3 Theological Virtues: Faith - Hope - Charity

And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinthians 13:13

The classical treatises divide virtues into two groups: human or acquired and divine or infused. Among the acquired virtues, four main ones are noted: Prudence, Justice, Fortitude and Temperance. Among the infused virtues are Faith, Hope and Charity; they are also called theological virtues because they are not the result of human efforts, but a gift infused by God in his children.  

In my view, however, neither the human ones are purely human, for we are always under the influence of the divine Grace, nor are the divine ones purely divine because human consent and effort are always required. In this regard, St. Augustine said that every good thing we do is by the grace of God, that is, it is a gift.

Faith – It is an attitude, conviction or belief in the existence of a Supreme Being who is both immanent and transcendent and who has historically revealed himself in Jesus of Nazareth, His only son, who lived among us, died, rose again and ascended into Heaven to prepare a place for us, leaving us the Holy Spirit to guide and accompany us on our way to this place. We relate to God through Faith.

Hope – More than an attitude of reasonable trust in the face of the uncertainty of the future, our Hope has a name, it is the salvation that God promises and offers us in Jesus Christ, His son. His resurrection from the dead makes death a passage to the afterlife and not a final destination. We relate to ourselves through Hope, that is how we react to our inner restlessness.

Charity – It is the virtue that regulates our action and the way we situate ourselves in life in relation to creation and to other people. Charity regulates how much I am part of other people's lives and how much others are part of my life. We relate to others through Charity: I am worth insofar as I serve; whoever does not live to serve is not fit to live.

The virtues in the Trinity, the Trinity in the virtues
Faith in God the Father opens us to the Hope we find in the Son through his resurrection, and motivates a gift of Charity, making us see Christ in each person. And whoever sees the Son sees the Father, like Jesus told Philip. Hope is the only-begotten daughter of mother Faith, as Christ is the only begotten Son of God the Father, and just as the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, so Charity proceeds from Faith and Hope.

God the Father is our Faith, Creator of Heaven and Earth; Faith is our past, our historical memory, being our Father, it is He who explains our being. God the Son, historically Jesus of Nazareth, is our Hope, in him we have an older brother who lived, died and rose again, opening the gates of Heaven to us and a graceful way out of this life. The Holy Spirit who proceeds from the Father and the Son is Charity that comes from Faith and Hope.

If Faith and Hope are thought and feeling, Charity is action; it is the way we occupy our place in the world during the time God has given us to live. To exercise this virtue, we need the person of God who came to stay, the Holy Spirit who dwells in us in the form of the seven gifts or talents, and who inspires, guides and encourages us in the here and now of our lives and on the way back to the Father.

Virtues and time
O time turn back / Bring me everything that I've lost / Have mercy on me and give me the life / The life I've already lived. Manuel Paião 1984

When we have already lived a few years, the past begins to be longer than the future; the memories of this past spring to our mind more than the projects of the future. I can understand the author of the song mentioned above in the sense that the recollection of the joys and pleasures of the past, causes sadness in the present; the longing of the remembrance of past pleasures is oftentimes not a joyful feeling but a sad one.

In contrast, the memory of the past sacrifices made at individual level to achieve an ideal at the community level when we dedicated ourselves to someone, when we put our lives at the service of a cause, brings us joy in the present. It is as if it is still happening: the joy of the victory of battles won in the past still resonates and makes us feel it in the present, giving a boost to our self-esteem and making us say, "It was all worth it..."

Human life is spatiotemporal, that is, we occupy a space, our place in the world, our being and how we are, our role in the whole history of humanity, for a period of time. This time is, like everything, tridimensional, that is, it is subdivided into past, present and future. These three times are interactive, that is, neither the future is only about the future, nor the past only about the past, nor the present deals only with the here and now. The three are real, the three are alive, the three influence each other and coexist.

Both the three times as well as the three virtues are interactive, as we have said. However, each virtue relates more with one time than with another. Of course Hope has to do with the future, being Faith projected into the future where its content is found. Charity must occupy our present and Faith is the virtue that inspires our past.

