Growing in the Theological Virtues – Trust Before Faith?

Just because the Hebrew people had grown in trust enough to know God more intimately through Moses, the lessons in growing in trust were far from over. In fact, one of the most noted parts of the Exodus story is how fickle the Hebrew people were. They whined in the desert after being rescued from…

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Growing in the Theological Virtues: Intimacy with God

The main goal of spiritual growth is to grow in our relationship with God. That’s exactly what the theological virtues help us to do. The first step of any human relationship is to build trust. As trust strengthens, our relationship grows in the security necessary to open ourselves in intimacy. Intimacy means to truly know…

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Growing in the Theological Virtues: Hope and the Bus Stop

The fruits of spiritual growth from the theological virtues, including the virtue of hope, are lived in this life. But the true object of our hope lies at the other end of death. Saint Paul tells us, “In the end, three things remain: faith, hope and love.” Saint Thomas Aquinas teaches that of the theological…

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Catholic Spirituality is Living the Adventure of Faith

Catholic Spirituality is Living the Adventure of Faith

If you follow From the Abbey’s spiritual growth tutorials for any length of time, you’ll notice a number of repeated themes: We need to put God at the center of our daily lives and conquer “external distractions” with the virtue of prudence. We need a daily habit of focused, meaningful prayer. Developing virtue is the…

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Are You Too Busy to Really Live?

Are You Too Busy to Really Live?

Everyone feels like they are too busy. We all suffer from busyness in one form or another. It seems to us that every minute of our time is spoken for. Our schedules are full. We cannot possibly handle another commitment. But when we live this way, we tend to jump from one “urgent” demand to…

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