Theological and Cardinal Virtues: Understanding Conscience and Marriage
Theological Virtues
Virtues are dispositions that help us to pray well, according to right reason.
- Faith: The light that guides us on the path to Heaven by believing in God and all He has revealed and proposes to His Church.
- Hope: The virtue by which we hope to achieve salvation and be eternally happy in Heaven.
- Charity: The virtue by which we love God above all things and our neighbor as ourselves for love of God.
Cardinal Virtues
- Prudence: Consists of thinking and acting with caution to avoid damage. It disposes practical reason to discern good and choose the right means to achieve it. It is the value of greater awareness that helps us deal with situations of ordinary life, and helps us to reflect and consider the possible effects of our words and actions.
- Justice: Consists of giving each his due. This precisely requires the guidance of prudence. There is no justice without mercy, charity, or love. Justice is a fundamental principle of the existence and coexistence of men.
- Fortitude: The virtue of fortitude is to have the courage and determination to persevere in good work to the end, no matter the obstacles, or to endure a bad situation with patience and intelligence to the end without collapsing.
- Temperance: The virtue of temperance enables us to properly control and channel our tendencies.
Conscience
The trial, which is the reason for the will and wickedness of our deeds, flanges the possibility of seeing them in relation to God’s plans. You can say it is the norm next to the immediate personal subjective morality, and the supreme standard, objective, is the law of God, which tells the route to be followed to achieve the ultimate goal. The most secret core and sanctuary of a human, where they are alone with God, is the place where your voice resonates, always calling to love, to do good, and to avoid evil.
Synderesis
Its application to particular circumstances by practical discernment of reasons and goods, and ultimately formed the view on conscious acts that are to be performed or have been performed. Conscience is the faculty of the soul. Conscience assists the word of God. Given the need for awareness that can make judgments according to reason and with divine law, or otherwise a misjudgment that departs from them. The human person must always obey the trial of his conscience. If the latter were to act deliberately, he would condemn himself. But it happens that conscience may be affected by ignorance and can make erroneous judgments about acts planned or committed.
Marriage
Marriage is a union blessed by God and raised to the category of a sacrament. It designates the love with which God loves man. Its goal: the man and woman are united by their own will in marriage, a covenant of love and fidelity for life, and also to form a family. Sacramental signs are partnerships. We all need to grow up in a family, with parents who gave us life or with other people who adopted us for love. The family is a basic necessity for everyone, as the original cell of social life. In each family, one receives what is essential for life: love, care, containment, education, food, and a home. There, we learn basic attitudes to life (listening, respect, sharing, helping, forgiving, and asking for pardon, etc.). Through family life, we prepare to live together in society, to be with others through social attitudes, and to be truly supportive.
The Concept of Family
The concept of family is a group of people living under one roof, arranged in fixed roles (father, mother, siblings, etc.), linked by blood or not, so caring for a family of common economic and social existence, with feelings of affection that bind them.
Human Freedom
Freedom is a gift from God that enables us to act or not, to choose between one thing or another. It lies in the way of thinking. When it serves for growth and maturation, responsibility diminishes the bad acts. Every human person has a right to be free and valued. Freedom is finite and reaches its reliable perfection because it makes us choose God, who is good and the ultimate truth. “My freedom ends where another’s begins” means I am free to choose what I want to some extent; the freedom of others begins. I am free as long as that liberty does not disturb the neighbor. “Any act is imputable to its author:” the author of an act must be conscious when doing so to try him.