Fundamentals of Faith - A spirit cannot be perceived by the

Preliminary Exams Reviewer

senses.
© Ysa Gabriel
- A mystery transcends all human
Human Nature and Words experience
- Human beings are relational
o to relate to others, we Revelation as the word of God
communicate - God revealed himself by the use of words
- Words are … - God’s way of communicating to us who
o revelatory and they reveal He is, in the person of Jesus Christ
information - It is God’s reaching out to us in friendship,
o we use words to relate and reach so we get to know and love Him (CFC
out to others 101)
o affirmation of human needs - Jesus Christ became our bridge to God
o When we speak, we… - God’s capability of limiting Himself in
1. Articulate ideas human words is in itself a manifestation of
2. Share a part of who we are His greatness
3. Inform - “Word of God” in Hebrew term is “dabar”
4. Express our deepest feelings means “word” and also “event” or
5. Heal or kill “reality”
o Words have many functions such - The Word of God involves azmode of
as; communication comprehensible by
1. Informative – speak to merely human beings
tell something or to converse 1. Events in Salvation History
2. Appellative – speak to be 2. Message of God proclaimed through
reciprocated or waiting for a the Prophet
response 3. Person of Jesus, who Himself is the
3. Expressive – say and speak our Word of God (Verbum Dei; Jesus, The
deepest emotions Word of God)
4. Preaching of Christian faith
Revelation 5. General message of God to
- Latin: re-velare “to lift the veil, to disclose, humanity (this goes beyond sex, race,
to uncover” religion, etc.,)
- to be known or to reveal ourselves 6. Bible

God is a Spirit and a Mystery

1 JOHN 4:12- “No one has ever seen God”
Human Language - Positive: highlights God’s immanence;

- Language is a a product of our own presents God as a person actively

experiences. For us to speak about god, involved in daily life experience
we have to be able to say something - Negative: may cause over familiarity
about Him in terms of what our senses with God which may lead to lack of

can perceive reverence

- Our image of God are products of - It is God’s reaching out to us in

Anthropomorphism friendship, so we get to know and love

o Anthropos = Man Him

o Morphe = Form
The ultimate purpose of God’s free act of self-
o Anthromorphism is the attribution
disclosing to us is nothing else but our
of human qualities to non-human
Salvation.
beings including God

Avenues of Revelation
Images of God
1. Revelation through events
- There is no such thing as perfect image
1. Images are signs pointing us to a a. Creation

greater reality - First act of God’s revelation

2. Images have strengths and limitations - Points to God as the cause of everything

3. Forming an imaginative picture of - The goodness of creation reflects the

God can be misleading goodness of God

4. Images can be manipulated and b. History

distorted - Events seen through the eyes of faith
become evidences of God’s divine plan
God’s Image as a Mother for humanity
- Positive: makes God more - Whether secular or religious, communal
approachable; presents God as a or personal, pleasant or tragic points as
caring and loving person actions of God.
- Negative: weakens God’s image 2. Revelation through Persons
primarily due to the negative attributes
a. Prophets
of the feminine caused by the cultural
- First spokespersons of God
conditioning of patriarchal
- Proclaims a religious interpretation of
history
God’s Image as a Friend
- Examples:
o Mahatma Gandhi
 - serve others = neighbor (proxima in Latin) Special Revelation
- " The best way to find yourself is to lose - Supernatural revelation
yourself in the service of others - Would be unknown to us without God’s
o Mother Teresa supernatural intervention through His
- "Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, chosen messengers
person to person - St. Thomas Aquinas equates this with the
- "what it really means to live the Gospel Bible.
o Martin Luther King Jr.
- "We are all equal” Public Revelation

o Pope John Paul II - Essential truths of our Christian faith

- "Darkness can only be scattered by light, revealed by Christ and taught by the

hatred can only be conquered by love Church

- "benevolent (bene - good, - for all of humanity because these are the

volent/volition - act) truths necessary for our salvation

b. Church - imposes the obligation of faith;