2 Timothy 4:7 – "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith." Faith comes from the past to give us self-esteem, a feeling that it was worth it and that our struggles were not in vain. Hope comes from the future to tell us "do not be afraid"; Charity arises from the present to give us the priorities that overcome our stress in saying, "strive FIRST for the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well". (Matthew 6:33)

Grammatically, our existence is not defined in simple present; the present continuous does not serve us either. The grammatical time that most reflects what happens to us at the level of existence will be a mix of present perfect with present continuous. Applying this time to the quote of St. Paul would be "I have been keeping the Faith." In the present perfect, the action began in the past, continues in the present and is opened to the future.  

Faith and the past - between depression and self-esteem
A psychiatrist said that a Christian must have a poor memory of the past. I would not say that we should forget what went wrong in the past so we could live without depression and with a minimum self-esteem. What we need to have is a benevolent vision of our past, we must reconcile with it and with all the people who were part of it, including ourselves of course. The past has of course gone, but it continues to be reinterpreted in the present.

Certain facts that were part of it have already had several interpretations throughout our life. As we know more about ourselves, that is, as we have an overview of our life, it is easier to fit in a positive way each negative fact of our past life. There is an interesting Portuguese and Spanish proverb that I assume is the popular version of the “Felix Culpa” theology that says: “There are no evils from which good does not come”. On the same wavelength, another says that God writes straight on crooked lines. Human lines are crooked but God even on these lines he writes straight.

We must be able to chant our Happy Fault (Félix Culpa) about our past so that it comes to our present in a positive way, and not negative, haunting us. Like Jules Verne on his voyage to the center of the Earth, we have to travel back to our past to flood it with the light of our present (because, as a proverb has it, “where the sun does not enter, the doctor does”) and thus prevent this from invading our present in a sneaky, clandestine and negative way.

What we know about ourselves, of our past, we can control; what we don't know about ourselves, controls us. That is why this pilgrimage journey from the present to the past is necessary. By returning to the present after this journey to the past, I am able to establish Faith as the guiding thread of my life; like in a pearl necklace, this thread binds each of the facts of the past in a harmonious way that positively explains how I came to be what I am today.

This thread that binds all the facts together in a positive way is our faith in Christ, the center, origin and destination of our lives. Like the Earth revolving around the Sun, our (liturgical) year is spent around his Person and his Word, from his birth to his Ascension into Heaven, in a helical movement from the past to the future.

This makes events of every Christmas, every Easter and every Pentecost always old and always new; where I was at Christmas last year is not where I am now. Therefore, every feast is always same and always different in this helical journey around Christ towards the future.

Hope and the future - between anxiety and Hope
Therefore do not worry, saying, “What will we eat?” or “What will we drink?” or “What will we wear?” (…) your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and is righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. ‘So do not worry about tomorrow, (…) Today’s trouble is enough for today.  Matthew 6:31-34

From the moment we are adopted by God as his children, we should no longer worry. Children live occupied and always try to be occupied, not preoccupied. They leave the worries to their parents, who are the ones that should be worried about the well-being of the child. This must be our relationship with God our Father: we must be busy with the affairs of the Kingdom of God and leave to him our livelihood, our clothing, our future.

As we have already mentioned in other texts, the biblical man walks towards the future backwards, being guided by the past. As we walk with our back to the future, the horizons are broadened and each particular fact is seen and placed in plain sight as a piece of a puzzle. On the other hand, that same past provides me with the navigation tool for the future. At sea, both on the surface of the water and under it, submarines are not guided by sight, but by instruments; the same goes for airplanes in the air. Our past is the instrument of navigation for the future because, as much as we want to, we do not know the future; but since it is known to God, it is in him that we trust.

(...) if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in vain and your faith has been in vain.  1 Corinthians 15:14

Where we come from, where we are going and what is the meaning of our life are the questions that every human being asks himself from the moment he knows himself as a person. Only Christ is the complete answer to these questions.

