Virtues Of the year

“Jesus is the Truth… and the Truth will set you free.” John 8: 32

What is the virtue of Charity?

There are three Theological virtues: faith, hope, and charity (also known as love). Charity helps us to love God, ourselves, and others, and when we put God first, we are able to see ourselves and others as God sees us. 

The Catechism of the Catholic Church describes charity as the source of all other virtues: “The practice of all the virtues is animated and inspired by charity, which ‘binds everything together in perfect harmony’; it is the form of the virtues; it articulates and orders them among themselves; it is the source and the goal of their Christian practice. Charity upholds and purifies our human ability to love, and raises it to the supernatural perfection of divine love” (paragraph 1827).

How can I practice Charity? 

When we practice charity in our daily lives, it may not always look like a big sacrifice. Typically, it is going to look like small acts performed with great love. It looks like the smiling face and open arms of Mother Teresa, or the attentiveness and kindness that Saint John Bosco showed to his students. 

When our parents ask us to do something, it means not talking back to them and choosing obedience out of love for them. When our siblings or classmates annoy us, it means not reacting in a negative way and choosing patience out of love for them. When a situation does not turn out the way we expected it to, it means thanking God for our blessings anyway because we love Him. Charity will not always happen naturally, we need to put forth the effort and intentionally practice it every single day.

What is Truth, and what is freedom? 

In 1985, Pope Saint John Paul II said the following in his Apostolic Letter to Youth: “Christ's words: ‘You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free,’ become an essential program… And what does it mean to be free? It means to know how to use one's freedom in truth–to be ‘truly’ free. To be truly free does not at all mean doing everything that pleases me, or doing what I want to do. Freedom contains in itself the criterion of truth, the discipline of truth. To be truly free means to use one's own freedom for what is a true good. Continuing therefore: to be truly free means to be a person of upright conscience, to be responsible, to be a person ‘for others.’” Even the Catechism tells us in paragraph 1733: “The more one does what is good, the freer one becomes. There is no true freedom except in the service of what is good and just.”

This is connected to charity. Jesus is the Truth, and by choosing Him, we are choosing Love. We may think that when we are free, we get to do whatever we want, but we know deep down that this can result in selfishness, which leads to sin. Sin, ultimately, makes us a slave to it, and it can weigh us down, whereas true freedom is choosing the good–for ourselves and for others, which is motivated by the love of God. 

This school year, challenge yourself to practice charity in all areas of your life–at school and at home–and seek out what is true, good, and beautiful. When we are motivated by love, and when we share love with those around us, God will transform our entire lives.

August: charity

September: courtesy

October: reverence

November: hope

December: fortitude

January: honesty

February: gratitude

March: loyalty

April: wisdom

May: charity