CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN BRIEF

Most people have not read one of the greatest books in print---the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Most Catholics have not read it. I have, and was surprised to find that there's nothing surprising in it. It simply puts all the pieces of a mixed up world together into one wonderful working whole. If all were to follow this book, there would be no more problems in the world. Of course pride and greed and desire of power and all those yucky things prevent this from happening, but because of that the Catechism is needed all the more. And it's needed to be read all the more.

After each section in the Catechism there's a capsulization of what was just written, called "In Brief." I've gone through and have faithfully typed all these In Brief notes in hopes that you will peruse them and be encouraged to read this book formally made public by St. John Paul II. The notes are numbered here and in the Catechism, so if you have a copy on hand and want to know more about something, just go back a few numbers in the text and things will be explained in full. For the sake of simplicity here, I do not include the source references, to the Bible, Saints, Church councils, etc. For those you will need to look in the actual Catechism. But even if you never get a copy of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, you can learn much just by reading these In Brief notes with an open, thoughtful mind and a prayerful heart. God bless you.

44   Man is by nature and vocation a religious being. Coming from God, going toward God, man lives a fully human life only if he freely lives by his bond with God.

45   Man is made to live in communion with God in whom he finds happiness: "When I am completely united to you, there will be no more sorrow or trials; entirely full of you, my life will be complete."

46   When he listens to the message of creation and to the voice of conscience, man can arrive at certainty about the existence of God, the cause and the end of everything.

47   The Church teaches that the one true God, our Creator and Lord, can be known with certainty from his works, by the natural light of human reason.

48   We really can name God, starting from the manifold perfections of his creatures, which are likenesses of the infinitely perfect God, even if our limited language cannot exhaust the mystery.

49   "Without the Creator, the creature vanishes." This is the reason why believers know that the love of Christ urges them to bring the light of the living God to those who do not know him or who reject him.

68   By love, God has revealed himself and given himself to man. He has thus provided the definitive, superabundant answer to the questions that man asks himself about the meaning and purpose of his life.

69   God has revealed himself to man by gradually communicating his own mystery in deeds and in words.

70   Beyond the witness to himself that God gives in created things, he manifested himself to our first parents, spoke to them and, after the fall, promised them salvation and offered them his covenant.

71   God made an everlasting covenant with Noah and with all living beings. It will remain in force as long as the world lasts.

72   God chose Abraham and made a covenant with him and his descendants. By the covenant God formed his people and revealed his law to them through Moses. Through the prophets, he prepared them to accept the salvation destined for all humanity.

73   God has revealed himself fully by sending his own Son, in whom he has established his covenant for ever. The Son is his Father's definitive Word; so there will be no further Revelation after him.

96   What Christ entrusted to the apostles, they in turn handed on by their preaching and writing, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, to all generations, until Christ returns in glory.

97   "Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture make up a single sacred deposit of the Word of God," in which, as in a mirror, the pilgrim Church contemplates God, the source of all her riches.

98   "The Church, in her doctrine, life, and worship, perpetuates and transmits to every generation all that she herself is, all that she believes."

99   Thanks to its supernatural sense of faith, the People of God as a whole never ceases to welcome, to penetrate more deeply, and to live more fully from the gift of divine Revelation.

100   The task of interpreting the Word of God authentically has been entrusted solely to the Magisterium of the Church, that is, to the Pope and to the bishops in communion with him.

134   All Sacred Scripture is but one book, and this one book is Christ, "because all divine Scripture speaks of Christ, and all divine Scripture is fulfilled in Christ."

135   "The Sacred Scriptures contain the Word of God and, because they are inspired they are truly the Word of God."

136   God is the author of Sacred Scripture because he inspired its human authors; he acts in them and by means of them. He thus gives assurance that their writings teach without error his saving truth.

137   Interpretation of the inspired Scripture must be attentive above all to what God wants to reveal through the sacred authors for our salvation. What comes from the Spirit is not fully "understood except by the Spirit's action."

138   The Church accepts and venerates as inspired the 46 books of the Old Testament and the 27 books of the New.

139   The four Gospels occupy a central place because Christ Jesus is their center.

140   The unity of the two Testaments proceeds from the unity of God's plan and his Revelation. The Old Testament prepares for the New and the New Testament fulfills the Old; the two shed light on each other; both are true Word of God.

141   "The Church has always venerated the divine Scriptures as she venerated the Body of the Lord": both nourish and govern the whole Christian life. "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path."

176   Faith is a personal adherence of the whole man to God who reveals himself. It involves an assent of the intellect and will to the self-revelation God has made through his deeds and words.

177   "To believe" has thus a twofold reference: to the person and to the truth: to the truth, by trust in the person who bears witness to it.

178   We must believe in no one but God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

179   Faith is a supernatural gift from God. In order to believe, man needs the interior helps of the Holy Spirit.

180   "Believing" is a human act, conscious and free, corresponding to the dignity of the human person.

181   "Believing" is an ecclesial act. The Church's faith precedes, engenders, supports, and nourishes our faith. The Church is the mother of all believers. "No one can have God as Father who does not have the Church as Mother."

182   We believe all "that which is contained in the word of God, written or handed down, and which the Church proposes for belief as divinely revealed."

183   Faith is necessary for salvation. The Lord himself affirms: "He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned."

184   "Faith is a foretaste of the knowledge that will make us blessed in the life to come."

228   "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord..." "The supreme being must be unique, without equal...If God is not one, he is not God."

229   Faith in God leads us to turn to him alone as our first origin and our ultimate goal, and neither to prefer anything to him nor to substitute anything for him.

230   Even when he reveals himself, God remains a mystery beyond words: "If you understood him, it would not be God."

231   The God of our faith has revealed himself as He who is; and he has made himself known as "abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness." God's very being is Truth and Love.

261   The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is the central mystery of the Christian faith and of Christian life. God alone can make it known to us by revealing himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

262   The Incarnation of God's Son reveals that God is the eternal Father and that the Son is consubstantial with the Father, which means that, in the Father and with the Father, the Son is one and the same God.

263   The mission of the Holy Spirit, sent by the Father in the name of the Son and by the Son "from the Father," reveals that, with them, the Spirit is one and the same God. "With the Father and the Son he is worshipped and glorified."

264   "The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father as the first principle and, by the eternal gift of this to the Son, from the communion of both the Father and the Son."

265   By the grace of Baptism "in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit," we are called to share in the life of the Blessed Trinity, here on earth in the obscurity of faith, and after death in eternal light.

266   "Now this is the Catholic faith: We worship one God in the Trinity and the Trinity in unity, without either confusing the persons or dividing the substance; for the person of the Father is one, the Son's is another, the Holy Spirit's another; but the Godhead of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is one, their glory equal, their majesty coeternal."

267   Inseparable in what they are, the divine persons are also inseparable in what they do. But within the single divine operation each shows forth what is proper to him in the Trinity, especially in the divine missions of the Son's Incarnation and the gift of the Holy Spirit.

275   With Job, the just man, we confess: "I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted."

276   Faithful to the witness of Scripture, the Church often addresses its prayer to the "almighty and eternal God," believing firmly that "nothing will be impossible with God."

277   God shows forth his almighty power by converting us from our sins and restoring us to  his friendship by grace. "God, you show your almighty power above all in your mercy and forgiveness..."

278   If we do not believe that God's love is almighty, how can we believe that the Father could create us, the Son redeem us, and the Holy Spirit sanctify us?

315   In the creation of the world and of man, God gave the first and universal witness to his almighty love and his wisdom, the first proclamation of the "plan of his loving goodness," which finds its goal in the new creation in Christ.

316   Though the work of creation is attributed to the Father in particular, it is equally a truth of faith that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit together are the one, indivisible principle of creation.

317   God alone created the universe freely, directly, and without any help.

318   No creature has the infinite power necessary to "create" in the proper sense of the word, that is, to produce and give being to that which had in no way possessed it (to call into existence "out of nothing").

319   God created the world to show forth and communicate his glory. That his creatures should share in his truth, goodness, and beauty---this is the glory for which God created them.

320   God created the universe and keeps it in existence by his Word, the Son "upholding the universe by his word of power" and by his Creator Spirit, the giver of life.

321   Divine providence consists of the dispositions by which God guides all his creatures with wisdom and love to their ultimate end.

322   Christ invites us to filial trust in the providence of our heavenly Father, and St. Peter the apostle repeats: "Cast all your anxieties on him, for he cares about you."

323   Divine providence works also through the actions of creatures. To human beings God grants the ability to cooperate freely with his plans.

324   The fact that God permits physical and even moral evil is a mystery that God illuminates by his Son Jesus Christ who died and rose to vanquish evil. Faith gives us the certainty that God would not permit an evil if he did not cause a good to come from that very evil, by ways that we shall fully know only in eternal life.

350   Angels are spiritual creatures who glorify God without ceasing and who serve his saving plans for other creatures: "The angels work together for the benefit of us all."

351   The angels surround Christ their Lord. They serve him especially in the accomplishment of his saving mission to men.

352   The Church venerates the angels who help her on her earthly pilgrimage and protect every human being.

353   God willed the diversity of his creatures and their own particular goodness, their interdependence, and their order. He destined all material creatures for the good of the human race. Man, and through him all creation, is destined for the glory of God.

354   Respect for laws inscribed in creation and the relations which derive from the nature of things is a principle of wisdom and a foundation for morality.

380   "Father,...you formed man in your own likeness and set him over the whole world to serve you, his creator, and to rule over all creatures."

381   Man is predestined to reproduce the image of God's Son made man, the "image of the invisible God," so that Christ shall be the first-born of a multitude of brothers and sisters.

382   "Man, though made of body and soul, is a unity." The doctrine of the faith affirms that the spiritual and immortal soul is created immediately by God.

383   "God did not create man a solitary being. From the beginning, 'male and female he created them.' This partnership of man and woman constitutes the first form of communion between persons."

384   Revelation makes known to us the state of original holiness and justice of man and woman before sin: from their friendship with God flowed the happiness of their existence in paradise.

