Faith, hope, and charity

Life intervened this week, and I haven’t had time to write the post I thought I was going to write. Instead, I thought I would jot down some brief thoughts about the three Christian virtues of faith, hope, and charity, which is in line with the New Testament theme I’ve been exploring the past couple of weeks.

Let’s start with charity, which is sometimes used interchangeably with the concept of love but also has meanings related to the English words ‘mercy’, ‘compassion’, and ‘empathy’.

Charity in the sense of giving to the poor is clearly not a Christian concept since plenty of non-Christian societies have this notion. The trouble with this kind of charity is that, almost by definition, it costs the giver little. A rich person may throw a few coins here and there with no real sacrifice required.

Then there is the problem of hypocrisy. This occurs when charity becomes a status marker. Not only is this kind of charity cheap, what is being purchased is not the welfare of the poor but the ego of the wealthy. Jesus talks about this in the Bible when he says:

“So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honoured by others.” Matthew 6:2

A third issue with charity is that, much of the time, it falls under the umbrella of justice. To give somebody what is due to them is just. To not give them their due is unjust. Where it is a social expectation for the rich to give to the poor, it is not really a matter of charity at all. Both the giving and the receiving then become mechanical and devoid of any good intentions. The modern welfare state works this way.

Christian charity has nothing to do with these lesser forms of charity. In fact, in its highest manifestation, it’s not even really about good intentions or any other feel-good qualities. Christian charity is a paradox that involves giving somebody what they do not deserve. Forgiveness is a prime example. Christian charity asks not that you forgive when it is easy to do so; it asks that you forgive the unforgivable.

The same idea applies to the concept of hope. The highest form of hope can only take place when the situation is genuinely hopeless, when you are so far sunk into despair that you can see no way out. The same goes for faith. Only when you are mired in sin can true faith arise.

If follows from these considerations that the Christian virtues are irrational, esoteric and personal in nature. Christian charity, for example, is not a social event, but a private one. Under the terms of justice, the unforgivable act must be punished. Charity is a matter of the heart.

The crucial thing about the Christian virtues is that they don’t negate or replace the Greek ones (assuming the Greeks here to be the most eloquent exponents of what we might as well call paganism). Rather, the Christian virtues are built on top of the Greek. Thus, the Christian virtues imply what we might call a state change. First you must be in sin, then you can have faith. First you must find yourself in a hopeless situation, then you can feel hope. First, something unforgivable must have happened. Then you can exercise charity as forgiveness.

As a result of this dynamic, there is a shallow and fake kind of Christian virtue which pretends you can have faith, hope, and charity without first going through the sinful, hopeless, and unforgivable. This is especially prevalent in the modern world with the concept of charity as compassion. We are drowning in a fake and phony compassion which excuses everything. Since this fake compassion also destroys the Greek virtues, it is nothing more than barbarism.

Christian charity is not about making excuses for the inexcusable. It requires that you first fully confront the inexcusable and that you accept that it is unforgivable. Only from that state can true charity arise. True charity take place in the heart, not the mind. The easiest way to spot fake charity is that it is full of reasons and excuses. The heart has no need of these.

This is a paradox that sits at the heart of the Christian virtues. They are irrational, but not as a negation of rationality, rather as a transcendence of it. First you must face the situation with full consciousness. Then you can transcend it. A person who is in a state of sin but isn’t conscious of it cannot attain faith. A person who is not aware they are in a hopeless situation has no need of hope. A person who does not feel that something unforgivable has been done cannot practice charity.

Since consciousness implies logic and rationality, the Christian virtues are often written off as nonsense. By definition, a hopeless situation is hopeless. Logically and rationally speaking, there is no way out. The same goes for an unforgivable act. A sin once committed cannot be undone. For the ancient Greeks, it took enormous courage and fortitude to face such things with full consciousness. That was the highest virtue for them, and there was nothing beyond it.

Thus, the Greek position can be described as pessimistic, while the Christian is optimistic. Another way to think about it is that the Greek is concerned with the exoteric aspects of reality and the Christian with the esoteric. Faith, hope, and charity are first and foremost interior states of an individual. For the Greeks and Romans, such interior states were valueless. What mattered was action.

From the viewpoint of reason, the Christian virtues are written off as a form of dissociation, a cowardly refusal to face reality. In fact, the Christian virtues begin with action. First there is the sinful or unforgivable act. First there is the situation that is hopeless. These are things that happen in the real world. Faith, hope, and charity are the esoteric response against these exoteric realities.

Does that esoteric response matter? The Greeks and Romans would have said no. But, in fact, the Greek virtues are the gateway to the Christian ones. Firstly, you must be conscious of sin, the unforgivable act, and the state of hopelessness. Only then can you take the leap into faith, hope, and charity. The Greeks already knew how rare it was to face the world with full consciousness. The Christian virtues are rarer still.

As Jesus put it: many are called, but few are chosen.