Monday, February 24 : Catechism of the Catholic Church

The characteristics of faith. The freedom of faith: To be human, “man’s response to God by faith must be free, and… therefore nobody is to be forced to embrace the faith against his will. the act of faith is of its very nature a free act.” (Vatican II DH). “God calls men to serve him in spirit and in truth. Consequently they are bound to him in conscience, but not coerced. . . The necessity of faith: Believing in Jesus Christ and in the One who sent him for our salvation is necessary for obtaining that salvation. Perseverance in faith: Faith is an entirely free gift that God makes to man. We can lose this priceless gift… To live, grow and persevere in the faith until the end we must nourish it with the word of God; we must beg the Lord to increase our faith (Lk 17,5; Mk 9,24); it must be “working through charity,” (Gal 5,6) abounding in hope, and rooted in the faith of the Church. Faith – the beginning of eternal life. Faith makes us taste in advance the light of the beatific vision, the goal of our journey here below. Then we shall see God “face to face” (1Cor 13,12), “as he is” (1Jn 3,2).So faith is already the beginning of eternal life… Now, however, “we walk by faith, not by sight”; we perceive God as “in a mirror, dimly” and only “in part”. Even though enlightened by him in whom it believes, faith is often lived in darkness and can be put to the test. the world we live in often seems very far from the one promised us by faith. Our experiences of evil and suffering, injustice and death, seem to contradict the Good News; they can shake our faith and become a temptation against it… It is then we must turn to the witnesses of faith: to Abraham, who “in hope… believed against hope” (Rom 4,18); to the Virgin Mary in “her pilgrimage of faith” (Vatican II LG) and to so many others: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith” (Heb 12,1-2).

Roman Catholic Ordinary Calendar – rosary,team