In Christ we put our Hope that our death is a birth to eternal life, not the end of life, an eternal death. It is this future that gives meaning to our present, and without this future nothing of the present would make sense. If, as atheists and agnostics believe, we come from nothing and head towards nothing, if nothing is the beginning and nothing is the end, how can the middle be something of meaning? How can something have meaning when it begins in nothing and ends in nothing?

Without the future, the present is nauseating no matter how pleasant it may be. This is what Sartre experienced, Nietzsche before him and Camus after him: if you come from nothing, you have no Faith, if you go to nothing, you have no Hope, the surest thing is that you have no Charity because life lacks meaning, it is nauseating.

(…) I know the one in whom I have put my trust… 2 Timothy 1:12

We are not heading towards the sunset of our life, but towards the dawn of eternal life. Therefore, no matter how happy we are, the best is yet to come; no matter how much we suffer or how much we are decrepit, limited, sick or old, the best is to come always, it is not here in the circumstances and vicissitudes of the here and now that we put our trust in, for we know that we do not have a lasting city here, but we are looking for the city that is to come. (Hebrews 13:14)

Charity and the present - between stress and tranquility
‘Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.’  Matthew 11:28-30

Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labour in vain. Unless the Lord guards the city, the guard keeps watch in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives sleep to his beloved...  Psalm 127:1-2

Our present can be invaded by the remorse of the past or by the fear, worry and anxiety of the future. In this way, we become stressed, disoriented, paralyzed, not knowing where to go and what to do, like Marta (Luke 10:38-42) who went around like a headless chicken.

The Master calls us to go to Him, to accept His yoke, His law, His way of proceeding and doing things, and then we will find rest. It is the Lord who guards the city: dawn does not last long before morning come. All we have to do is not to save for tomorrow what we can do today.

The priority is the Kingdom of God and His justice, everything else comes after. We often realize that we have been sweeping other people’s houses, and upon return, we find our own house swept clean as well. It is in helping others that we help ourselves. It is in helping to solve the problems of others that we find ours magically solved. That is why others do not come to increase our stress, they come to eliminate it. This is what it means to "strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well."

When you ask for a favor, ask someone who is busy, and not someone who is unoccupied, because the latter will tell you he still got a lot to do. The problem of stress is fundamentally a problem of priorities. We often self-sabotage when under a lot of stress, we do what is the least important first, putting aside and compulsively delaying what truly counts.

Trinitarian Fatima: My God I believe, I adore and I love you...
My God, I believe, I adore, I hope and I love You. / I ask pardon of You for those who do not believe, / do not adore, do not hope, and do not love You.

The seer and "evangelist" of Fatima, Lucia, told the then Cardinal Ratzinger that the "practical" aim of all the apparitions was to make the people of God grow in the theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity, which are present in the message since the first prayer taught by the Angel: "My God, I believe, I adore, I hope and I love you..."

A simple and singular prayer, that is also complete; an invitation to Christians to live the three dimensions of human time: Past - Present - Future, drawing inspiration from the three theological virtues: Faith - Hope - Charity. Human life takes place exclusively in the present; a present that, when it is full of Charity inspired by the past of our parents’ Faith, is without fear or anxiety because of the Hope that projects us into the future.

The virtue of Faith: "I Believe" – Faith is the philosopher's stone that makes us see life and reality with different eyes. Faith is a step we take beyond what is rational and yet reasonable; it is a risk, a decision, a fundamental option. It is the key that opens the door to Salvation – in other words, door to Heaven in the future, but which in the present, in the here and now, translates into peace, happiness and feeling good, physically, spiritually, psychologically and morally.

The virtue of Hope: "I hope" – The theological virtue of Hope is Faith projected into the future that gives a sense of security in the present moment. A Christian does not need anxiolytics because he has no anxiety; perfectly anchored in Faith that translates, in the present, in the here and now, into Charity to God and neighbour. "He who does not owe does not fear" says the proverb; a Christian does not fear because he is not indebted to anyone, not to God, not to men.