413   "God did not make death, and he does not delight in the death of the living...It was through the devil's envy that death entered the world."

414   Satan or the devil and the other demons are fallen angels who have freely refused to serve God and his plan. Their choice against God is definitive. They try to associate man in their revolt against God.

415   "Although set by God in a state of rectitude, man, enticed by the evil one, abused his freedom at the very start of history. He lifted himself up against God and sought to attain his goal apart from him."

416   By his sin Adam, as the first man, lost the original holiness and justice he had received from God, not only for himself but for all human beings.

417   Adam and Eve transmitted to their descendants human nature wounded by their own first sin and hence deprived of original holiness and justice; this deprivation is called "original sin."

418   As a result of original sin, human nature is weakened in its powers; subject to ignorance, suffering, and the domination of death; and inclined to sin. (This inclination is called "concupiscence.")

419   "We therefore hold, with the Council of Trent, that original sin is transmitted with human nature, 'by propagation, not by imitation' and that it is...'proper to each.'"

420   The victory that Christ won over sin has given us greater blessings than those which sin had taken from us: "where sin increased, grace abounded all the more."

421   Christians believe that "the world has been established and kept in being by the Creator's love; has fallen into slavery to sin but has been set free by Christ, crucified and risen to break the power of the evil one..."

452   The name Jesus means "God saves." The child born of the Virgin Mary is called Jesus, "for he will save his people from their sins": "there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved."

453   The title "Christ" means "Anointed One" (Messiah). Jesus is the Christ, for "God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power." He was the one "who is to come," the object of "the hope of Israel."

454   The title "Son of God" signifies the unique and eternal relationship of Jesus Christ to God his Father: he is the only Son of the Father; he is God himself. To be a Christian, one must believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.

455   The title "Lord" indicates divine sovereignty. To confess or invoke Jesus as Lord is to believe in his divinity. "No one can say 'Jesus is Lord' except by the Holy Spirit."

479   At the time appointed by God, the only Son of the Father, the eternal Word, that is, the Word and substantial Image of the Father, became incarnate; without losing his divine nature he has assumed human nature.

480   Jesus Christ is true God and true man, in the unity of his divine person; for this reason he is the one and only mediator between God and men.

481   Jesus Christ possesses two natures, one divine and the other human, not confused, but united in the one person of God's Son.

482   Christ, being true God and true man, has a human intellect and will, perfectly attuned and subject to his divine intellect and divine will, which he has in common with the Father and the Holy Spirit.

483   The Incarnation is therefore the mystery of the wonderful union of the divine and human natures in the one person of the Word.

508   From among the descendants of Eve, God chose the Virgin Mary to be the mother of his Son. "Full of grace," Mary is "the most excellent fruit of redemption": from the first instant of her conception, she was totally preserved from the stain of original sin and she remained pure from all personal sin throughout her life.

509   Mary is truly "Mother of God" since she is the mother of the eternal Son of God made man, who is God himself.

510   Mary "remained a virgin in conceiving her Son, a virgin in giving birth to him, a virgin in carrying him, a virgin in nursing him at her breast, always a virgin": with her whole being she is "the handmaid of the Lord."

511   The Virgin Mary "cooperated through free faith and obedience in human salvation." She uttered her yes "in the name of all human nature." By her obedience she became the new Eve, mother of the living.

561   "The whole of Christ's life was a continual teaching: his silences, his miracles, his gestures, his prayer, his love for people, his special affection for the little and the poor, his acceptance of the total sacrifice on the Cross for the redemption of the world, and his Resurrection are the actualization of his word and the fulfillment of Revelation."

562   Christ's disciples are to conform themselves to him until he is formed in them. "For this reason we, who have been made like to him, who have died with him and risen with him, are taken up into the mysteries of his life, until we reign together with him."

563   No one, whether shepherd or wise man, can approach God here below except by kneeling before the manger at Bethlehem and adoring him hidden in the weakness of a new-born child.

564   By his obedience to Mary and Joseph, as well as by his humble work during the long years in Nazareth, Jesus gives us the example of holiness in the daily life of family and work.

565   From the beginning of his public life, at his baptism, Jesus is the "Servant," wholly consecrated to the redemptive work that he will accomplish by the "baptism" of his Passion.

566   The temptation in the desert shows Jesus, the humble Messiah, who triumphs over Satan by his total adherence to the plan of salvation willed by the father.

567   The Kingdom of heaven was inaugurated on earth by Christ. "This kingdom shone out before men in the word, in the works, and in the presence of Christ." The Church is the seed and beginning of this kingdom. Her keys are entrusted to Peter.

568   Christ's Transfiguration aims at strengthening the apostles' faith in anticipation of his Passion: the ascent onto the "high mountain" prepares for the ascent to Calvary. Christ, Head of the Church, manifests what his Body contains and radiates in the sacraments: "the hope of glory."

569   Jesus went up to Jerusalem voluntarily, knowing well that there he would die a violent death because of the opposition of sinners.

570   Jesus' entry into Jerusalem manifests the coming of the kingdom that the Messiah-King, welcomed into his city by children and the humble of heart, is going to accomplish by the Passover of his death and Resurrection.

592   Jesus did not abolish the Law of Sinai, but rather fulfilled it with such perfection that he revealed its ultimate meaning and redeemed the transgressions against it.

593   Jesus venerated the Temple by going up to it for the Jewish feasts of pilgrimage, and with a jealous love he loved this dwelling of God among men. The temple prefigures his own mystery. When he announces its destruction, it is as a manifestation of his own execution and of the entry into a new age in the history of salvation, when his Body would be the definitive Temple.

594   Jesus performed acts, such as pardoning sins, that manifested him to be the Savior God himself. Certain Jews, who did not recognize God made man, saw in him only a man who made himself God, and judged him as a blasphemer.

619   "Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures."

620   Our salvation flows from God's initiative of love for us, because "he loved us and sent his Son to be the expiation for our sins." "God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself."

621   Jesus freely offered himself for our salvation. Beforehand, during the Last Supper, he both symbolized this offering and made it really present: "This is my body which is given for you."

622   The redemption won by Christ consists in this, that he came "to give his life as a ransom for many," that is, he "loved [his own] to the end," so that they might be "ransomed from the futile ways inherited from [their] fathers."

623   By his loving obedience to the Father, "unto death, even death on a cross," Jesus fulfills the atoning mission of the suffering Servant, who will "make many righteous; and he shall bear their iniquities."

629   To the benefit of every man, Jesus Christ tasted death. It is truly the Son of God made man who died and was buried.

630   During Christ's period in the tomb, his divine person continued to assume both his soul and his body, although they were separated from each other by death. For this reason the dead Christ's body "saw no corruption."

636   By the expression "He descended into hell," the Apostles' Creed confesses that Jesus did really die and through his death for us conquered death and the devil "who has the power of death."

637   In his human soul united to his divine person, the dead Christ went down to the realm of the dead. He opened heaven's gates for the just who had gone before him.

656   Faith in the Resurrection has as its object an event which is historically attested to by the disciples, who really encountered the Risen One. At the same time, this event is mysteriously transcendent insofar as it is the entry of Christ's humanity into the glory of God.

657   The empty tomb and the linen cloths lying there signify in themselves that by God's power Christ's body had escaped the bonds of death and corruption. They prepared the disciples to encounter the Risen Lord.

658   Christ, "the first-born from the dead," is the principle of our own resurrection, even now by the justification of our souls, and one day by the new life he will impart to our bodies.

665   Christ's ascension marks the definitive entrance of Jesus' humanity into God's heavenly domain, whence he will come again; this humanity in the meantime hides him from the eyes of men.

666   Jesus Christ, the head of the Church, precedes us into the Father's glorious kingdom so that we, the members of his Body, may live in the hope of one day being with him for ever.

667   Jesus Christ, having entered the sanctuary of heaven once and for all, intercedes constantly for us as the mediator who assures us of the permanent outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

680   Christ the Lord already reigns through the Church, but all the things of this world are not yet subjected to him. The triumph of Christ's kingdom will not come about without one last assault by the powers of evil.

681   On Judgment Day at the end of the world, Christ will come in glory to achieve the definitive triumph of good over evil which, like the wheat and the tares, have grown up together in the course of history.

682   When he comes at the end of time to judge the living and the dead, the glorious Christ will reveal the secret disposition of hearts and will render to each man according to his works and according to his acceptance or refusal of grace.

742   "Because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba! Father!'"

743   From the beginning to the end of time, whenever God sends his Son, he always sends his Spirit: their mission is conjoined and inseparable. 

744   In the fullness of time the Holy Spirit completes in Mary all the preparations for Christ's coming among the People of God. by the action of the Holy Spirit in her, the Father gives the world Emmanuel, "God-with-us."

745   The Son of God was consecrated as Christ (Messiah) by the anointing of the Holy Spirit at his Incarnation.

746   By his Death and his Resurrection, Jesus is constituted in glory as Lord and Christ. From his fullness, he poured out the Holy Spirit on the apostles and the Church.

747   The Holy Spirit, whom Christ the head pours out on his members, builds, animates, and sanctifies the Church. She is the sacrament of the Holy Trinity's communion with men.

777   The word "Church" means "convocation." It designates the assembly of those whom God's Word "convokes," i.e., gathers together to form the People of God, and who themselves, nourished with the Body of Christ, become the Body of Christ.

778   The Church is both the means and the goal of God's plan: prefigured in creation, prepared for in the Old Covenant, founded by the words and actions of Jesus Christ, fulfilled by his redeeming cross and his Resurrection, the Church has been manifested as the mystery of salvation by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. She will be perfected in the glory of heaven as the assembly of all the redeemed of the earth. 

779   The Church is both visible and spiritual, a hierarchical society and the Mystical Body of Christ. She is one, yet formed of two components, human and divine. That is her mystery, which only faith can accept.

780   The Church in this world is the sacrament of salvation, the sign and the instrument of the communion of God and men.

