Contents
- Human beings do not know where to find happiness
- Humans are prisoners of a chain of violences, rivalry, and suspicion that separates them from one another
- The word of God guides them toward the love of the neighbor as a source of joy. The love of parents for their children is an example of this love
- God wants to reassure humans of the gratuitousness of his love; his word becomes flesh to prove its truthfulness to us in Jesus
- Christ’s gift of life on the cross renews the ever-present gift of God’s unconditional love for his children. Meaning of the word “for-give”: to give again
Related articles
This article is an in-depth exploration of the theme: The filial relationship
In turn, it relates to the following in-depth explorations:
GRATUITY
The human condition is such that we do not know where to find the source of our happiness. (See Augustine on happiness) Not understanding that true happiness comes from a fraternal relationship of love with other human beings, we are led to believe that wealth, power, and sensual pleasures are the true source of happiness. This creates rivalry between human beings in order to acquire these goods, at the expense of others if necessary. And this leads to a chain reaction where offense is met with offense, which is the slavery of sin that the Bible speaks of. (See Shabbat, God’s rest) Now, God’s will is to free us from such slavery, but in order for human beings to be oriented toward their happiness, God spoke to men through the prophets, and his words tell us where true happiness is to be found. What is commonly called the Law of Moses are the Ten words of God revealed to his prophet on Mount Sinai (see Exodus 20:12 ff. and Deuteronomy 5:16 ff.). Human beings are not aware of their straying, and so these words appear in the form of a law. This law, which reveals to human beings that certain behaviors are not good, makes them aware of their faults and reveals their errors. But it does not have the power to change human beings. On the other hand, the gift of love transforms the heart. Knowing that we are loved despite our faults, freely, is what can dispose the heart to welcome love in all its greatness. This love, which is welcomed, experienced, and dwells in the heart, has the power to transform it. To access this unconditional love of Christ, of God, for the human race is to access a source of joy, the source of life in which we recognize ourselves as children of God. Seeking this source (John 4:1-42 The source of living water) will involve loving in return, forgiving in return. These are the deeds that necessarily accompany faith, otherwise faith would be a dead letter. But if faith is the experience of receiving gratuitous love, it will necessarily give rise to actions, because we will want to draw again from this source of joy, to multiply this experience in the bonds that unite us to our neighbor by offering in turn this love, this peace, this forgiveness.
The divine spirit, received and welcomed, makes us live as children of God. In the filial spirit, the son glorifies the father, the father is reflected in him, and the son gives thanks to him. Good deeds are also inspired by the filial spirit that glorifies the father. The father’s greatness is revealed in filial obedience and trust. The love of parents for their children is the image, on earth, of God’s unconditional love: they are ready to sacrifice themselves for their children, they do everything for them, they want their children to be fulfilled. Thus, God will do everything so that human beings can attain filial trust, but human beings find it difficult to believe in gratuitous love; they suspect ulterior motives and seek proof of the sincerity and gratuitousness of love. They are prisoners of a mercantile mentality, according to which they only own what they have been able to buy by themselves. (See the article We are God’s children, not his servants)
All of God’s pedagogy will then be directed toward one goal: to prove the gratuitousness of his paternal and maternal love for humanity, for his children. This unconditional love of the Father appears in all its greatness when he forgives his children’s mistakes with kindness. What greater error, what greater misguidance than that which led to the murder of the innocent one par excellence, the Son of God, Jesus? It is here that God’s infinite mercy and attachment to mankind is manifested: “Forgive them, for they don’t know what they do” (Luke 23:34), Jesus will say on the cross, and the Father is ready to forgive the murderers of his own son. (See the article For-giveness)
From this also comes a legal vocabulary that will serve to overturn the mentality and justice of men in order to reveal divine justice, the extent of his mercy and his love. The law makes crime objective; because of the law, the guilty party is condemned. Divine law consists of the words addressed to Moses on Mount Sinai (Exodus 34:28 and Deuteronomy 4:13), which invite us to love God and our neighbor and show us the way to happiness. This will also have the effect of revealing to man that he is pursuing a false path, an illusory happiness, if he does not find it in a relationship of love, of gratuitousness, in the exchange that makes him in the image of God. It is then that God comes to the aid of the man who seeks the way, who is ready to recognize his missteps, to lead him to perfect love. God himself therefore inspires faith in man, a faith that is a gift (dōreá, cháris), which is the discovery of God’s forgiveness. This for-giveness means the renewed gift, the eternal covenant of God’s filial love offered to humanity freely. It is the peculiarity of divine justice not to condemn the repentant sinner, but to make him righteous. This is something very important to understand, and St. Paul’s letter to the Romans and Thomas Aquinas’ commentary on this letter will help us to do so: when God does justice by responding to the call of the man who is confident (who believes, who trusts), he does not limit himself to acquitting man and letting him go free from his faults, but he makes him righteous. This means that he communicates his own spirit to him and allows him to taste the joy of showing mercy in turn, of spreading God’s love, the same charity, the same free gift to the world.
Biblical texts
Luke 7:36-50 The forgiven woman
Luke 14:12-14: The gratuitousness of love
12 Ἔλεγεν δὲ καὶ τῷ κεκληκότι αὐτόν, Ὅταν ποιῇς ἄριστον ἢ δεῖπνον, μὴ φώνει τοὺς φίλους σου, μηδὲ τοὺς ἀδελφούς σου, μηδὲ τοὺς συγγενεῖς σου, μηδὲ γείτονας πλουσίους· μήποτε καὶ αὐτοί σε ἀντικαλέσωσιν, καὶ γένηταί σοι ἀνταπόδομα.
12 Jesus said to the one who had invited him, “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, so that they will also invite you in return and you be repaid.
13 Ἀλλ’ ὅταν ποιῇς δοχήν, κάλει πτωχούς, ἀναπήρους, χωλούς, τυφλούς·
13 But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind.
14 καὶ μακάριος ἔσῃ, ὅτι οὐκ ἔχουσιν ἀνταποδοῦναί σοι· ἀνταποδοθήσεται γάρ σοι ἐν τῇ ἀναστάσει τῶν δικαίων.
14 You will be blessed, for they will not be able to repay you; indeed, you will be rewarded in the resurrection of the righteous.