Faith also assures Christians that, no matter how good or how bad the present moment is, everything is fleeting and their story will have a happy ending. The end of their story is already assured in the death and Resurrection of the Lord. If we have the Faith that allows us to believe that even the hairs of our head are numbered, as the gospel says, we live in the certainty that even though the present moment may be of suffering and anguish, the best is yet to come and our story will have a happy ending. Therefore, fear and anxiety disappear and the ups and downs of our lives are lived in Hope and Faith in divine providence and not in fear.

"In the end my Immaculate Heart will triumph" – It is in this Faith and in this Hope that the little shepherds of Fatima lived, especially Lucia, who would soon lose the companionship of her cousins. Realizing that she was going to be alone in the world, Lucia must have felt a great sadness, which led Our Lady to ask her, "And you suffer much for this?" Then, as a way of comfort and consolation, she said, "My Immaculate Heart will be your refuge and the way that will lead you to God," or to heaven that had already been promised to her, Jacinta, and Francisco since the very first apparition.

The virtue of Charity: I adore... and I love you – We live only in the present, inspired by the past and confident in the future. The present of our life must be full of Charity; Charity, or Love, can only be lived in the present moment. "Don't keep for tomorrow what you can and should do today." Good intentions do not save anyone, not even ourselves. Charity cannot be a project, but an action in the present time. Charity cannot be postponed.

I adore you - The present moment must be full of love of God. Finding time and seeking a place to be with Him, like Jesus used to do and like Francisco of Fatima also used to do, isolating himself from his companions, by hiding behind a wall or in a deserted place, or spending school time in the Church of Fatima, consoling the Hidden Jesus.

I love you – When we love God as Father with all our heart, we look at the other with different set of eyes; he is no longer our enemy, our rival whom we fear or envy, but our brother whom we desire all the best in the world. In this sense, love of God does not exist without love of neighbour and vice versa, that is why for Jesus, the two are part of a single commandment of love.

Three virtues, three Popes
There are those who want to see an incarnation of the theological virtues in the lives of the last three Popes of the Church. John Paul II, who crossed the threshold of the third millennium, is the Pope of Hope; Benedict XVI, who wrote an encyclical on Faith, proclaimed the year of Faith and his whole life as a theologian defended the reasonableness of Faith, and is therefore the Pope of Faith; Pope Francis, by the name he has chosen, by his words and gestures, is the Pope of Charity.

FAITH
Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own insight. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths. Proverbs 3:5-6

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. (…) And without faith it is impossible to please God, for whoever would approach him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.  Hebrews 11:1, 6

We walk by faith, not by sight.  2 Corinthians 5:7

To have faith is to sign a blank page and let God write whatever he wants. St. Augustine

Faith - a sixth sense - transcends the intellect without contradicting it. Gandhi

The first of the three virtues is the foundation for the other two. Faith was, in Roman mythology, the goddess of trust, daughter of Saturn and Opis. To have Faith means to believe, trust, bet on, or adhere to a person or group of people or a doctrine. To believe, to credit, means the same as to rely on, but it has a different etymological root, because the concept of believing derives from ‘cor’ which in Latin means heart; to place the hand over one’s heart is a symbolic gesture that means to believe, to trust, and even to commit oneself, to be loyal, faithful.

Faith is the mental acceptance of the truth of a doctrine, an affirmation, or existence of a Supreme Being, for which there are no immediate ascertainable certainty. Similarly, the Bible, in turn, defines Faith in Hebrews 11:1 as being the firm foundation of things to be expected, and proof of things that are not seen.

Faith is a reasonable leap prepared rationally, like someone who is walking along the road and reaches a point where he has to jump over to the other side of the precipice; Faith is a leap into the future or a visible present reality starting from a hypothetical future not yet present. Faith is to navigate on the sea or in the air or under the sea without the sight of the way or route we go through. Faith is the child who throws himself into the air into the expectant arms of his father or mother.