802   Christ Jesus "gave himself for us to redeem us from all iniquity and to purify for himself a people of his own."

803   "You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people."

804   One enters into the People of God by faith and Baptism. "All men are called to belong to the new People of God," so that, in Christ, "men may form one family and one People of God."

805   The Church is the Body of Christ. Through the Spirit and his action in the sacraments, above all the Eucharist, Christ, who once was dead and is now risen, establishes the community of believers as his own Body.

806   In the unity of this Body, there is a diversity of members and functions. All members are linked to one another, especially to those who are suffering, to the poor and persecuted.

807   The Church is this Body of which Christ is the head: she lives from him, in him, and for him; he lives with her and in her.

808   The Church is the Bride of Christ: he loved her and handed himself over for her. He has purified her by his blood and made her the fruitful mother of all God's children.

809   The Church is the Temple of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is the soul, as it were, of the Mystical Body, the source of its life, of its unity in diversity, and of the riches of its gifts and charisms.

810   "Hence the universal Church is seen to be 'a people brought into unity from the unity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.'"

866   The Church is one: she acknowledges one Lord, confesses one faith, is born of one Baptism, forms only one Body, is given life by the one Spirit, for the sake of one hope, at whose fulfillment all divisions will be overcome.

867   The Church is holy: the Most Holy God is her author; Christ, her bridegroom, gave himself up to make her holy; the Spirit of holiness gives her life. Since she still includes sinners, she is "the sinless one made up of sinners." Her holiness shines in the saints; in Mary she is already all-holy.

868   The Church is catholic: she proclaims the fullness of the faith. She bears in herself and administers the totality of the means of salvation. She is sent out to all peoples. She speaks to all men. She encompasses all times. She is "missionary of her very nature."

869   The Church is apostolic. She is built on a lasting foundation: "the twelve apostles of the Lamb." She is indestructible. She is upheld infallibly in the truth: Christ governs her through Peter and the other apostles, who are present in their successors, the Pope and the college of bishops.

870   "The sole Church of Christ which in the Creed we profess to be one, holy, catholic, and apostolic,...subsists in the Catholic Church, which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the bishops in communion with him. Nevertheless, many elements of sanctification and of truth are found outside its visible confines."

934   "Among the Christian faithful by divine institution there exist in the Church sacred ministers, who are also called clerics in law, and other Christian faithful who are also called laity." In both groups there are those Christian faithful who, professing the evangelical counsels, are consecrated to God and so serve the Church's saving mission.

935   To proclaim the faith and to plant his reign, Christ sends his apostles and their successors. He gives them a share in his own mission. From him they receive the power to act in his person.

936   The Lord made St. Peter the visible foundation of his Church. He entrusted the keys of the Church to him. The bishop of the Church of Rome, successor to St. Peter, is "head of the college of bishops, the Vicar of Christ and Pastor of the universal Church on earth."

937   The Pope enjoys, by divine institution, "supreme, full, immediate, and universal power in the care of souls."

938   The Bishops, established by the Holy Spirit, succeed the apostles. They are "the visible source and foundation of unity in their own particular Churches."

939   Helped by the priests, their co-workers, and by the deacons, the bishops have the duty of authentically teaching the faith, celebrating divine worship, above all the Eucharist, and guiding their Churches as true pastors. Their responsibility also includes concern for all the Churches, with and under the Pope.

940   "The characteristic of the lay state being a life led in the midst of the world and of secular affairs, lay people are called by God to make of their apostolate, through the vigor of the Christian spirit, a leaven in the world."

941   Lay people share in Christ's priesthood: ever more united with him, they exhibit the grace of Baptism and Confirmation in all dimensions of their personal, family, social, and ecclesial lives, and so fulfill the call to holiness addressed to all the baptized.

942   By virtue of their prophetic mission, lay people "are called...to be witnesses to Christ in all circumstances and at the very heart of the community of mankind."

943   By virtue of their kingly mission, lay people have the power to uproot the rule of sin within themselves and in the world, by their self-denial and holiness of life.

944   The life consecrated to God is characterized by the public profession of the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience, in a stable state of life recognized by the Church.

945   Already destined for him through Baptism, the person who surrenders himself to the God he loves above all else thereby consecrates himself more intimately to God's service and to the good of the whole Church.

960   The Church is a "communion of saints": this expression refers first to the "holy things" (sancta), above all the Eucharist, by which "the unity of believers, who form one body in Christ, is both represented and brought about."

961   The term "communion of saints" refers also to the communion of "holy persons" (sancti) in Christ who "died for all," so that what each one does or suffers in and for Christ bears fruit for all.

962   "We believe in the communion of all the faithful of Christ, those who are pilgrims on earth, the dead who are being purified, and the blessed in heaven, all together forming one Church; and we believe that in this communion, the merciful love of God and his saints is always [attentive] to our prayers."

973   By pronouncing her "fiat" at the Annunciation and giving her consent to the Incarnation, Mary was already collaborating with the whole work her Son was to accomplish. She is mother wherever he is Savior and head of the Mystical Body.

974   The Most Blessed Virgin Mary, when the course of her earthly life was completed, was taken up body and soul into the glory of heaven, where she already shares in the glory of her Son's Resurrection, anticipating the resurrection of all members of his Body.

975   "We believe that the Holy Mother of God, the new Eve, Mother of the Church, continues in heaven to exercise her maternal role on behalf of the members of Christ."

984   The Creed links "the forgiveness of sins" with its profession of faith in the Holy Spirit, for the risen Christ entrusted to the apostles the power to forgive sins when he gave them the Holy Spirit.

985   Baptism is the first and chief sacrament of the forgiveness of sins: it unites us to Christ, who died and rose, and gives us the Holy Spirit.

986   By Christ's will, the Church possesses the power to forgive the sins of the baptized and exercises it through bishops and priests normally in the sacrament of Penance.

987   "In the forgiveness of sins, both priests and sacraments are instruments which our Lord Jesus Christ, the only author and liberal giver of salvation, wills to use in order to efface our sins and give us the grace of justification."

1015   "The flesh is the hinge of salvation." We believe in God who is creator of the flesh; we believe in the Word made flesh in order to redeem the flesh; we believe in the resurrection of the flesh, the fulfillment of both the creation and the redemption of the flesh.

1016   By death the soul is separated from the body, but in the resurrection God will give incorruptible life to our body, transformed by reunion with our soul. Just as Christ is risen and lives for ever, so all of us will rise at the last day.

1017   "We believe in the true resurrection of this flesh that we now possess." We sow a corruptible body in the tomb, but he raises up an incorruptible body, a "spiritual body."

1018   As a consequence of original sin, man must suffer "bodily death, from which man would have been immune had he not sinned."

1019   Jesus, the Son of God, freely suffered death for us in complete and free submission to the will of God, his Father. By his death he has conquered death, and so opened the possibility of salvation to all men.

1051   Every man receives his eternal recompense in his immortal soul from the moment of his death in a particular judgment by Christ, the judge of the living and the dead.

1052   "We believe that the souls of all who die in Christ's grace...are the People of God beyond death. On the day of resurrection, death will be definitively conquered, when these souls will be reunited with their bodies."

1053   "We believe that the multitude of those gathered around Jesus and Mary in Paradise forms the Church of heaven, where in eternal blessedness they see God as he is and where they are also, to various degrees, associated with the holy angels in the divine governance exercised by Christ in glory, by interceding for us and helping our weakness by their fraternal concern."

1054   Those who die in God's grace and friendship imperfectly purified, although they are assured of their eternal salvation, undergo a purification after death, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of God.

1055   By virtue of the "communion of saints," the Church commends the dead to God's mercy and offers her prayers, especially the holy sacrifice of the Eucharist, on their behalf.

1056   Following the example of Christ, the Church warns the faithful of the "sad and lamentable reality of eternal death," also called "hell."

1057   Hell's principal punishment consists of eternal separation from God in whom alone man can have the life and happiness for which he was created and for which he longs.

1058   The Church prays that no one should be lost: "Lord, let me never be parted from you." If it is true that no one can save himself, it is also true that God "desires all men to be saved," and that for him "all things are possible."

1059   "The holy Roman Church firmly believes and confesses that on the Day of Judgment all men will appear in their own bodies before Christ's tribunal to render an account of their own deeds."

1060   At the end of time, the Kingdom of God will come in its fullness. Then the just will reign with Christ for ever, glorified in body and soul, and the material universe itself will be transformed. God will then be "all in all," in eternal life.

1110   In the liturgy of the Church, God the Father is blessed and adored as the source of all the blessings of creation and salvation with which he has blessed us in his Son, in order to give us the Spirit of filial adoption.

1111   Christ's work in the liturgy is sacramental: because his mystery of salvation is made present there by the power of his Holy Spirit; because his Body, which is the Church, is like a sacrament (sign and instrument) in which the Holy Spirit dispenses the mystery of salvation; and because through her liturgical actions the pilgrim Church already participates, as by a foretaste, in the heavenly liturgy.

1112   The mission of the Holy Spirit in the liturgy of the Church is to prepare the assembly to encounter Christ; to recall and manifest Christ to the faith of the assembly; to make the saving work of Christ present and active by his transforming power; and to make the gift of communion bear fruit in the Church.

1131   The sacraments are efficacious signs of grace, instituted by Christ and entrusted to the Church, by which divine life is dispensed to us. The visible rites by which the sacraments are celebrated signify and make present the graces proper to each sacrament. They bear fruit in those who receive them with the required dispositions.

1132   The Church celebrates the sacraments as a priestly community structured by the baptismal priesthood and the priesthood of ordained ministers.

1133   The Holy Spirit prepares the faithful for the sacraments by the Word of God and the faith which welcomes that word in well-disposed hearts. Thus the sacraments strengthen faith and express it.

1134   The fruit of sacramental life is both personal and ecclesial. For every one of the faithful on the one hand, this fruit is life for God in Christ Jesus; for the Church, on the other, it is an increase in charity and in her mission of witness.

