205. Comparing the merit (worth) in the two lives, contemplative vs. active
205. COMPARING THE MERIT (WORTH) IN THE TWO LIVES, CONTEMPLATIVE VS. ACTIVE
Even if contemplation is more joyful than action, that does not prove it is more morally meritorious. Isn’t it selfish to prefer the cultivation of one’s own spiritual joy to the needs of others? It is love, after all, that is the first and greatest commandment. Mustn’t “thy will be done” rather than “my intellect be perfected” be our most fundamental desire?
Whether the active life is of greater merit than the contemplative?
That which pertains more directly to the love of God is generically more meritorious than that which pertains directly to the love of our neighbor for God’s sake. Now the contemplative life pertains directly and immediately to the love of God. . . . Wherefore the contemplative life is generically (abstractly, in itself, by its own essential universal nature) of greater merit than the active life. . . .
Nevertheless it may happen (concretely, in a given situation, individually) that one man merits more by the works of the active life than another by the works of the contemplative life. For instance through excess of divine love a man may now and then suffer separation from the sweetness of divine contemplation for the time being, that God’s will may be done and for His glory’s sake. . . (II-II,182,2).
The story is a common one of the monk rapt in the contemplation of God and interrupted by a beggar at the door. If he does not turn from his contemplative joy and open the door to the beggar, it is not God that he is contemplating, but himself. For the beggar is Christ. If, on the other hand, he does turn from his contemplative joy and open the door to the beggar, his joy is increased, for the same reason: because the beggar is Christ, and Christ loves us and wills for us the greatest joy.
The merit of both contemplation and action comes from charity. The primacy of contemplation does not exclude or contradict the primacy of charity:
It is written (Col 3:14): Above all things have charity, which is the bond of perfection, because it binds, as it were, all the other virtues together in perfect unity.
A thing is said to be perfect in so far as it attains its proper end, which is the ultimate perfection thereof. Now it is charity that unites us to God, Who is the last end of the human mind, since he that abideth in charity abideth in God, and God in him (1 Jn 4:16). Therefore the perfection of the Christian life consists radically in charity (II-II,184,1).
The contrast between love and contemplation, and between God and neighbor as the object of these two acts, is a false contrast.
The loving contemplation of God is the greatest joy and has the greatest merit (1) because love is indeed the greatest thing, and the greatest commandment, (2) but love and contemplation imply or include each other. For (2a) we contemplate out of love and we contemplate the God of love. And (2b) loving God and loving neighbor are inseparable. Loving action toward our neighbor can and should be contemplation’s own extended hand. We can do the works of Martha in the spirit of Mary.