimate life of the Triune God becomes totally gift,
an exchange of mutual love between the Divine Persons. It is the Holy Spirit who is the personal
expression of this self-giving, of this being-love. He is Person-Love, Person-Gift” (cf. DViv 10). The
difference between the Divine Son and the Holy Spirit is that the Spirit proceeds as BREATH of love,
while the Son proceeds as the Word or Image of the Father. Thus we speak of the Holy Spirit as the
Third Person of the Blessed Trinity, one in being with the Father and the Son.

1325. “With the Father and the Son He is worshipped and glorified” is perhaps the most
suggestive part of the Nicene Creed’s description of the Holy Spirit. For it indicates first that it is in
liturgical worship that we most often experience the Spirit. Second, in this worship the Spirit is
experienced as “on our side”: He is within us as we pray united together in one Body under Jesus
Christ our Head, to Our Father.

The Blessed Trinity:

Mystery of Personal Loving Communion

1326. Now we can better appreciate the doctrine of the Blessed Trinity which states there is ONE
GOD, who is THREE EQUAL and DISTINCT PERSONS.

1327. God is ONE. We must not imagine the three divine Persons are three Gods, nor three parts of
the one God. Each Person is the WHOLE GOD. The divine Persons are RELATIONS which
SUBSIST in the divine nature. The one God is Father as begetting the Son and breathing the Spirit;
the same God is Son as begotten of the Father and breathing the Spirit; the same God is Spirit as
Breath of Father and Son. “The Father generates, the Son is generated and the Holy Spirit proceeds, so
that there be distinctions between the Persons but unity in nature” (Lateran IV, cf. ND 318-19). The
three Persons constitute ONE GOD, one divine nature, a mystery of “PERSONAL LOVING
COMMUNION” (cf. FC 11).

“The Lord Jesus, when praying to the Father ‘that they may all be one . . . even as we are one’ (Jn
17:2122), has opened up new horizons to human reason by implying that there is a certain parallel
between the union existing among the divine Persons and the union of the sons of God in truth and love” (
GS, 24).
1328. The three Divine Persons are EQUAL. God the Father does not come first, then the Son,
and then the Holy Spirit. All three divine Persons are equally eternal, with no beginning and no end
(cf. CCC 255).
We often forget that “father” and “son” are relational terms, and presume that the father comes
first, and then the son. But this is not true. A man is a person and a husband but not a father until he
has a son or daughter. Father and son are co-relational terms: one exists in relation to the other. So
God the Father and God the Son relate to each other and are equally eternal. One does not come before
the other. The same for the Spirit who is the BREATH of the Father and Son. Breath and Breather are
simultaneous. Neither comes before the other.

1329. The Divine Persons are DISTINCT. Jesus affirmed “the Father and I are one” (Jn 10:30).
By this he did not mean he is identical with the Father, but rather that he is perfectly UNITED with the
Father. As he explained to Philip “I am in the Father and the Father is in me. The words I speak are
not spoken of myself; it is the Father who lives in me accomplishing his works” (Jn 14:10). So God
the Father and Jesus, His only begotten Son-made-flesh (cf. Jn 1:14), are distinct Persons, yet wholly
united in LOVE, their Holy Spirit (cf. CCC 254).

1330. In creating us, the three Divine Persons freely shared themselves, their own divine life of
Love, with us. Moreover, we are raised from being “creatures” of God to being His sons and
daughters. The Father adopts us as His children by sending His only begotten Son to become one of
us, and the Holy Spirit to dwell within us as the inner source of divine life. This is what we properly
mean by Grace.

1331. We Filipino Catholics, need to become more aware of the Father, Son, and Spirit in our daily
lives. This is an important step in maturing in our Christian Faith. We begin to appreciate the reality
of the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of the Father and the Risen Christ within us __ the reality of Grace. Now
the “Third Person of the Blessed Trinity” takes on real meaning for us, completing our previous study
of God the Father and His only begotten Son-become-man, Jesus Christ, our Savior [Part I]. Now
with the Holy Spirit we can come to a deeper, more personal appreciation of the Blessed Trinity in our
lives as the loving God of our salvation.