Catechism index

2011 You are glorified in the assembly of your Holy Ones, for in crowning their merits you are crowning your own gifts. 59 The charity of Christ is the source in us of all our merits before God. Grace, by uniting us to Christ in active love, ensures the supernatural quality of our acts and …
2012 IV. Christian Holiness "We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him . . . For those whom he fore knew he also predestined to be conformed to the image …
2013 IV. Christian Holiness "All Christians in any state or walk of life are called to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection of charity." 65 All are called to holiness: "Be perfect, as …
2014 IV. Christian Holiness Spiritual progress tends toward ever more intimate union with Christ. This union is called "mystical" because it participates in the mystery of Christ through the sacraments - "the holy mysteries" - and, …
2015 IV. Christian Holiness The way of perfection passes by way of the Cross. There is no holiness without renunciation and spiritual battle. 68 Spiritual progress entails the ascesis and mortification that gradually lead to living …
2016 He who climbs never stops going from beginning to beginning, through beginnings that have no end. He never stops desiring what he already knows. 69 The children of our holy mother the Church rightly hope for the grace of final perseverance and the recompense of God their Father for the good works accomplished with his grace in …
2017 IN BRIEF The grace of the Holy Spirit confers upon us the righteousness of God. Uniting us by faith and Baptism to the Passion and Resurrection of Christ, the Spirit makes us sharers in …
2018 IN BRIEF Like conversion, justification has two aspects. Moved by grace, man turns toward God and away from sin, and so accepts forgiveness and righteousness from on high.
2019 IN BRIEF Justification includes the remission of sins, sanctification, and the renewal of the inner man.
2020 IN BRIEF Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ. It is granted us through Baptism. It conforms us to the righteousness of God, who justifies us. It has for its …
2021 IN BRIEF Grace is the help God gives us to respond to our vocation of becoming his adopted sons. It introduces us into the intimacy of the Trinitarian life.
2022 IN BRIEF The divine initiative in the work of grace precedes, prepares, and elicits the free response of man. Grace responds to the deepest yearnings of human freedom, calls freedom to cooperate with it, …
2023 IN BRIEF Sanctifying grace is the gratuitous gift of his life that God makes to us; it is infused by the Holy Spirit into the soul to heal it of sin and to sanctify …
2024 IN BRIEF Sanctifying grace makes us "pleasing to God." Charisms, special graces of the Holy Spirit, are oriented to sanctifying grace and are intended for the common good of the Church. God also acts …
2025 IN BRIEF We can have merit in God's sight only because of God's free plan to associate man with the work of his grace. Merit is to be ascribed in the first place to …
2026 IN BRIEF The grace of the Holy Spirit can confer true merit on us, by virtue of our adoptive filiation, and in accordance with God's gratuitous justice. Charity is the principal source of merit …
2027 IN BRIEF No one can merit the initial grace which is at the origin of conversion. Moved by the Holy Spirit, we can merit for ourselves and for others all the graces needed to …
2028 IN BRIEF "All Christians . . . are called to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection of charity" (LG 40 # 2). "Christian perfection has but one limit, that of having …
2029 IN BRIEF "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me" (Mt 16:24). Previous - Next Copyright © Libreria Editrice Vaticana
2030 THE CHURCH, MOTHER AND TEACHER It is in the Church, in communion with all the baptized, that the Christian fulfills his vocation. From the Church he receives the Word of God containing the teachings of "the law …