|
1725 The Beatitudes take up and fulfil Gods promisesfrom Abraham on by ordering them to the Kingdom of heaven. They respond to the desire for happiness that God has placed in the human heart. 1726 The Beatitudes teach us the final end to
which God calls us: the Kingdom, the vision of God,
participation in the divine nature, eternal life, filiation,
rest in God. 1727 The beatitude of eternal ljfe is
agratuitousg~ft of God. It is supernatural, as is the grace
that leads us there. 1728 The Beatitudes confront us with decisive
choices concerning earthly goods; they pur~fy our hearts in
order to teach us to love God above all things. 1729 The beatitude of heaven sets the standards
for discernment in the use of earthly goods in keeping with
the law of God. 1730 God created man a rational being, conferring on him the dignity of a person who can initiate and control his own actions. God willed that man should be left in the hand of his own
freely attain his full and blessed
perfection by cleaving to him.~26
Man is rational and therefore like God; he is created
with free will and is master over his acts.27
1731 Freedom is the power, rooted in
reason and will, to act or not to act, to do this or that,
and so to perform deliberate actions on ones own
responsibility. By free will one shapes ones own life.
goodness; it attains its perfection when
directed toward God, our beatitude. |
|