The Commands of Christ Require a Free Response

[originally posted September 22, 2009]

Balthasar is speaking on catechisms in this passage (long before the Catechism of the Catholic Church was produced):

"And since Catholic Christians must not pass off the evangelical counsels of Christ concerning ethical conduct as 'natural law', to be obeyed by all men, there emerges within the catechectical issue a much more sensitive question: Are identical norms to be applied to the devout as well as to the lukewarm? To those at the center of the Church and at the periphery?

No catechism can ever compress into a rigid system the Commands of Christ which always require a free response."

(Test Everything, Hold Fast to What Is Good, 72).

This quote captures in a nutshell the dynamic of the evangelical counsels which Balthasar understands as drawing the Christian into an ever deeper discipleship of the Lord. For those who live decisively a life of celibacy, the counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience mean one thing; for the married, they mean something analogous. But, the gaze of Christ falls on every person, wherever they are: the call to holiness is universal...