155. Is love in us from God or from our own active choice?
155. IS LOVE IN US FROM GOD OR FROM OUR OWN ACTIVE CHOICE?
Do I decide to love, or does God make me love? Is charity my work or is it God’s?
When the Holy Ghost moves the human mind (soul, heart, spirit), the movement of charity does not proceed from this motion in such a way that the human mind be merely moved without being the principle (source, origin, cause) of this movement as when a body is moved by some extrinsic motive power. For this is contrary to the nature of a voluntary act, whose principle needs to be in itself; so that it would follow that to love is not a voluntary act, which involves a contradiction, since love of its very nature implies an act of the will.
Likewise, neither can it be said that the Holy Ghost moves the will in such a way to the act of loving as though the will were (merely) an instrument, for an instrument . . . has not the power to act or not to act; for then again the act would cease to be voluntary and meritorious. . . .
Given that the will is moved by the Holy Ghost to the act of love, it is necessary that the will also should be the efficient cause of that act. . . (II-II,23,2).
God does not give us charity without our willing it. He does not do it instead of us doing it. He turns our free wills on, not off. He, the First Cause, causes us to be the originating cause of our own choice to love, as a parent is the cause of the child yet causes the child to be human and therefore free and therefore to have the power of being the cause of its own choices.
It is not that our will to receive God’s grace causes God to give it. As the child’s will does not cause the parent’s will, but vice versa, so our will does not cause God’s will but vice versa. Our willing charity is not the cause of God giving us that gift; God’s gift is the cause of our willing it.
Selfish love, eros, is within our natural power. Unselfish love, agape, is not. It is a gift of God. If you have it, thank God for it, not yourself. If you don’t have it, ask God for it, not yourself.
But it is evident that the act of charity surpasses the nature of the power of the will . . . unless some form be superadded to the natural power, inclining it to the act of love, this same act would not be . . . easy and pleasurable to perform. And this is evidently untrue, since no virtue has such a strong inclination to its act as charity has, nor does any virtue perform its act with so great pleasure. . .
The Divine Essence Itself is charity, even as It is wisdom and goodness. Wherefore just as we are said to be good with the goodness which is God, and wise with the wisdom which is God (since the goodness whereby we are good is a participation of divine goodness, and the wisdom whereby we are wise is a share of divine wisdom), so too the charity whereby we love our neighbor is a participation of divine charity. . . .
God is effectively the life both of the soul by charity and of the body by the soul . . . charity is the life of the soul even as the soul is the life of the body . . . just as the soul is immediately united to the body, so is charity to the soul (II-II,23,2).
Human nature by itself without God is hopelessly egotistic, even though it can temper its egotism with justice and kindness and politeness. Charity is the main work of the life of God in the soul (zoe, supernatural life, sanctifying grace, the new birth—there are many names for it). Yet we have by nature a need and aptitude for supernatural charity; for when it comes, it makes us supremely happy.
Charity is not only a gift given by God, like a miracle, or creation, or the soul itself; but it is the very life of God Himself, it is God’s gift of Himself. We actually “participate in”, or share, or have a finite part of, the infinite reality of divine charity. Charity is not only the effect of union with God, charity is real union with God, as drinking is union with water.