The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) Day 237: The Morality of the Passions (2025)
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Aug 25, 2025 Explore the intriguing relationship between passions and morality. Learn how emotions can shape our decisions, serving as a double-edged sword between virtue and vice. Discover the importance of self-discipline and divine guidance in managing these complex feelings. Dive into the significance of love as a central passion, while also reflecting on how emotions like anger and joy influence ethical choices. Finally, differentiate between transient feelings and genuine love to better navigate the moral landscape of our lives.
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What Passions Really Are
- Passions are movements of the sensitive appetite that incline us to act or not act toward perceived good or evil.
- They bridge the life of the senses and the life of the mind and are natural components of the human psyche.
Passions Are Amoral, Not Decisive
- Passions are amoral on their own: they are neither good nor evil by themselves.
- Morality depends on how reason and will engage those passions and what actions follow.
Love Is The First Movement
- Love is the fundamental passion because it is aroused by attraction to the good and wills the good of the other.
- Other passions (fear, anger, joy, sadness) stem from this first movement toward the good.