1187   The liturgy is the work of the whole Christ, head and body. Our high priest celebrates it unceasingly in the heavenly liturgy, with the holy Mother of God, the apostles, all the saints, and the multitude of those who have already entered the kingdom.

1188   In a liturgical celebration, the whole assembly is leitourgos, each member according to his own function. The baptismal priesthood is that of the whole Body of Christ. But some of the faithful are ordained through the sacrament of Holy Orders to represent Christ as head of the Body.

1189   The liturgical celebration involves signs and symbols relating to creation (candles, water, fire), human life (washing, anointing, breaking bread), and the history of salvation (the rites of the Passover). Integrated into the world of faith and taken up by the power of the Holy Spirit, these cosmic elements, human rituals, and gestures of remembrance of God become bearers of the saving and sanctifying action of Christ.

1190   The Liturgy of the Word is an integral part of the celebration. The meaning of the celebration is expressed by the Word of God which is proclaimed and by the response of faith to it.

1191   Song and music are closely connected with the liturgical action. The criteria for their proper use are the beauty expressive of prayer, the unanimous participation of the assembly, and the sacred character of the celebration.

1192   Sacred images in our churches and homes are intended to awaken and nourish our faith in the mystery of Christ. through the icon of Christ and his works of salvation, it is he whom we adore. through sacred images of the holy Mother of god, of the angels and of the saints, we venerate the persons represented.

1193   Sunday, the "Lord's Day," is the principal day for the celebration of the Eucharist because it is the day of the Resurrection. It is the pre-eminent day of the liturgical assembly, the day of the Christian family, and the day of joy and rest from work. Sunday is "the foundation and kernel of the whole liturgical year."

1194   The Church, "in the course of the year,...unfolds the whole mystery of Christ from his Incarnation and Nativity through his Ascension, to Pentecost and the expectation of the blessed hope of the coming of the Lord."

1195   By keeping the memorials of the saints---first of all the holy Mother of God, then the apostles, the martyrs, and other saints---on fixed days of the liturgical year, the Church on earth shows that she is united with the liturgy of heaven. She gives glory to Christ for having accomplished his salvation in his glorified members; their example encourages her on her way to the Father.

1196   The faithful who celebrate the Liturgy of the Hours  are united to Christ our high priest, by the prayer of the Psalms, meditation on the Word of God, and canticles and blessings, in order to be joined with his unceasing and universal prayer that gives glory to the Father and implores the gift of the Holy Spirit on the whole world.

1197   Christ is the true temple of God, "the place where his glory dwells"; by the grace of God, Christians also become temples of the Holy Spirit, living stones out of which the Church is built.

1198   In its earthly state the Church needs places where the community can gather together. Our visible churches, holy places, are images of the holy city, the heavenly Jerusalem, toward which we are making our way on pilgrimage.

1199   It is in these churches that the Church celebrates public worship to the glory of the Holy Trinity, hears the word of God and sings his praise, lifts up her prayer, and offers the sacrifice of Christ sacramentally present in the midst of the assembly. These churches are also places of recollection and personal prayer.

1207   It is fitting that liturgical celebration tends to express itself in the culture of the people where the Church finds herself, though without being submissive to it. Moreover, the liturgy itself generates cultures and shapes them.

1208   The diverse liturgical traditions or rites, legitimately recognized, manifest the catholicity of the Church, because they signify and communicate the same mystery of Christ.

1209   The criterion that assures unity amid the diversity of liturgical traditions is fidelity to apostolic Tradition, i.e., the communion in the faith and the sacraments received from the apostles, a communion that is both signified and guaranteed by apostolic succession.

1275   Christian initiation is accomplished by three sacraments together: Baptism which is the beginning of new life; Confirmation which is its strengthening; and the Eucharist which nourishes the disciple with Christ's Body and Blood for his transformation in Christ.

1276   "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you."

1277   Baptism is birth into the new life in Christ. In accordance with the Lord's will, it is necessary for salvation, as is the Church herself, which we enter by Baptism.

1278   The essential rite of Baptism consists in immersing the candidate in water or pouring water on his head, while pronouncing the invocation of the Most Holy Trinity: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

1279   The fruit of Baptism, or baptismal grace, is a rich reality that includes forgiveness of original sin and all personal sins, birth into the new life by which man becomes an adoptive son of the Father, a member of Christ and a temple of the Holy Spirit. By this very fact the person baptized is incorporated into the Church, the Body of Christ, and made a sharer in the priesthood of Christ.

1280   Baptism imprints on the soul an indelible spiritual sign, the character, which consecrates the baptized person for Christian worship. Because of the character Baptism cannot be repeated.

1281   Those who die for the faith, those who are catechumens, and all those who, without knowing of the Church but acting under the inspiration of grace, seek God sincerely and strive to fulfill his will, can be saved even if they have not been baptized.

1282   Since the earliest times, Baptism has been administered to children, for it is a grace and a gift of God that does not presuppose any human merit; children are baptized in the faith of the Church. Entry into Christian life gives access to true freedom.

1283   With respect to children who have died without Baptism, the liturgy of the Church invites us to trust in God's mercy and to pray for their salvation.

1284   In case of necessity, any person can baptize provided that he have the intention of doing that which the Church does and provided that he pours water on the candidate's head while saying: "I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit."

1315   "Now when the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent to them Peter and John, who came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit; for it had not yet fallen on any of them, but they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. then they laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit."

1316   Confirmation perfects Baptismal grace; it is the sacrament which gives the Holy Spirit in order to root us more deeply in the divine filiation, incorporate us more firmly into Christ, strengthen our bond with the Church, associate us more closely with her mission, and help us bear witness to the Christian faith in words accompanied by deeds.

1317   Confirmation, like Baptism, imprints a spiritual mark or indelible character on the Christian's soul; for this reason one can receive this sacrament only once in one's life.

1318   In the East this sacrament is administered immediately after Baptism and is followed by participation in the Eucharist; this tradition highlights the unity of the three sacraments of Christian initiation. In the Latin Church this sacrament is administered when the age of reason has been reached, and its celebration is ordinarily reserved to the bishop, thus signifying that this sacrament strengthens the ecclesial bond.

1319   A candidate for Confirmation who has attained the age of reason must profess the faith, be in the state of grace, have the intention of receiving the sacrament, and be prepared to assume the role of disciple and witness to Christ, both within the ecclesial community and in temporal affairs.

1320   The essential rite of Confirmation is anointing the forehead of the baptized with sacred chrism (in the East other sense-organs as well), together with the laying on of the minister's hand and the words: "Accipe signaculum doni Spiritus Sancti" (Be sealed with the Gift of the Holy Spirit.) in the Roman Rite, or: Signaculum doni Spiritus Sancti [the seal of the gift of the Holy Spirit] in the Byzantine rite.

1321   When Confirmation is celebrated separately from Baptism, its connection with Baptism is expressed, among other ways, by the renewal of baptismal promises. The celebration of Confirmation during the Eucharist helps underline the unity of the sacraments of Christian initiation.

1406   Jesus said: "I am the living bread that came down from heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he will live for ever;...he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life and...abides in me, and I in him."

1407   The Eucharist is the heart and the summit of the Church's life, for in it Christ associates his Church and all her members with his sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving offered once for all on the cross to his Father; by this sacrifice he pours out the graces of salvation on his Body which is the Church.

1408   The Eucharistic celebration always includes: the proclamation of the Word of God; thanksgiving to God the Father for all his benefits, above all the gift of his Son; the consecration of bread and wine; and participation in the liturgical banquet by receiving the Lord's body and blood. These elements constitute one single act of worship.

1409   The Eucharist is the memorial of Christ's Passover, that is, of the work of salvation accomplished by the life, death, and resurrection of Christ, a work made present by the liturgical action.

1410   It is Christ himself, the eternal high priest of the New Covenant who, acting through the ministry of the priests, offers the Eucharistic sacrifice. And it is the same Christ, really present under the species of bread and wine, who is the offering of the Eucharistic sacrifice.

1411   Only validly ordained priests can preside at the Eucharist and consecrate the bread and the wine so that they become the Body and Blood of the Lord.

1412   The essential signs of the Eucharistic sacrament are wheat bread and grape wine, on which the blessing of the Holy Spirit is invoked and the priest pronounces the words of consecration spoken by Jesus during the Last Supper: "This is my body which will be given up for you. ...This is the cup of my blood. ..."

1413   By the consecration the transubstantiation of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ is brought about. Under the consecrated species of bread and wine Christ himself, living and glorious, is present in a true, real, and substantial manner: his Body and his Blood, with his soul and his divinity.

1414   As sacrifice, the Eucharist is also offered in reparation for the sins of the living and the dead and to obtain spiritual or temporal benefits from God.

1415   Anyone who desires to receive Christ in Eucharistic communion must be in the state of grace. Anyone aware of having sinned mortally must not receive communion without having received absolution in the sacrament of penance.

1416   Communion with the Body and Blood of Christ increases the communicant's union with the Lord, forgives his venial sins, and preserves him from grave sins. Since receiving this sacrament strengthens the bonds of charity between the communicant and Christ, it also reinforces the unity of the Church as the Mystical Body of Christ.

1417   The Church warmly recommends that the faithful receive Holy Communion when they participate in the celebration of the Eucharist; she obliges them to do so at least once a year.

1418   Because Christ himself is present in the sacrament of the altar, he is to be honored with the worship of adoration. "To visit the Blessed Sacrament is...a proof of gratitude, an expression of love, and a duty of adoration toward Christ our Lord."

1419   Having passed from this world to the Father, Christ gives us in the Eucharist the pledge of glory with him. Participation in the Holy Sacrifice identifies us with his Heart, sustains our strength along the pilgrimage of this life, makes us long for eternal life, and unites us even now to the Church in heaven, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and all the saints.

1485   "On the evening of that day, the first day of the week," Jesus showed himself to his apostles. "He breathed on them, and said to them: 'Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.'"

1486   The forgiveness of sins committed after Baptism is conferred by a particular sacrament called the sacrament of conversion, confession, penance, or reconciliation.

