Go and Do Likewise (I): You Did It to Me
Social needs, civil rights and duties, international relations, dialogue, and political action call Christians, children of one Father, to be "actively, freely, and responsibly present in public life" (St. Josemaría).
Why was Jesus baptized?
Here are some answers to the most common questions about the sacrament of Baptism: what it is, the origin of the term, why Jesus was baptized, when the practice of Baptism began in the Church, and how this sacrament is celebrated.
What is Advent?
Advent is the liturgical season before Christmas, in which the Church prepares to celebrate Christ's birth. This article responds to some common questions about the origin, meaning, and customs of Advent.
Topic 21: Baptism and Confirmation
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.
Topic 22: The Eucharist (II)
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.
Topic 23: Penance and the Anointing of the Sick
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.
Topic 25: Christian Life: Law and Conscience
Eternal law, natural law, the New Law or Law of Christ, human political and ecclesiastical laws are all moral laws in a very different sense, although they all have something in common. To form an upright conscience it is necessary to instruct the intelligence in the knowledge of the truth – for which we can rely on the help of the Magisterium of the Church – and to educate the will and emotions through the practice of the virtues.
Topic 26: The Morality of Human Actions
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.
Topic 24: Marriage and Holy Orders
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.
Topic 27: The Action of the Holy Spirit: Grace, the Theological Virtues, and the Commandments
The Christian life is our life as children of God in Christ through the Holy Spirit. The action of the Holy Spirit in the Christian’s soul, besides giving sanctifying grace and the theological virtues, communicates inspirations and actual graces, and has a specific manifestation that the Church calls the gifts of the Holy Spirit. The Decalogue contains a set of serious duties, but it is also and above all an instruction, a teaching on how to live.