From the point of view of knowledge, Faith does not belong neither to analysis nor to deductive logical knowledge; Faith has more to do with synthesis and intuitive knowledge. To have Faith is to intuit that something is right without all the guarantees; it is to write a blank cheque, to lend money or a book and believe that it will be returned. Faith is to bet and to risk.

Einstein's theory of general relativity was for a long time an object of Faith; it was born out of an intuition of its founder; it was only a short time ago that we began to have evidence of the veracity of this theory. The new quantum physics that admits invisible and imperishable realities contradicts and is quite different from Newton's mechanical physics, where reality seemed to function perfectly, like a Swiss clock.

Rational, irrational, reasonable
Many scientists who once looked at Faith as superstition, but with the theory of relativity and the new quantum physics, are now forced to recognize that not all scientific knowledge arises from deductive logic and are susceptible to be proven empirically in the immediate. These scientists are dualists because between the rationality of science and the irrationality of superstition, they do not recognize a reasonable, intermediate, plausible and humanly understandable concept.

Fides quaerens intellectum (Faith seeking understanding) – St. Anselmo's great maxim speaks of Faith as a form of knowledge that enables the intellect to go beyond itself, to jump over to the other side if there is no other way to get there. Faith is not irrational because it strives to understand, and since it is not immediately verifiable like science of our time, it is therefore reasonable.

The First Vatican Council, in fact, defines Faith as a reasonable gift. Reasonable is a mixture of rational and irrational. To have Faith is to read the signs of the times, unnoticeable details that indicate to us that something is about to happen. We humans only know that there is a fire when we see or smell the smoke, the jungle animals know there is a fire nearby long before they see or smell the smoke. In many other atmospheric and natural phenomena, animals are very intuitive in order to protect themselves from imminent disasters.

Faith identifies us with a past                                                                              The heritage of humanity is not only made up of historical monuments, but also of all that the human race is and has done throughout the 5 million years of its existence on this planet. All this is genetically encrypted in the DNA of every child who comes into this world, it is something like Jung's collective unconscious, and it is a part of us and defines us as such. All this is in the past.

"Libri ex libris fiunt", when I want to create something new, in any field of knowledge, I have to research what has already been done on this subject in order to add the fruit of my work. Only God has the ability to create out of nothing.

Faith in a personal God, Creator of everything and everyone, who revealed himself through the prophets and then in His Son, and who sent us the Holy Spirit, already has a history. My adherence to this Faith makes me a part of this history and gives me identity and a sense of belonging to a people and a community.

The same is true at the individual level. I know what I am and what I am capable of by looking back, seeing the performance of my talents and my shortcomings in the various circumstances that life has thrown at me throughout my personal history. It is the approval of this past that gives me the sense of self-esteem that I need to relate properly with myself, with God, with others, and with my environment. If I am trapped in my past, hostage to my past, I am not free for others or for God.

Even God who lives in eternity, outside of space and time confinement, in order to present himself to men, made use of his coexistence with them in the past, presenting himself to Moses as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob...

HOPE
(...) because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. You have heard of this hope before in the word of the truth, the gospel (…) Colossians 1:5

(…) remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and labour of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.  1 Thessalonians 1:3

(…) with the eyes of your heart enlightened, you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance among the saints, (…) Ephesians 1:18

Let us hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who has promised is faithful. Hebrews 10:23

It is likely that the Lord created hope on the same day that he created spring. Bern Williams

They do not know nor dream /That dream commands life /And that as long as man dreams
The world jumps and advances /Like a colored ball /Between the hands of a child. António Gedeão

While there is life, there's hope. Marcus Tullius

The second, of the three virtues is the daughter of Faith, just as Jesus Christ is the Only Begotten Son of the Father and indeed it is in Him that the anchor of our Hope rests. As St. Paul stressed, "If Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in vain and your faith has been in vain (1 Corinthians 15:14); everything falls apart like a deck of cards if Christ has not risen, our whole life lacks meaning and foundation like a sand castle. Christ is the only guarantee of life beyond death because He himself passed this threshold, not as God that he was, but as the man whom he incarnated, Jesus of Nazareth.