1487   The sinner wounds God's honor and love, his own human dignity as a man called to be a son of God, and the spiritual well-being of the Church, of which each Christian ought to be a living stone.

1488   To the eyes of faith no evil is graver than sin and nothing has worse consequences for sinners themselves, for the Church, and for the whole world.

1489   To return to communion with God after having lost it through sin is a process born of the grace of God who is rich in mercy and solicitous for the salvation of men. One must ask for this precious gift for oneself and for others.

1490   The movement of return to God, called conversion and repentance, entails sorrow for and abhorrence of sins committed, and the firm purpose of sinning no more in the future. Conversion touches the past and the future and is nourished by hope in God's mercy.

1491   The sacrament of Penance is a whole consisting in three actions of the penitent and the priest's absolution. The penitent's acts are repentance, confession or disclosure of sins to the priest, and the intention to make reparation and do works of reparation.

1492   Repentance (also called contrition) must be inspired by motives that arise from faith. If repentance arises from love of charity for God, it is called "perfect" contrition; if it is founded on other motives, it is called "imperfect."

1493   One who desires to obtain reconciliation with God and with the Church, must confess to a priest all the unconfessed grave sins he remembers after having carefully examined his conscience. The confession of venial faults, without being necessary in itself, is nevertheless strongly recommended by the Church.

1494   The confessor proposes the performance of certain acts of "satisfaction" or "penance" to be performed by the penitent in order to repair the harm caused by sin and to re-establish habits befitting a disciple of Christ.

1495   Only priests who have received the faculty of absolving from the authority of the Church can forgive sins in the name of Christ.

1496   The spiritual effects of the sacrament of Penance are:

      ---reconciliation with God by which the penitent recovers grace;

      ---reconciliation with the Church;

      ---remission of the eternal punishment incurred by mortal sins;

      ---remission, at least in part, of temporal punishments resulting from sin;

      ---peace and serenity of conscience, and spiritual consolation;

      ---an increase of spiritual strength for the Christian battle.

1497   Individual and integral confession of grave sins followed by absolution remains the only ordinary means of reconciliation with God and with the Church.

1498   Through indulgences the faithful can obtain the remission of temporal punishment resulting from sin for themselves and also for the souls in Purgatory.

1526   "Is any among you sick? Let him call for the presbyters of the Church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer of faith will save the sick man, and the Lord will raise him up; and if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven."

1527   The sacrament of Anointing of the Sick has as its purpose the conferral of a special grace on the Christian experiencing the difficulties inherent in the condition of grave illness or old age.

1528   The proper time for receiving this holy anointing has certainly arrived when the believer begins to be in danger of death because of illness or old age.

1529   Each time a Christian falls seriously ill, he may receive the Anointing of the Sick, and also when, after he has received it, the illness worsens.

1530   Only priests (presbyters and bishops) can give the sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick, using oil blessed by the bishop, or if necessary by the celebrating presbyter himself.

1531   The celebration of the Anointing of the Sick consists essentially in the anointing of the forehead and hands of the sick person (in the Roman Rite) or of other parts of the body (in the Eastern rite), the anointing being accompanied by the liturgical prayer of the celebrant asking for the special grace of this sacrament.

1532   The special grace of the sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick has as its effects:

      ---the uniting of the sick person to the passion of Christ, for his own good and that of the whole Church;

      ---the strengthening, peace, and courage to endure in a Christian manner the sufferings of illness or old age;

      ---the forgiveness of sins, if the sick person was not able to obtain it through the sacrament of Penance;

      ---the restoration of health, if it is conducive to the salvation of his soul;

      ---the preparation for passing over to eternal life.

1590   St. Paul said to his disciple Timothy: "I remind you to rekindle the gift of God that is within you through the laying on of my hands," and "If any one aspires to the office of bishop, he desires a noble task." To Titus he said: "This is why I left you in Crete, that you amend what was defective, and appoint presbyters in every town, as I directed you."

1591   The whole Church is a priestly people. Through Baptism all the faithful share in the priesthood of Christ. This participation is called the "common priesthood of the faithful." Based on this common priesthood and ordered to its service there exists another participation in the mission of Christ: the ministry conferred by the sacrament of Holy Orders, where the task is to serve in the name and in the person of Christ the Head in the midst of the community.

1592   The ministerial priesthood differs in essence from the common priesthood of the faithful because it confers a sacred power for the service of the faithful. The ordained ministers exercise their service for the People of God by teaching (munus docendi), divine worship (munus liturgicum), and pastoral governance (munus regendi).

1593   Since the beginning, the ordained ministry has been conferred and exercised in three degrees: that of bishops, that of presbyters, and that of deacons. The ministries conferred by ordination are irreplaceable for the organic structure of the Church: without the bishop, presbyters, and deacons, one cannot speak of the Church.

1594   The bishop receives the fullness of the sacrament of Holy Orders, which integrates him into the episcopal college and makes him the visible head of the particular Church entrusted to him. As successors of the apostles and members of the college, the bishops share in the apostolic responsibility and mission of the whole Church under the authority of the Pope, successor of St. Peter.

1595   Priests are united with the bishops in sacerdotal dignity and at the same time depend on them in the exercise of their pastoral functions; they are called to be the bishops' prudent co-workers. They form around their bishop the presbyterium which bears responsibility with him for the particular Church. They receive from the bishop the charge of a parish community or a determinate ecclesial office.

1596   Deacons are ministers ordained for tasks of service of the Church; they do not receive the ministerial priesthood, but ordination confers on them important functions in the ministry of the word, divine worship, pastoral governance, and the service of charity, tasks which they must carry out under the pastoral authority of their bishop.

1597   The sacrament of Holy Orders is conferred by the laying on of hands followed by a solemn prayer of consecration asking God to grant the ordinand the graces of the Holy Spirit required for his ministry. Ordination imprints an indelible sacramental character.

1598   The Church confers the sacrament of Holy Orders only on baptized men (viri), whose suitability for the exercise of the ministry has been duly recognized. Church authority alone has the responsibility and right to call someone to receive the sacrament of Holy Orders.

1599   In the Latin Church the sacrament of Holy Orders for the presbyterate is normally conferred only on candidates who are ready to embrace celibacy freely and who publicly manifest their intention of staying celibate for the love of God's kingdom and the service of men.

1600   It is bishops who confer the sacrament of Holy Orders in the three degrees.

1659   St. Paul said: "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the Church. ...This is a great mystery, and I mean in reference to Christ and the Church."

1660   The marriage covenant, by which a man and a woman form with each other an intimate communion of life and love, has been founded and endowed with its own special laws by the Creator. By its very nature it is ordered to the good of the couple, as well as to the generation and education of children. Christ the Lord raised marriage between the baptized to the dignity of a sacrament.

1661   The sacrament of Matrimony signifies the union of Christ and the Church. It gives spouses the grace to love each other with the love with which Christ has loved his Church; the grace of the sacrament thus perfects the human love of the spouses, strengthens their indissoluble unity, and sanctifies them on the way to eternal life.

1662   Marriage is based on the consent of the contracting parties, that is, on their will to give themselves, each to the other, mutually and definitively, in order to live a covenant of faithful and fruitful love.

1663   Since marriage establishes the couple in a public state of life in the Church, it is fitting that its celebration be public, in the framework of a liturgical celebration, before the priest (or a witness authorized by the Church), the witnesses, and the assembly of the faithful.

1664   Unity, indissolubility, and openness to fertility are essential to marriage. Polygamy is incompatible with the unity of marriage; divorce separates what God has joined together; the refusal of fertility turns married life away from its "supreme gift," the child.

1665   The remarriage of persons divorced from a living, lawful spouse contravenes the plan and law of God as taught by Christ. They are not separated from the Church, but they cannot receive Eucharistic communion. They will lead Christian lives especially by educating their children in the faith.

1666   The Christian home is the place where children receive the first proclamation of the faith. For this reason the family home is rightly called "the domestic church," a community of grace and prayer, a school of human virtues and of Christian charity.

1677   Sacramentals are sacred signs instituted by the Church. They prepare men to receive the fruit of the sacraments and sanctify different circumstances of life.

1678   Among the sacramentals blessings occupy an important place. They include both praise of God for his works and gifts, and the Church's intercession for men that they may be able to use God's gifts according to the spirit of the Gospel.

1679   In addition to the liturgy, Christian life is nourished by various forms of popular piety, rooted in the different cultures. While carefully clarifying them in the light of faith, the Church fosters the forms of popular piety that express an evangelical instinct and a human wisdom and that enrich Christian life.

1710   "Christ...makes man fully manifest to man himself and brings to light his exalted vocation."

1711   Endowed with a spiritual soul, with intellect and with free will, the human person is from his very conception ordered to God and destined for eternal beatitude. He pursues his perfection in "seeking and loving what is true and good."

1712   In man, true freedom is an "outstanding manifestation of the divine image."

1713   Man is obliged to follow the moral law, which urges him "to do what is good and avoid what is evil." This law makes itself heard in his conscience.

1714   Man, having been wounded in his nature by original sin, is subject to error and inclined to evil in exercising his freedom.

1715   He who believes in Christ has new life in the Holy Spirit. The moral life, increased and brought to maturity in grace, is to reach its fulfillment in the glory of heaven.

1725   The Beatitudes take up and fulfill God's promises from 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 life is a gratuitous gift 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 purify 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.

1743   "God willed that man should be left in the hand of his own counsel, so that he might of his own accord seek his creator and freely attain his full and blessed perfection by cleaving to him."

1744   Freedom is the power to act or not to act, and so to perform deliberate acts of one's own. Freedom attains perfection in its acts when directed toward God, the sovereign Good.

1745   Freedom characterizes properly human acts. It makes the human being responsible for acts of which he is the voluntary agent. His deliberate acts properly belong to him.

1746   The imputability or responsibility for an action can be diminished or nullified by ignorance, duress, fear, and other psychological or social factors.

