Opus Dei

The Eucharist makes Jesus Christ present. He invites us to accept the salvation that He offers us, and to receive the gift of His Body and Blood as the food of eternal life. Our Lord announced the Eucharist during his public life and instituted this sacrament at the Last Supper. When the Church celebrates this sacrament, she follows the Eucharistic rite carried out by Christ at the Last Supper.

Only voluntary actions are the object of a moral evaluation properly speaking. The education of the complex world of feelings is a fundamental part of Christian formation and life. The path for ordering the passions is the acquisition of moral habits called virtues. The object, the intention and the circumstances are the “sources” or constitutive elements of the morality of human acts.

Marriage is an institution foreseen by God in his wisdom, so as to carry out in humanity his divine plan of love. It is born of the personal and irrevocable consent of the spouses. The essential properties of marriage are unity and indissolubility. This special covenant is ordered to the procreation and education of children, who are the most excellent gift of marriage and contribute greatly to the good of their parents.

Our prayer involves every aspect of our life. The Catechism distinguishes between vocal prayer, meditation and contemplative prayer. All three have a fundamental feature in common: the recollection of the heart. Prayer is not optional for the spiritual life, but rather a vital necessity.

Sexuality reaches the deepest core of the human person. True education in chastity is not satisfied with simply informing about the biological aspects, but helps people to reflect on the personal and moral values that come into play in our affective relationships with others. Sins against the sixth commandment are often a substitute for the lack of true love for which the heart yearns.

Penance is a sacrament which brings healing and salvation from sin. Over the course of history, the ministers of Christ and the Church have exercised the power to forgive sins in different ways. At the same time, in this sacrament the Church has maintained a fundamental structure which is made up of two equally essential elements: the action of the person who experiences conversion under the influence of the Holy Spirit, and the action of God which occurs through the ministry of the Church.

The Holy Mass makes present, in the Church’s daily liturgical life, the one sacrifice of our redemption. The Mass is a true and proper sacrifice because it makes sacramentally present the one, perfect and definitive sacrifice of the Cross. The faithful can and should participate in the offering of the Eucharistic sacrifice. The desire to receive Holy Communion should always be present in Christians: what food produces in the body for the good of physical life, the Eucharist produces in the soul.

Baptism incorporates the person who receives it into the Life, Death and Resurrection of Christ and into his saving action. This sacrament leaves in the Christian an indelible spiritual seal of belonging to Christ. Through Confirmation, Christians participate more fully in Christ’s mission and in the fullness of the Holy Spirit. A baptised and confirmed Christian is destined to take part in the Church’s mission of evangelising by virtue of these two sacraments.

No one, under any circumstance, can claim the right to directly kill an innocent human being. The fifth commandment also forbids striking, wounding or doing any unjust bodily harm to oneself or to one’s neighbours, as well as offending them with insulting words or wishing them harm. As regards abortion and euthanasia, respect for life should be a boundary line that no individual or state can violate.

The good news of salvation requires that the Church be present in the world. The Gospel is a proclamation of the transformation of the world according to God’s plan. The Church’s social doctrine is part of social moral theology, which derives from a Christian conception of the human being and political life. The Church’s social morality teaches the primacy of spiritual and moral goods over material goods.