[7 DEADLY SINS:]
• LUST:
- Intense or unbridled sexual desire leading to fornification, adultery, rape, bestiality and unethical sexuality
- Lust can also be for money & power - Lust is the least serious of cardinal sins
• GLUTTONY:
- Overconsumption of anything to the point of waste
- Gluttony of food may leave the needy in hunger
- Earing too expensive, more quantity, too soon & too eager
• GREED:
- Desire to acquire & accumulate more than what is needed in earthly world
• SLOTH:
- A sense of laziness & indifference
- Failure to do things we ought to do
- Sloth is laziness in all aspects of physical, mental, spiritual
- Failing to utilise the gifts of Holy spirit & failing to love God with all our hearts, our souls and mind.
• WRATH:
- A sense of vengeance
- An anger becomes a wrath when it is unduly & long lasting
- If anger reaches a point to deliberately kill/cause serious harm to someone is against charity & mercy
- A person of wrath is someone who is a 'slave of himself'
• ENVY:
- It arises out of 'vainglory'( unjustified self glorification)
- Envy has 3 stages; attempt to lower other's reputations, becomes joyful at other's misfortune & sad at other's fortune and finally, it creates hatred, because of the sorrow he has caused himself
- Pride & Envy both are two very worst & heavy capital /deadly sins of them all.
• PRIDE:
- Similar to 'vainglory', which is an unjustified or unqualified self glorification
- Unnecessary feel of superiority over others & failing to acknowledge other's credits
- Pride is identified with 'absence of humility'
- Pride is the father of all sins & humility is its only remedy
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[7 VIRTUES:]
• CHASTITY:
- Refrain from sexual activity outside marriage & before marriage
• TEMPERANCE:
- Self moderation or self refrain from anything like anger, gluttony etc is called temperance
- Generally, it is self control of anything
• CHARITY:
- Loving God above all things for his sake, and loving our neighbors for the love of God
- Charity is the ultimate perfection of human spirit
- Charity glorifies God & reflects his nature on others
- Fruits of Charity are joy, mercy & peace
• DILIGENCE:
- Doing one's part, with having faith in God
- Apart from our efforts which could fail, when 'diligence' and 'faith' in God combined can assure spiritual success
• PATIENCE:
- Perseverance to endure difficult circumstances
- Patience/Tolerance is the identification of work of Holy Spirit
• GRATITUDE:
- Being thankful to everyone/anyone who does good to you.
- Gratitude towards God, for being merciful & abundant, will make us humble before God
- Gratitude to people who does good to you, will reflect God to them
• HUMILITY:
- Being humble to everyone even if they are unjust as how Jesus was. It's called 'righteous humility'
- 'True humility' means to be inherently humble to everyone and not just self depreciate for purpose of praises
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[7 GIFTS OF HOLY SPIRIT:]
• Wisdom:
- First & greatest virtue of Holy spirit. Both wise & loving heart combining both mind and heart towards divinity is perfect wisdom.
- Gift of wisdom must end in virtue of charity.
• Understanding:
- Understanding helps us relate truths with divinity. Illuminating & substantiating divine scriptures leading to profound appreciation of God, through worldly truths.
- Gift of understanding must end in strengthening of faith.
• Counsel:
- Being divinely intuitive, prudence and working under the guidance of Holy spirit to take prudent decisions.
- Gift of counsel must end in being divinely prudent.
• Fortitude:
- Stand up for what is right in the eyes of God. Courage & Endurance to stand upto what/who(God) we believe in.
- Gift of fortitude must end in virtue of good courage.
• Knowledge:
- To learn upto what is humanly possible, thereby appreciating, admiring & praising the works of God & nature is the essence of being knowledgeable from Christian point of view.
- Gift of knowledge must end in strengthening of faith.
• Piety:
- Total surrender of one self towards God, accepting all his self imperfections and seeking the abundance from God. Such tendency of real feel of dependency towards God as your father, will make us treat all our fellow beings in world equally and forgive them, pray for them and sacrifice for them since we all are one brother/sisters and children of God.
- Gift of piety must end in virtue of peace
• Fear of the Lord:
- Fear here does not mean 'servile fear' which is a fear of getting punished, rather having a 'child's fear' towards his father. Pope Francis says "..joyful awareness of God's grandeur & grateful realisation that only in him we find true peace".
- Gift of fear of Lord must end in strengthening hope.
* RELATION BETWEEN 7 GIFTS WITH BEATITUDES:
Saint Augustine drew a connection between the gifts of the Holy Spirit and the Beatitudes (Matt.5:3-12).
- Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven, reflects Fear of the Lord as the "poor in spirit" are the humble and God-fearing.
- Blessed are they who mourn, for they will be comforted, corresponds to the Gift of Knowledge, as for Augustine the knowledge of God brings both an increased awareness of personal sin, and to some extent grieving at the abandonment of practices and activities that separate one from God.
- Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the land, relates to Piety.
- Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied, pertains to Fortitude.
- Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy demonstrates the Gift of Counsel.
- Blessed are the clean of heart, for they will see God, the Gift of Understanding.
- Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God, Wisdom.
- Blessed are they who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven
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