1747   The right to the exercise of freedom, especially in religious and moral matters, is an inalienable requirement of the dignity of man. But the exercise of freedom does not entail the putative right to say or do anything.

1748   "For freedom Christ has set us free."

1757   The object, the intention, and the circumstances make up the three "sources" of the morality of human acts.

1758   The object chosen morally specifies the act of willing accordingly as reason recognizes and judges it good or evil.

1759   "An evil action cannot be justified by reference to a good intention." The end does not justify the means.

1760   A morally good act requires the goodness of its object, of its end, and of its circumstances together.

1761   There are concrete acts that it is always wrong to choose, because their choice entails a disorder of the will, i.e., a moral evil. One may not do evil so that good may result from it.

1771   The term "passions" refers to the affections or the feelings. By his emotions man intuits the good and suspects evil.

1772   The principal passions are love and hatred, desire and fear, joy, sadness, and anger.

1773   In the passions, as movements of the sensitive appetite, there is neither moral good nor evil. But insofar as they engage reason and will, there is moral good or evil in them.

1774   Emotions and feelings can be taken up in the virtues or perverted by the vices.

1775   The perfection of the moral good consists in man's being moved to the good not only by his will but also by his "heart."

1795   "Conscience is man's most secret core, and his sanctuary. There he is alone with God whose voice echoes in his depths."

1796   Conscience is a judgment of reason by which the human person recognizes the moral quality of a concrete act.

1797   For the man who has committed evil, the verdict of his conscience remains a pledge of conversion and of hope.

1798   A well-formed conscience is upright and truthful. It formulates its judgments according to reason, in conformity with the true good willed by the wisdom of the Creator. Everyone must avail himself of the means to form his conscience.

1799   Faced with a moral choice, conscience can make either a right judgment in accordance with reason and the divine law or, on the contrary, an erroneous judgment that departs from them.

1800   A human being must always obey the certain judgment of his conscience.

1801   Conscience can remain in ignorance or make erroneous judgments. Such ignorance and errors are not always free of guilt.

1802   The Word of God is a light for our path. We must assimilate it in faith and prayer and put it into practice. This is how moral conscience is formed.

1833   Virtue is a habitual and firm disposition to do good.

1834   The human virtues are stable dispositions of the intellect and the will that govern our acts, order our passions, and guide our conduct in accordance with reason and faith. they can be grouped around the four cardinal virtues: prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance.

1835   Prudence disposes the practical reason to discern, in every circumstance, our true good and to choose the right means for achieving it.

1836   Justice consists in the firm and constant will to give God and neighbor their due.

1837   Fortitude ensures firmness in difficulties and constancy in the pursuit of the good.

1838   Temperance moderates the attraction of the pleasures of the senses and provides balance in the use of created goods.

1839   The moral virtues grow through education, deliberate acts, and perseverance in struggle. Divine grace purifies and elevates them.

1840   The theological virtues dispose Christians to live in a relationship with the Holy Trinity. They have God for their origin, their motive, and their object---God known by faith, God hoped in and loved for his own sake.

1841   There are three theological virtues: faith, hope, and charity. They inform all the moral virtues and give life to them.

1842   By faith, we believe in God and believe all that he has revealed to us and that Holy Church proposes for our belief.

1843   By hope we desire, and with steadfast trust await from God, eternal life and the graces to merit it.

1844   By charity, we love God above all things and our neighbor as ourselves for love of God. Charity, the form of all the virtues, "binds everything together in perfect harmony."

1845   The seven gifts of the Holy Spirit bestowed upon Christians are wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord.

1870   "God has consigned all men to disobedience, that he may have mercy upon all."

1871   Sin is an utterance, a deed, or a desire contrary to the eternal law. It is an offense against God. It rises up against God in a disobedience contrary to the obedience of Christ.

1872   Sin is an act contrary to reason. It wounds man's nature and injures human solidarity.

1873   The root of all sins lies in man's heart. The kinds and the gravity of sins are determined principally by their objects.

1874   To choose deliberately---that is, both knowing it and willing it---something gravely contrary to the divine law and to the ultimate end of man is to commit a mortal sin. This destroys in us the charity without which eternal beatitude is impossible. Unrepented, it brings eternal death.

1875   Venial sin constitutes a moral disorder that is reparable by charity, which it allows to subsist in us.

1876   The repetition of sins---even venial ones---engenders vices, among which are the capital sins.

1890   There is a certain resemblance between the unity of the divine persons and the fraternity that men ought to establish among themselves.

1891   The human person needs life in society in order to develop in accordance with his nature. Certain societies, such as the family and the state, correspond more directly to the nature of man.

1892   "The human person...is and ought to be the principle, the subject, and the object of every social organization."

1893   Widespread participation in voluntary associations and institutions is to be encouraged.

1894   In accordance with the principle of subsidiarity, neither the state nor any larger society should substitute itself for the initiative and responsibility of individuals and intermediary bodies.

1895   Society ought to promote the exercise of virtue, not obstruct it. It should be animated by a just hierarchy of values.

1896   Where sin has perverted the social climate, it is necessary to call for the conversion of hearts and appeal to the grace of God. Charity urges just reforms. There is no solution to the social question apart from the Gospel.

1918   "There is no authority except from God, and those authorities that exist have been instituted by God."

1919   Every human community needs an authority in order to endure and develop.

1920   "The political community and public authority are based on human nature and therefore...belong to an order established by God."

1921   Authority is exercised legitimately if it is committed to the common good of society. To attain this it must employ morally acceptable means.

1922   The diversity of political regimes is legitimate, provided they contribute to the good of the community.

1923   Political authority must be exercised within the limits of the moral order and must guarantee the conditions of the exercise of freedom.

1924   The common good comprises "the sum total of social conditions which allow people, either as groups or as individuals, to reach their fulfillment more fully and more easily."

1925   The common good consists of three essential elements: respect for and promotion of the fundamental rights of the person; prosperity, or the development of the spiritual and temporal goods of society; the peace and security of the group and of its members.

1926   The dignity of the human person requires the pursuit of the common good. Everyone should be concerned to create and support institutions that improve the conditions of human life.

1927   It is the role of the state to defend and promote the common good of civil society. The common good of the whole human family calls for an organization of society on the international level.

1943   Society ensures social justice by providing the conditions that allow associations and individuals to obtain their due.

1944   Respect for the human person considers the other "another self." It presupposes respect for the fundamental rights that flow from the dignity intrinsic of the person.

1945   The equality of men concerns their dignity as persons and the rights that flow from it.

1946   The differences among persons belong to God's plan, who wills that we should need one another. These differences should encourage charity.

1947   The equal dignity of human persons requires the effort to reduce excessive social and economic inequalities. It gives urgency to the elimination of sinful inequalities.

1948   Solidarity is an eminently Christian virtue. It practices the sharing of spiritual goods even more than material ones.

1975   According to Scripture the Law is a fatherly instruction by God which prescribes for man the ways that lead to the promised beatitude, and proscribes the ways of evil.

1976   "Law is an ordinance of reason for the common good, promulgated by the one who is in charge of the community."

1977   Christ is the end of the law; only he teaches and bestows the justice of God.

1978   The natural law is a participation in God's wisdom and goodness by man formed in the image of his Creator. It expresses the dignity of the human person and forms the basis of his fundamental rights and duties.

1979   The natural law is immutable, permanent throughout history. The rules that express it remain substantially valid. It is a necessary foundation for the erection of moral rules and civil law.

1980   The Old Law is the first stage of revealed law. Its moral prescriptions are summed up in the Ten Commandments.

1981   The Law of Moses contains many truths naturally accessible to reason. God has revealed them because men did not read them in their hearts.

1982   The Old Law is a preparation for the Gospel.

1983   The New Law is the grace of the Holy Spirit received by faith in Christ, operating through charity. It finds expression above all in the Lord's Sermon on the Mount and uses the sacraments to communicate grace to us.

1984   The Law of the Gospel fulfills and surpasses the Old Law and brings it to perfection: its promises, through the Beatitudes of the Kingdom of heaven; its commandments, by reforming the heart, the root of human acts.

1985   The New Law is a law of love, a law of grace, a law of freedom.

1986   Besides its precepts the New Law includes the evangelical counsels. "The Church's holiness is fostered in a special way by the manifold counsels which the Lord proposes to his disciples in the Gospel."

2017   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 his life.

2018   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   Justification includes the remission of sins, sanctification, and the renewal of the inner man.

2020   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 goal the glory of God and of Christ, and the gift of eternal life. It is the most excellent work of God's mercy.

2021   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   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, and perfects freedom.

2023   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 it.

2024   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 through many actual graces, to be distinguished from habitual grace which is permanent in us.

2025   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 the grace of God, and secondly to man's collaboration. Man's merit is due to God.

2026   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 in us before God.

2027   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 attain eternal life, as well as necessary temporal goods.

2028   "All Christians...are called to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection of charity." "Christian perfection has but one limit, that of having none."

2029   "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me."

2047   The moral life is a spiritual worship. Christian activity finds its nourishment in the liturgy and the celebration of the sacraments.

2048   The precepts of the Church concern the moral and Christian life united with the liturgy and nourished by it.

2049   The Magisterium of the Pastors of the Church in moral matters is ordinarily exercised in catechesis and preaching, on the basis of the Decalogue which states the principles of moral life valid for every man.

2050   The Roman Pontiff and the bishops, as authentic teachers, preach to the People of God the faith which is to be believed and applied in moral life. It is also encumbent on them to pronounce on moral questions that fall within the natural law and reason.

2051   The infallibility of the Magisterium of the Pastors extends to all the elements of doctrine, including moral doctrine, without which the saving truths of the faith cannot be preserves, expounded, or observed.

2075   "What good deed must I do, to have eternal life?"---"If you would enter into life, keep the commandments."

2076   By his life and by his preaching Jesus attested to the permanent validity of the Decalogue.

2077   The gift of the Decalogue is bestowed from within the covenant concluded by God with his people. God's commandments take on their true meaning in and through this covenant.