- A collective discernment and sense of adherence is necessary, binding all of us

divine actions. They ritualize these - final and complete - in the person of

through the following: Jesus Christ

1. Preaching of the Word - Divine revelation - it is by Jesus in which

2. In worship and celebration God revealed Himself

3. Acts of service and charity

Public Revelation

c. Jesus Christ - Church recognized messengers from

- God revealing and God revealed apparitions & mystical experiences

- Fullness of God’s revelation - do not add to the public revelation of

- Ultimate self communication Jesus

- no obligation of belief
Kinds of Revelation
1. General and Special Revelation Faith

2. Public and Private Revelation - Latin: ob audire; hear or listen to

- To obey in faith is to submit freely to the
General Revelation word that has been heard because its
- Natural revelation truth is guaranteed by God ( CCC 144 )
- God’s revelation through the created - The desire for God written in the human
world or his creation heart. God never ceases to draw man to
Himself (CCC 27)
 - God calls men to serve Him in spirit and 4. The cares and riches of this world;
truth. The very nature of faith in 5. Attitude of sinful man which makes him
conscience, but not coerced. The fact hide from God.
received its fullest manifestation in Christ
- Although Man can forget about God or
(CCC 160)
reject Him, he never ceases to call
Models of Faith every man to seek Him so as to find life

1. Abraham and happiness.

- by faith, Abraham obeyed when he was - But this search for God demands effort

called to go out to a place which he was of intellect, a sound will and an upright

to receive an inheritance heart as well as witness of others who

- He is the Father of all who believes teach him to seek God

- Hebrews 11:1 “Faith is the assurance of

things hoped for the conviction of things - Our faith is not alone or solitary.

not seen” - Faith involves trust in and loyalty to other

2. Virgin Mary persons. This is ratified and deepened by

- by faith, Mary welcomes the tidings and our shared trust in and loyalty to God.

promise brought by the Angel Gabriel, - The person who seeks God discovers
certain ways of coming to know him.
believing that with God, nothing is
impossible
Fides quarens intellectum = faith seeking
- Fiat = May it be done according to your
will understanding
Obedial Potency = The natural facility given by
Continuation of Faith God to us, enabling us to know God; we use
- In many ways people have given our brain to know God
expression to their quest for God in their
religious belief and behavior. (CCC 28) Five Ways of Proving the Existence of God

- This intimate and vital bond of man to ( St. Thomas Aquinas)

God can be forgotten overlooked or 1. From Motivation (Motion)
even explicitly rejected by man - The series of motion necessitates a
(Gaudium Et Spes 19-21) first mover
- Nothing can be move by itself,
Causes for man’s rejection of bond with God
everything must have a mover
1. Revolt against the evil of the world
- a being that changes things, but he
2. Religious ignorance
3. Indifference does not change
2. From Efficient Cause (Cause & Effect)
Concept of Human Person
- The series of cause and effect
1. Conscious Being
requires a first efficient cause
2. With inherent human dignity
- There are series of efficient causes in
3. Created and redeemed by God
the world, nothing is the efficient
4. Limited but original
cause of itself
5. Embodied and historical
- there is a cause nothing can be
continuous, there has to be a main 3 Essential Dimensions of Faith

cause of how it started and it is God - By faith man freely commits his entire

3. From Possibility and Necessity self to God, making the full

- The contingency of beings necessitates submission of his intellect and will to

a non-contingent being to bring forth God who reveals. (DV 5)
existence. 1. Mind (Believing)
- Some being exists of its own necessity - Also the Doctrine or what should we
and does not receive existence from believe in
another being but rather causes them
2. Heart (Entrusting / Worshipping)
- Everything is perishable, but there is a
- also the worship or the trust that
being that is unperishable who does
grows through a prayer and worship;
those things.
a personal heartfelt conversation
4. From Gradation of Being
- if we could believe and do what our
- The degrees of perfection point to a
perfect being who has the maximum of
belief requires us to what we can

all positive qualities hope for

- There is a gradation found in things, 3. Will (Doing)

