CCC 66 “The Christian economy, therefore, since it is the new and definitive Covenant, will never pass away; and no new public revelation is to be expected before the glorious manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ.”1 Yet even if Revelation is already complete, it has not been made completely explicit; it remains for Christian faith gradually to grasp its full significance over the course of the centuries.
CCC 312 In time we can discover that God in his almighty providence can bring a good from the consequences of an evil, even a moral evil, caused by his creatures: “It was not you”, said Joseph to his brothers, “who sent me here, but God. .. You meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive.”2 From the greatest moral evil ever committed – the rejection and murder of God’s only Son, caused by the sins of all men – God, by his grace that “abounded all the more”,3 brought the greatest of goods: the glorification of Christ and our redemption. But for all that, evil never becomes a good.
CCC 449 By attributing to Jesus the divine title “Lord”, the first confessions of the Church’s faith affirm from the beginning that the power, honor and glory due to God the Father are due also to Jesus, because “he was in the form of God”,4 and the Father manifested the sovereignty of Jesus by raising him from the dead and exalting him into his glory.5
CCC 1041 The message of the Last Judgment calls men to conversion while God is still giving them “the acceptable time,. .. the day of salvation.”6 It inspires a holy fear of God and commits them to the justice of the Kingdom of God. It proclaims the “blessed hope” of the Lord’s return, when he will come “to be glorified in his saints, and to be marveled at in all who have believed.”7
CCC 1130 The Church celebrates the mystery of her Lord “until he comes,” when God will be “everything to everyone.”8 Since the apostolic age the liturgy has been drawn toward its goal by the Spirit’s groaning in the Church: Marana tha!9 The liturgy thus shares in Jesus’ desire: “I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you. .. until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.”10 In the sacraments of Christ the Church already receives the guarantee of her inheritance and even now shares in everlasting life, while “awaiting our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Christ Jesus.”11 The “Spirit and the Bride say, ‘Come. .. Come, Lord Jesus!”’12
St. Thomas sums up the various aspects of sacramental signs: “Therefore a sacrament is a sign that commemorates what precedes it- Christ’s Passion; demonstrates what is accomplished in us through Christ’s Passion – grace; and prefigures what that Passion pledges to us – future glory.”13
CCC 1809 Temperance is the moral virtue that moderates the attraction of pleasures and provides balance in the use of created goods. It ensures the will’s mastery over instincts and keeps desires within the limits of what is honorable. The temperate person directs the sensitive appetites toward what is good and maintains a healthy discretion: “Do not follow your inclination and strength, walking according to the desires of your heart.”14 Temperance is often praised in the Old Testament: “Do not follow your base desires, but restrain your appetites.”15 In the New Testament it is called “moderation” or “sobriety.” We ought “to live sober, upright, and godly lives in this world.”16
To live well is nothing other than to love God with all one’s heart, with all one’s soul and with all one’s efforts; from this it comes about that love is kept whole and uncorrupted (through temperance). No misfortune can disturb it (and this is fortitude). It obeys only [God] (and this is justice), and is careful in discerning things, so as not to be surprised by deceit or trickery (and this is prudence).17
CCC 2760 Very early on, liturgical usage concluded the Lord’s Prayer with a doxology. In the Didache, we find, “For yours are the power and the glory for ever.”18 The Apostolic Constitutions add to the beginning: “the kingdom,” and this is the formula retained to our day in ecumenical prayer.19 The Byzantine tradition adds after “the glory” the words “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” The Roman Missal develops the last petition in the explicit perspective of “awaiting our blessed hope” and of the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.20 Then comes the assembly’s acclamation or the repetition of the doxology from the Apostolic Constitutions.
CCC 2818 In the Lord’s Prayer, “thy kingdom come” refers primarily to the final coming of the reign of God through Christ’s return.21 But, far from distracting the Church from her mission in this present world, this desire commits her to it all the more strongly. Since Pentecost, the coming of that Reign is the work of the Spirit of the Lord who “complete[s] his work on earth and brings us the fullness of grace.”22
1 DV 4; cf. 1 Tim 6:14; Titus 2:13.
2 Gen 45:8; 50:20; cf. Tob 2:12 (Vulg.).
3 Cf. Rom 5:20.
4 Cf. Acts 2:34 – 36; Rom 9:5; Titus 2:13; Rev 5:13; Phil 2:6.
5 Cf. Rom 10:9; I Cor 12:3; Phil 2:9-11.
6 2 Cor 6:2.
7 Titus 2:13; 2 Thess 1:10.
8 1 Cor 11:26; 15:28.
9 1 Cor 16:22.
10 Lk 22:15.
11 Titus 2:13.
12 Rev 22:17, 20.
13 St. Thomas Aquinas, STh III, 60, 3.
14 Sir 5:2; cf. 37:27-31.
15 Sir 18:30.
16 Titus 2:12.
17 St. Augustine, De moribus eccl. 1, 25, 46: PL 32, 1330-1331.
18 Didache 8, 2: SCh 248, 174.
19 Apostolic Constitutions, 7, 24, 1: PG 1,1016.
20 Titus 2:13; cf. Roman Missal 22, Embolism after the Lord’s Prayer.
21 Cf. Titus 2:13.
22 Roman Missal, Eucharistic Prayer IV, 118.