I. PASSIONS
1763 The term
"passions" belongs to the Christian patrimony. Feelings or passions are emotions
or movements of the sensitive appetite that incline us to act or not to act in
regard to something felt or imagined to be good or evil.
1764 The
passions are natural components of the human psyche; they form the passageway
and ensure the connection between the life of the senses and the life of the
mind. Our Lord called man's heart the source from which the passions spring.[40]
1765 There are
many passions. The most fundamental passion is love, aroused by the attraction
of the good. Love causes a desire for the absent good and the hope of obtaining
it; this movement finds completion in the pleasure and joy of the good
possessed. The apprehension of evil causes hatred, aversion, and fear of the
impending evil; this movement ends in sadness at some present evil, or in the
anger that resists it.
1766 "To love is
to will the good of another."[41] All other affections have their source in this
first movement of the human heart toward the good. Only the good can be
loved.[42] Passions "are evil if love is evil and good if it is good."[43]
II. PASSIONS AND MORAL LIFE
1767 In
themselves passions are neither good nor evil. They are morally qualified only
to the extent that they effectively engage reason and will. Passions are said to
be voluntary, "either because they are commanded by the will or because the will
does not place obstacles in their way."[44] It belongs to the perfection of the
moral or human good that the passions be governed by reason.[45]
1768 Strong
feelings are not decisive for the morality or the holiness of persons; they are
simply the inexhaustible reservoir of images and affections in which the moral
life is expressed. Passions are morally good when they contribute to a good
action, evil in the opposite case. The upright will orders the movements of the
senses it appropriates to the good and to beatitude; an evil will succumbs to
disordered passions and exacerbates them. Emotions and feelings can be taken up
into the virtues or perverted by the vices.
1769 In the
Christian life, the Holy Spirit himself accomplishes his work by mobilizing the
whole being, with all its sorrows, fears and sadness, as is visible in the
Lord's agony and passion. In Christ human feelings are able to reach their
consummation in charity and divine beatitude.
1770 Moral
perfection consists in man's being moved to the good not by his will alone, but
also by his sensitive appetite, as in the words of the psalm: "My heart and
flesh sing for joy to the living God."[46]