some better, some worse. Predications - Also the morality or the commitment
require reference to the uttermost for only those who will enter the
- There must be a being that can cause kingdom will bet those who does the
the good in all will of the Father in Heaven
5. From Governance of Things
- what we do in account of what we
- The order and the beauty visible in the
believe in
world requires an intelligent designe
- Some natural things lack knowledge but Paralyses of Faith
may reach its goal. So there is an - the usual condition when a
intelligent being.
dimension of faith is left out
 - Faith is not only a belief in Christ’s Word
1. Ideological Activism and Kingdom but also bearing witness
- believes the right things, does what is and proclaiming it
good, but hardly prays and goes to 3. Informed and Communitarian
Church - Faith that is believing Christ’s Words
- Doctrine + Morals
transmitted through Sacred scriptures
2. Idealistic Activism and tradition, accepting his teachings
- Does good to others, goes to Church and believing that he has the words of
quite often, but does not really know eternal life
what he/she believes in 4. Inculturated
- Morals + Worship - Faith that is lived in daily relationships
3. Pious Dogmatism ( family, friends, classmates etc.)
- Does believes the right things, always
goes to Church , but lives a questionable Paradoxical Characteristics of Faith
Christian life. • Polar contrasts
- Doctrine + Worship • Complementing
4. Idealism – only Doctrine • Effecting
5. Activism – only Morals • Surprising
6. Ritualism – only Worship • Truth / Idea

Characteristics of Faith 1. Faith is certain yet obscure

1. Trinitarian • Certain

- Faith that is a personal conviction and - because faith is grounded on an

belief in God our father, revealed by unshakeable foundation – on God

Jesus Christ, his own divine son-made- revealing himself in convincing signs

man, and theiur presence to us through - Faith can never originates from some

the Holy Spirit in the Church logical deduction, from ourselves our

- Trinitarian Nature of Faith other limited men or women

o Father – initiates everything, even • Obscure

our response (creator) - God is more than what we can even

o Son – fulfills the plans of eternal fully comprehend.

friendship (redeemer) - Faith can never originate from some

o Holy Spirit – concept of faith logical deduction from ourselves or from

(sanctifier) ourselves because we are limited.

2. Loving, Maturing and Missionary

 - We "walk by faith and not by sight" (2 “Seek not to understand that you may believe,
Cor. 5:7). but believe that you may understand” - St.
- God's Spirit helps human reason to Augustine
understand truths that are above the 4. Faith is an act yet a process of
capacity of human reason. perseverance
• Act
2. Faith is free yet morally obliging
• Free - we a personal decision for Christ
• Process
- we are invited to faith and conversion
- This faith, even though a personal
but not coerced (CCC 160).
decision, is a life-long (and perhaps a
- No one, not even God, forces us to
fluctuating process; an enduring way of
believe.
life within the Christian community.
• Morally Obliging
5. Faith is a gift yet our doing
- faith is necessary for our salvation. • Gift
- Without faith, it is impossible to please - because it is a grace from God, from his
God and to attain fellowship with him. initiative of revealing himself through
- Persons who love us most have the most salvation history.
claim on us. - No one can say "Jesus is Lord," except
3. Faith is reasonable yet beyond natural by the Holy Spirit (1 Cor 12:3).
reason
• Our doing
• Reasonable
- Faith demands our free cooperation
- God can be known through human
with others.
reason. (i.e. five proofs of Thomas
- It involved hearing, discerning God in
Aquinas).
our lives, and witnessing. It is motivated
- Only rational creatures can believe.
by prayer and worship.
• Beyond Natural Reason
- There is absolute necessity for grace
6. Faith is personal yet morally ecclesial
• Personal
because faith is an act of the will
- we a private response; but faith is not
moved by God's grace.
individualistic (for ourselves alone)
- Before faith is exercised, one needs
• Ecclesial
grace.
- within our Christian family, we grow and
- Our belief in Christ illumines our reason, "I
mature in faith.
am the light of the world. No follower of
- God reveals himself in terms of
mine shall ever walk in darkness; no, he
community.
shall possess the light of life." (John 8:12)
- The Church, though persecuted,
remains through the test of time.