2078   In fidelity to Scripture and in conformity with Jesus' example, the tradition of the Church has always acknowledged the primordial importance and significance of the Decalogue.

2079   The Decalogue forms an organic unity in which each "word" or "commandment" refers to all the others taken together. To transgress one commandment is to infringe the whole Law.

2080   The Decalogue contains a privileged expression of the natural law. It is made known to us by divine revelation and by human reason.

2081   The Ten Commandments, in their fundamental content, state grave obligations. However, obedience to these precepts also implies obligations in matter which is, in itself, light.

2082   What God commands he makes possible by his grace.

2133   "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your strength."

2134   The first commandment summons man to believe in God, to hope in him, and to love him above all else.

2135   "You shall worship the Lord your God." Adoring God, praying to him, offering him the worship that belongs to him, fulfilling the promises and vows made to him are acts of the virtue of religion which fall under obedience to the first commandment.

2136   The duty to offer God authentic worship concerns man both as an individual and as a social being.

2137   "Men of the present day want to profess their religion freely in private and in public."

2138   Superstition is a departure from the worship that we give to the true God. It is manifested in idolatry, as well as in various forms of divination and magic.

2139   Tempting God in words or deeds, sacrilege, and simony are sins of irreligion forbidden by the first commandment.

2140   Since it rejects or denies the existence of God, atheism is a sin against the first commandment.

2141   The veneration of sacred images is based on the mystery of the Incarnation of the Word of God. It is not contrary to the first commandment.

2160   "O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!"

2161   The second commandment enjoins respect for the Lord's name. The name of the Lord is holy.

2162   The second commandment forbids every improper use of God's name. Blasphemy is the use of the name of God, of Jesus Christ, of the Virgin Mary, and of the saints in an offensive way.

2163   False oaths call on God to be witness to a lie. Perjury is a grave offense against the Lord who is always faithful to his promises.

2164   "Do not swear whether by the Creator, or any creature, except truthfully, of necessity, and with reverence."

2165   In Baptism, the Christian receives his name in the Church. Parents, godparents, and the pastor are to see that he be given a Christian name. The patron saint provides a model of charity and the assurance of his prayer.

2166   The Christian begins his prayers and activities with the Sign of the Cross: "in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen."

2167   God calls each one by name.

2189   "Observe the sabbath day, to keep it holy." "The seventh day is a sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord."

2190   The sabbath, which represented the completion of the first creation, has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ.

2191   The Church celebrates the day of Christ's Resurrection on the "eighth day," Sunday, which is rightly called the Lord's Day.

2192   "Sunday...is to be observed as the foremost holy day of obligation in the universal Church." "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass."

2193   "On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound...to abstain from those labors and business concerns which impede the worship to be rendered to God, the joy which is proper to the Lord's Day, or the proper relaxation of mind and body."

2194   The institution of Sunday helps all "to be allowed sufficient rest and leisure to cultivate their familial, cultural, social, and religious lives."

2195   Every Christian should avoid making unnecessary demands on others that would hinder them from observing the Lord's Day.

2247   "Honor your father and your mother."

2248   According to the fourth commandment, God has willed that, after him, we should honor our parents and those whom he has vested with authority for our good.

2249   The conjugal community is established upon the covenant and consent of the spouses. Marriage and family are ordered to the good of the spouses, to the procreation and the education of children.

2250   "The well-being of the individual person and of both human and Christian society is closely bound up with the healthy state of conjugal and family life."

2251   Children owe their parents respect, gratitude, just obedience, and assistance. Filial respect fosters harmony in all of family life.

2252   Parents have the first responsibility for the education of their children in the faith, prayer, and all the virtues. They have the duty to provide as far as possible for the physical and spiritual needs of their children.

2253   Parents should respect and encourage their children's vocations. They should remember and teach that the first calling of the Christian is to follow Jesus.

2254   Public authority is obliged to respect the fundamental rights of the human person and the conditions for the exercise of his freedom.

2255   It is the duty of citizens to work with civil authority for building up society in a spirit of truth, justice, solidarity, and freedom.

2256   Citizens are obliged in conscience not to follow the directives of civil authorities when they are contrary to the demands of the moral order. "We must obey God rather than men."

2257   Every society's judgments and conduct reflect a vision of man and his destiny. Without the light the Gospel sheds on God and man, societies easily become totalitarian.

2318   "In [God's] hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of all mankind."

2319   Every human life, from the moment of conception until death, is sacred because the human person has been willed for its own sake in the image and likeness of the living and holy God.

2320   The murder of a human being is gravely contrary to the dignity of the person and the holiness of the Creator.

2321   The prohibition of murder does not abrogate the right to render an unjust aggressor unable to inflict harm. Legitimate defense is a grave duty for whoever is responsible for the lives of others or the common good.

2322   From its conception, the child has the right to life. Direct abortion, that is, abortion willed as an end or as a means, is a "criminal" practice, gravely contrary to the moral law. The Church imposes the canonical penalty of excommunication for this crime against human life.

2323   Because it should be treated as a person from conception, the embryo must be defended in its integrity, cared for, and healed like every other human being.

2324   Intentional euthanasia, whatever its forms or motives, is murder. It is gravely contrary to the dignity of the human person and to the respect due to the living God, his Creator.

2325   Suicide is seriously contrary to justice, hope, and charity. It is forbidden by the fifth commandment.

2326   Scandal is a grave offense when by deed or omission it deliberately leads others to sin gravely.

2327   Because of the evils and injustices that all war brings with it, we must do everything reasonably possible to avoid it. The Church prays: "From famine, pestilence, and war, O Lord, deliver us."

2328   The Church and human reason assert the permanent validity of the moral law during armed conflicts. Practices deliberately contrary to the law of nations and to its universal principles are crimes.

2329   "The arms race is one of the greatest curses on the human race and the harm it inflicts on the poor is more than can be endured."

2330   "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God."

2392   "Love is the fundamental and innate vocation of every human being."

2393   By creating the human being man and woman, God gives personal dignity equally to the one and the other. Each of them, man and woman, should acknowledge and accept his sexual identity.

2394   Christ is the model of chastity. Every baptized person is called to lead a chaste life, each according to his particular state of life.

2395   Chastity means the integration of sexuality within the person. It includes an apprenticeship in self-mastery.

2396   Among the sins gravely contrary to chastity are masturbation, fornication, pornography, and homosexual practices.

2397   The covenant which spouses have freely entered into entails faithful love. It imposes on them the obligation to keep their marriage indissoluble.

2398   Fecundity is a good, a gift and an end of marriage. By giving life, spouses participate in God's fatherhood.

2399   The regulation of births represents one of the aspects of responsible fatherhood and motherhood. Legitimate intentions on the part of the spouses do not justify recourse to morally unacceptable means (for example, direct sterilization or contraception).

2400   Adultery, divorce, polygamy, and free union are grave offenses against the dignity of marriage.

2450   "You shall not steal." "Neither thieves, nor the greedy..., nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God."

2451   The seventh commandment enjoins the practice of justice and charity in the administration of earthly goods and the fruits of men's labor.

2452   The goods of creation are destined for the entire human race. The right to private property does not abolish the universal destination of goods.

2453   The seventh commandment forbids theft. Theft is the usurpation of another's goods against the reasonable will of the owner.

2454   Every manner of taking and using another's property unjustly is contrary to the seventh commandment. The injustice committed requires reparation. Commutative justice requires the restitution of stolen goods.

2455   The moral law forbids acts which, for commercial or totalitarian purposes, lead to the enslavement of human beings, or to their being bought, sold or exchanged like merchandise.

2456   The dominion granted by the Creator over the mineral, vegetable, and animal resources of the universe cannot be separated from respect for moral obligations, including those toward generations to come.

2457   Animals are entrusted to man's stewardship; he must show them kindness. They may be used to serve the just satisfaction of man's needs.

2458   The Church makes a judgment about economic and social matters when the fundamental rights of the person or the salvation of souls requires it. She is concerned with the temporal common good of men because they are ordered to the sovereign Good, their ultimate end.

2459   Man is himself the author, center, and goal of all economic and social life. the decisive point of the social question is that goods created by God for everyone should in fact reach everyone in accordance with justice and with the help of charity.

2460   The primordial value of labor stems from man himself, its author and beneficiary. By means of his labor man participates in the work of creation. Work united to Christ can be redemptive.

2461   True development concerns the whole man. It is concerned with increasing each person's ability to respond to his vocation and hence to God's call.

2462   Giving alms to the poor is a witness to fraternal charity: it is also a work of justice pleasing to God.

2463   How can we not recognize Lazarus, the hungry beggar in the parable, in the multitude of human beings without bread, a roof or a place to stay? How can we fail to hear Jesus: "As you did it not to one of the least of these, you did it not to me"?

2504   "You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor." Christ's disciples have "put on the new man, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness."

2505   Truth or truthfulness is the virtue which consists in showing oneself true in deeds and truthful in words, and guarding against duplicity, dissimulation, and hypocrisy.

2506   The Christian is not to "be ashamed of testifying to our Lord" in deed and word. Martyrdom is the supreme witness given to the truth of the faith.

2507   Respect for the reputation and honor of persons forbids all detraction and calumny in word or attitude.

2508   Lying consists in saying what is false with the intention of deceiving one's neighbor.

2509   An offense committed against the truth requires reparation.

2510   The golden rule helps one discern, in concrete situations, whether or not it would be appropriate to reveal the truth to someone who asks for it.

2511   "The sacramental seal is inviolable." Professional secrets must be kept. Confidences prejudicial to another are not to be divulged.

2512   Society has a right to information based on truth, freedom, and justice. One should practice moderation and discipline in the use of the social communications media.

2513   The fine arts, but above all sacred art, "of their nature are directed toward expressing in some way the infinite beauty of God in works made by human hands. Their dedication to the increase of God's praise and of his glory is more complete, the more exclusively they are devoted to turning men's minds devoutly toward God."

2528   "Everyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart."

