Teachings of the Catholic Church

1. Is marriage slavery?

2. Is work slavery?

3. Is it possible to do the stuff that makes up human life and be happy?

4. Yes.  Develop the virtues.  These will allow you to follow the natural law, not slavishly or out of fear, but in deeds done joyfully and out of love.  Make yourself strong in dispositions open to love.

5. The virtues:

(a) Prudence:  Not merely smart or clever, but wise.  It is the art of deciding wisely.

Prudence is a quality of clear-sightedness.  Prudence discerns reality objectively, sizes up a factual situation for what it is, and weighs the real value of things. [How is this to be done?  In the full light of knowledge and faith.]

That man is prudent who directs the choice of his will according to the insight in a situation and in the true reality of things as God has created them, and who is able to apply the general principles of virtuous action to the concrete, immediate instance. [What true love and wise providence requires here and now.]

Prudence also involves the ability to accept instruction and advice:
 The prudent person will also know when a situation is beyond his own powers of insight, and he will then seek out the insight of a wiser, more competent person.  Indeed, he will always be seeking out those who have wisdom greater than his own, in order that he may grow in insight and wisdom.

While prudence is the intellectual foundation of the virtues, justice is their peak and culmination.

(b) Justice:  Giving your neighbor his due.  Fundamental respect for the dignity of others. For example: unprejudiced, fair, incorruptible objectivity, never talking behind another’s back, no hasty and ill-considered fault-finding, neither petty nor ungracious nor self-righteous.  “The just man is truthful.  Truthfulness is one of the cornerstones of communal life.  Wherever truth ceases to be respected, communal life breaks up and falls apart, whether within the family, among friends, or in the greater social bodies of nation and world.”

In other words, justice involves the fundamental commandments of justice contained in the decalogue.  “Justice alone allows men to live together in true peace and genuine harmony.”

Remember, though, at the heart of Commandments are the fundamental commandments of love:  Love your neighbor as you love yourself.  "Love as I have loved you."  Love your enemies.  Even to the point of death.

The person who lacks objectivity and who is unable to keep still and to allow the facts to speak, in order to gain a sound basis for a good judgment of reason, cannot possibly be a just person.  (The goal isn’t to do the right thing “by accident”; the goal is to become a just person: capable of doing good in any circumstance.)
 
Thus, we must also discipline our appetites.  We can categorize these into two broad categories: our concupiscible appetites (our lusting-after appetites) and our irascible (anger or fear) appetites.  Let’s deal with the second of these first.  To discipline our irascible appetites, we need the virtue of:

(c) Fortitude:  Bravery.  Bearing up.  Enduring.  Self-sacrifice with a sense of purpose.  This is what allows you to have integrity in following what you believe to be good.

“Good does not prevail of itself.  Courageous persons have to stand up for it.”  “Courage, however, is shown not only in attack, but also in endurance.”  The courageous man is ready to suffer injuries, endure misunderstanding, scorn, ridicule, as well as harm to body and possessions.

Patience is a part of fortitude: a firmness of soul that does not weaken under the constant attack of sorrow nor in the face of cruelty and evil.
 

*NB: Remember, we’re not doing away with the passions; we’re merely disciplining them – putting them under the control of reason so that they can be more effectively channeled for doing the good, rather than merely making us less effective.

To discipline our concupiscible appetites, we need the virtue of:

(d) Temperance:  I am in control of my reactions and emotions.  I don't react without thinking.  I don’t take goods because I “have to.”  I can let others take before I do.  It means, not abstaining from pleasures, but going the right length and no further. (And that can vary depending upon the circumstances; thus again, one needs prudence to gauge what is good for this particular circumstance with these particular people.)

All of the others support the fundamental virtue of justice.

6. What animates the whole?  Love.  What happens if love doesn't guide these virtues.  Then they can become caricatures of themselves:

(a) Prudence:  Overly careful or self-protective.  Or merely clever about getting stuff.

(b) Temperance:  Prudery.  And a certain, common kind of self-righteousness:  "I never touch fatty foods (during Lent)."  Lording your "restraint" over others.

(c) Fortitude:  Foolishly taking chances with your life and the lives of others.  Cruelty (big, brave macho man).  Or stoic, never feel anything.

(d) Justice:  Doing what the law says without mercy.  Eye for an eye, improperly understood.

7. So love must animate the virtues, as it must animate the following of the law.

(a) Faith: To believe in love, accept love; to trust that it has strength and value, meaning and true importance.  Faith in the power of love gives:

(b) Hope: The knowing (in faith) that one is headed for a happy end infinitely surpassing all expectation.  This faith in one’s end keeps one alert and resilient now.  “He who has ceased to hope cannot pray; and he who supposes himself already in possession of everything will not pray.”  To persevere in hope, one must believe that the fulness of love is still to be attained (that it is not yet complete) and that it can be attained and will ultimately conquer all its present limitations.  That is the only way for love to continue to grow (and not grow stale) and yet not, in the long run, despair.  Hope means a reliance on God’s love that cannot be shattered by anything.

(c) Charity: This kind of free, self-giving and selfless love both of God and neighbor is not primarily a matter of feeling, nor is it a wallowing in sentiment.  This free response of love is a matter of the free decision of a man’s will, enlightened by his intellect and by faith; it is the true fruit of the new life flowing into him from the Holy Spirit.  He believes that he is loved;  he accepts that love; and he chooses to respond in love.

8. Thus, when we think of charity, we should think, not only of our love, but God's love for us.  We love, because God has loved us first.

9. Thus opening our hearts to justice in the truest sense means opening our hearts to love.  How do we open our hearts to love?

10. Receive God’s love: God’s love is made present concretely – it comes in person – in Jesus Christ.

11. God’s love is also made present to us in the sacraments.

12. A sacrament is a "sign" of God's love.  An "outward and visible sign of an inward and invisible reality."  Mirror.  Image.  Mediate.  Messenger.  Embodiment.

13. Becoming a sacrament does not violate nature, but perfects it.

14. The first and most fundamental "sacrament":  Jesus Christ.

15. The seven sacraments:
(a) Baptism
(b) Confession
(c) Anointing of the Sick
(d) Confirmation
(e) Marriage
(f) Holy Orders
(g) Eucharist

16. Another important "sacrament":  the Church!

17. The importance of a community of virtue?

18. Potential problems with a particular community:
(a) it can cut you off from others outside the community
(b) it can have standards not related to your own personal good

19. You need a community of virtue that is universal in scope, and whose standards are all related to your good and your happiness as a complete and fulfilled human person.

20. Question:  What is the model of excellence for the community?  Or Who?

21. So, how do you do the stuff of life (like work and marriage) and do it well and become happy?  Develop the virtues.  Receive the sacraments.  Open yourself up to love -- particularly God's love.