Jesus' message is not just about configuring our present and saving our past, it is also about the future since it is about something that is already here, but not yet in its entirety: the Kingdom of God. It is the project of building the Kingdom that links the past, the present and the future, which leads us to walk in an archetypical dynamic of Egypt – Desert - Promised Land.

Christian Hope is the virtue through which we desire and work for the kingdom of Heaven and eternal life. By placing our Faith in Christ and his promises, we rely on our strength but also in the complementary help of the Holy Spirit. Christian Hope is the fulfillment of all that God has promised his people since Abraham.

Hope projects us into the future
Since the stubborn donkey did not want to move, the young man tied a carrot hanging at the end of a stick, he then mounted the donkey and held the carrot two feet in front of the animal’s nostrils. Hoping to bite the carrot, the donkey kept moving forward not realizing that the carrot was moving too.

Hope is Faith on wheels; the dynamic Faith that propels us into the future. We all need a carrot to entice us to move. Dream is the engine of life; it is not in the present, but it is what inspires our present.

Martin Luther King was one of those who, projected into the future, mortgaged his life in the fight for equality between Blacks and Whites; a dream he knew would not come true in his lifetime. The day before his assassination, drawing inspiration from Moses who, after 40 years of walking through the wilderness, saw the Promised Land, which he did not enter, from the top of Mount Nebo, King said, "I am grateful to God because he has granted me to see the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land."

For those who do not know where they are going, there are no favorable winds - One only lives with meaning in the present if it is imbued with the future. To live a present without the presence of a future is to drift. And when the present is painful, it is Hope for a better future that helps us to bear it.

About the Kingdom of God, theologians say that it is present, "already" among us since Christ came to us, but “not yet” in its fullness. Paraphrasing this idea, we can say that: while Faith helps us to look at the present as an “already”, Hope compels us to judge this very same present as a “not yet” in its plenitude.

Hope helps us to disengage from the present and to continue walking knowing that, regardless of how good the conditions we might be living in, this is not yet the Kingdom. The Hope that traces out for us the course of the future gives us a goal, a way to go, a knowledge of where to go.

There is no evil that always lasts, nor good that always endures - It is Hope that uninstalls us from the present when it is rosy, telling us that we have not arrived yet, and it is Hope that takes us out of despair from a present situation. Life is made up of ups and downs, just like the electrocardiogram and electroencephalogram. Hope makes us not lose our head at the top and not to despair at the bottom.
 
Not all optimists have Hope, but all who have Hope are optimists; don't look at a bottle as half empty, but as half full. Hope is the positive way of interpreting the present, of seeing it through the filters of the signs of the times, imbued with a bright future for everyone because God wants it so for everyone; He wants us to have life and have it in abundance.

CHARITY
What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but do not have works? Can faith save you? If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill’, and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead. But someone will say, ‘You have faith and I have works.’ Show me your faith without works, and I by my works will show you my faith. James 2:14-18

If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.  1 Corinthians 13:1-3

Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. 1 John 4:8
Let all that you do be done in love. 1 Corinthians 16:14

The third of the three virtues proceeds from Faith and Hope, just as the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son; and it is indeed the Holy Spirit who sustains us in the living and practicing of this virtue. While Faith underlies, and Hope inspires and motivates, Charity acts, for it proceeds from Faith and Hope as the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son.

It is in Charity or by Charity that we validate Faith and Hope or that we prove that we have Faith and Hope. If there is no Charity, Faith is dead, and if Faith is dead, Hope which is its daughter was never born. The value of Faith and Hope lies in their role as the foundation of Charity and in making it possible.