2529   The ninth commandment warns against lust or carnal concupiscence.

2530   The struggle against carnal lust involves purifying the heart and practicing temperance.

2531   Purity of heart will enable us to see God: it enables us even now to see things according to God.

2532   Purification of the heart demands prayer, the practice of chastity, purity of intention and of vision.

2533   Purity of heart requires the modesty which is patience, decency, and discretion. Modesty protects the intimate center of the person.

2551   "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."

2552   The tenth commandment forbids avarice arising from a passion for riches and their attendant power.

2553   Envy is sadness at the sight of another's goods and the immoderate desire to have them for oneself. It is a capital sin.

2554   The baptized person combats envy through good-will, humility, and abandonment to the providence of God.

2555   Christ's faithful "have crucified the flesh within its passions and desires"; they are led by the Spirit and follow his desires.

2556   Detachment from riches is necessary for entering the Kingdom of heaven. "Blessed are the poor in spirit."

2557   "I want to see God" expresses the true desire of man. Thirst for God is quenched by the water of eternal life.

2590   "Prayer is the raising of one's mind and heart to God or the requesting of good things from God."

2591   God tirelessly calls each person to this mysterious encounter with Himself. Prayer unfolds throughout the whole history of salvation as a reciprocal call between God and man.

2592   The prayer of Abraham and Jacob is presented as a battle of faith marked by trust in God's faithfulness and by certitude in the victory promised to perseverance.

2593   The prayer of Moses responds to the living God's initiative for the salvation of his people. It foreshadows the prayer of intercession of the unique mediator, Christ Jesus.

2594   The prayer of the People of God flourished in the shadow of the dwelling place of God's presence on earth, the ark of the covenant and the Temple, under the guidance of their shepherds, especially King David, and of the prophets.

2595   The prophets summoned the people to conversion of heart and, while zealously seeking the face of God, like Elijah, they interceded for the people.

2596   The Psalms constitute the masterwork of prayer in the Old Testament. They present two inseparable qualities: the personal, and the communal. They extend to all dimensions of history, recalling God's promises already fulfilled and looking for the coming of the Messiah.

2597   Prayed and fulfilled in Christ, the Psalms are an essential and permanent element of the prayer of the Church. They are suitable for men of every condition and time.

2620   Jesus' filial prayer is the perfect model of prayer in the New Testament. Often done in solitude and in secret, the prayer of Jesus involves a loving adherence to the will of the Father even to the Cross and an absolute confidence in being heard.

2621   In his teaching, Jesus teaches his disciples to pray with a purified heart, with lively and persevering faith, with filial boldness. He calls them to vigilance and invites them to present their petitions to God in his name. Jesus Christ himself answers prayers addressed to him.

2622   The prayers of the Virgin Mary, in her Fiat and Magnificat, are characterized by the generous offering of her whole being in faith.

2644   The Holy Spirit who teaches the Church and recalls to her all that Jesus said also instructs her in the life of prayer, inspiring new expressions of the same basic forms of prayer: blessing, petition, intercession, thanksgiving, and praise.

2645   Because God blesses the human heart, it can in return bless him who is the source of every blessing.

2646   Forgiveness, the quest for the Kingdom, and every true need are objects of the prayer of petition.

2647   Prayer of intercession consists in asking on behalf of another. It knows no boundaries and extends to one's enemies.

2648   Every joy and suffering, every event and need can become the matter for thanksgiving which, sharing in that of Christ, should fill one's whole life: "Give thanks in all circumstances."

2649   Prayer of praise is entirely disinterested and rises to God, lauds him, and gives him glory for his own sake, quite beyond what he has done, but simply because He is.

2661   By a living transmission---Tradition---the Holy Spirit in the Church teaches the children of God to pray.

2662   The Word of God, the liturgy of the Church, and the virtues of faith, hope, and charity are sources of prayer.

2680   Prayer is primarily addressed to the Father; it can also be directed toward Jesus, particularly by the invocation of his holy name: "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us sinners."

2681   "No one can say 'Jesus is Lord,' except by the Holy Spirit." The Church invites us to invoke the Holy Spirit as the interior Teacher of Christian prayer.

2682   Because of Mary's singular cooperation with the action of the Holy Spirit, the Church loves to pray in communion with the Virgin Mary, to magnify with her the great things the Lord has done for her, and to entrust supplications and praises to her.

2692   In prayer, the pilgrim Church is associated with that of the saints, whose intercession she asks.

2693   The different schools of Christian spirituality share in the living tradition of prayer and are precious guides for the spiritual life.

2694   The Christian family is the first place for education in prayer.

2695   Ordained ministers, the consecrated life, catechesis, prayer groups, and "spiritual direction" ensure assistance within the Church in the practice of prayer.

2696   The most appropriate places for prayer are personal or family oratories, monasteries, places of pilgrimage, and above all the church, which is the proper place for liturgical prayer for the parish community and the privileged place for Eucharistic adoration.

2720   The Church invites the faithful to regular prayer: daily prayers, the Liturgy of the Hours, Sunday Eucharist, the feasts of the liturgical year.

2721   The Christian tradition comprises three major expressions of the life of prayer: vocal prayer, meditation, and contemplative prayer. They have in common the recollection of the heart.

2722   Vocal prayer, founded on the union of body and soul in human nature, associates the body with the interior prayer of the heart, following Christ's example of praying to his father and teaching the Our Father to his disciples.

2723   Meditation is a prayerful quest engaging thought, imagination, emotion, and desire. Its goal is to make our own in faith the subject considered, by confronting it with the reality of our own life.

2724   Contemplative prayer is the simple expression of the mystery of prayer. It is a gaze of faith fixed on Jesus, an attentiveness to the Word of God, a silent love. It achieves real union with the prayer of Christ to the extent that it makes us share in his mystery.

2752   Prayer presupposes an effort, a fight against ourselves and the wiles of the Tempter. The battle of prayer is inseparable from the necessary "spiritual battle" to act habitually according to the Spirit of Christ: we pray as we live, because we live as we pray.

2753   In the battle of prayer we must confront erroneous conceptions of prayer, various currents of thought, and our own experience of failure. We must respond with humility, trust, and perseverance to these temptations which cast doubt on the usefulness or even the possibility of prayer.

2754   The principal difficulties in the practice of prayer are distraction and dryness. The remedy lies in faith, conversion, and vigilance of heart.

2755   Two frequent temptations threaten prayer: lack of faith and acedia---a form of depression stemming from lax ascetical practice that leads to discouragement.

2756   Filial trust is put to the test when we feel that our prayer is not always heard. The Gospel invites us to ask ourselves about the conformity of our prayer to the desire of the Spirit.

2757   "Pray constantly." It is always possible to pray. It is even a vital necessity. Prayer and Christian life are inseparable.

2758   The prayer of the hour of Jesus, rightly called the "priestly prayer," sums up the whole economy of creation and salvation. It fulfills the great petitions of the Our Father.

2773   In response to his disciples' request "Lord, teach us to pray," Jesus entrusts them with the fundamental Christian prayer, the Our Father.

2774   "The Lord's Prayer is truly the summary of the whole gospel," the "most perfect of prayer." It is at the center of the Scriptures.

2775   It is called "the Lord's Prayer" because it comes to us from the Lord Jesus, the master and model of our prayer.

2776   The Lord's Prayer is the quintessential prayer of the Church. It is an integral part of the major hours of the Divine Office and of the sacraments of Christian initiation: Baptism, Confirmation, and Eucharist. Integrated into the Eucharist it reveals the eschatological character of its petitions, hoping for the Lord, "until he comes."

2797   Simple and faithful trust, humble and joyous assurance are the proper dispositions for one who prays the Our Father.

2798   We can invoke God as "Father" because the Son of God made man has revealed him to us. In this Son, through Baptism, we are incorporated and adopted as sons of God.

2799   The Lord's Prayer brings us into communion with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. At the same time it reveals us to ourselves.

2800   Praying to our Father should develop in us the will to become like him and foster in us a humble and trusting heart.

2801   When we say "Our" Father, we are invoking the new covenant in Jesus Christ, communion with the Holy Trinity, and the divine love which spread through the Church to encompass the world.

2802   "Who art in heaven" does not refer to a place but to God's majesty and his presence in the hearts of the just. Heaven, the Father's house, is the true homeland toward which we are heading and to which, already, we belong.

2857   In the Our Father, the object of the first three petitions is the glory of the Father: the sanctification of his name, the coming of the kingdom, and the fulfillment of his will. The four others present our wants to him: they ask that our lives be nourished, healed of sin, and made victorious in the struggle of good over evil.

2858   By asking "hallowed be thy name" we enter into God's plan, the sanctification of his name---revealed first to Moses and then in Jesus---by us and in us, in every nation and in each man.

2859   By the second petition, the Church looks first to Christ's return and the final coming of the Reign of God. It also prays for the growth of the Kingdom of God in the "today" of our own lives.

2860   In the third petition, we ask our Father to unite our will to that of his Son, so as to fulfill his plan of salvation in the life of the world.

2861   In the fourth petition, by saying "give us," we express in communion with our brethren our filial trust in our heavenly Father. "Our daily bread" refers to the earthly nourishment necessary to everyone for subsistence, and also to the Bread of Life: the Word of God and the Body of Christ. It is received in God's "today," as the indispensable, (super-) essential nourishment of the feast of the coming Kingdom anticipated in the Eucharist. 

2862   The fifth petition begs God's mercy for our offences, mercy which can penetrate our hearts only if we have learned to forgive our enemies, with the example and help of Christ.

2863   When we say "lead us not into temptation" we are asking God not to allow us to take the path that leads to sin. This petition implores the Spirit of discernment and strength; it requests the grace of vigilance and final perseverance.

2864   In the last petition, "but deliver us from evil," Christians pray to God with the Church to show forth the victory, already won by Christ, over the "ruler of this world," Satan, the angel personally opposed to God and to his plan of salvation.

2865   By the final "Amen," we express our "fiat" concerning the seven petitions: "So be it."

You can also read the entire

Catechism of the Catholic Church

online.

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