Through Charity we know who has Faith and who has Hope. On the other hand, it is in Charity that Faith and Hope feed and grow. It is Charity that feeds back Faith and Hope, making them both grow. Charity leads to more Faith and Faith leads to more Charity.

Now we enter into the finest theological virtue that is the result of the previous two: if we have Faith, it means that we believe in God's revelation, and if we have Hope, it means that we have the inspiration to persevere, this also means that we have in us the values that have been given to us from God's revelation, in order to practice them.

It is here that Charity comes in — which is the visible face of Faith — it is Charity that confirms Faith and Hope, so we have as a statement: "Faith without works is dead", since it would mean that we do not adhere to God's revelation. This would imply, in other words, a denial of the commandments: to love one’s neighbour as oneself, to help the poor, to teach the needy, to evangelize, etc.

Charity is Love, just as it is a form of friendship with God. God Loves us, so we must love God, and if God loves us it means that we too must love our neighbour, therefore we have the order: love of God, of oneself and of others. If in Faith we love God above everything, it is in Charity that we love our neighbour as we love ourselves.

Charity fills our present
Obras son amores que no buenas razones... (Works are love not fancy words…) Castilian proverb

Unlike the past and the future, the present is in our hands, in it and only in it are we free to act. The present is the here and now of our life that must be full of action, of acts of Charity and Love. For the Christian, to live is to love and to love is to serve, to put oneself at the service of those who need us the most.

Considering what Mother Teresa of Calcutta did and how much there was to do in the face of so much misery and poverty, a journalist once said, "What Mother does is like a drop of water in the ocean"; to which she answered with great humility, "Yes, but if I did not do it the ocean would have one drop of water less."  

God does not ask us to revolutionize the world, or do THE best, he only asks us for OUR best. In the parable of the talents, the one who achieved more is no more praised than the one who achieved less; in the parable of the labourers in the vineyard, those who worked all day received no more than those who worked only one hour; in the parable of the sower, those who produce 100% are no more exalted than those who produce 60% or those who produce only 30%.

Much or few, all the Lord asks of us, is that we bear fruit: that our life be productive and that we leave here more than what we found. Furthermore, that we are part of the solution and not part of the problem; that is, may our living and acting be a contribution to the solutions of this world’s problems and not a contribution to make them worse.

We will be judged by how much or how little we love
It is in Charity that the Love of God manifests itself in love of neighbour and vice versa. As Christ is in the poor and the needy, it is by loving the poor and the needy that we live the gospel and that we love God.

In the end we will be judged by how much or how little we have loved; according to Matthew 25 the questions in the final judgment are already there, it would be bad if we did not pass a test where questions are already known. These questions are not about Faith nor about Hope; in regards to salvation, Faith and Hope are secondary; they are worthy to the extent of whether or not they have increased Charity.

The final judgment is not about Faith, what religion or practice we had, nor about Hope, but exclusively about Charity. I was hungry, I was thirsty, I was naked, I was in prison, I was sick, I was a pilgrim, an outsider, a foreigner, and you gave or did not give me assistance.

The matter of final judgment is not a Shakespearean question of to be or not to be, but rather a little more positivist or pragmatic of to do or not to do. Hell is paved with good intentions, so it is by works, by fruits that we know a person, it is by how much you do that we know how much you are worth.

Since it is our doing, our working and not our being that goes on trial, we are not at an advantage over the agnostics, atheists, Muslims or the faithful of any other religion. What is important is what you have done, and on this regard, although Christianity has the fullness of truth, all religions have some truth in them, as they are all meant to guide their followers to self-realization, happiness and heaven.

Many with few means (I am referring to the faithful of other religions) have gone further in perfection than others, such as Christians despite having all the means of holiness at their disposal. Let us be aware that: “From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked”. (Luke 12: 48)

Conclusion - The three virtues work in our lives like a GPS. Faith connects us to God, it is our guiding star or satellite, telling us where we are and what we are, that is, sinners. Hope tells us where we want to go and what we want to be, that is, saints. Charity is the only means and the road map to attain holiness.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC