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VirTrue: Affection (Affectus) a Part of Faith

VirTrue - Helping Man Grow in Truth and Virtue

🎙️ Intro Welcome to VirTrue where we work together to turn away from vice and adopt the virtuous life we are all called to. I’m your host, Jethro Higgins. Today, we are discussing the virtue of Affection, or Affectus, under the theological virtue of Faith. 🌿 Virtue Description Affection is a rightly ordered desire for what is truly good. Under Faith, Affectus is the movement of the will toward God in response to revealed truth. Faith is not mere intellectual assent. When the intellect believes, the will should respond with reverence, trust, devotion, and holy desire. St. Thomas Aquinas distinguishes between the sensitive appetite, which produces emotions, and the intellectual appetite, which is the will. Affectus belongs to the will. It is not a passion. It is chosen. Faith informs the mind.Affectus moves the heart. True faith does not remain abstract. It produces affection for the God who reveals Himself. ⚠️ Vice of Deficiency: Hard-Heartedness Definition Hard-heartedness is the refusal of the heart to be moved by divine truth. Why it fits Affectus warms the will toward God. Hard-heartedness blocks that movement. The intellect may assent, but the soul remains cold. What it looks like * Indifference in prayer * Mechanical worship * Minimal response to Scripture * Resistance to repentance * Lukewarm devotion St. Bernard warned against spiritual coldness and tepidity. A soul can believe and still remain unmoved. Faith without affection becomes sterile. 🔥 Vice of Excess: Obsession Definition Obsession is a disordered spiritual intensity where the sensitive appetite overwhelms reason. Why it fits Affectus is governed by truth. Obsession is governed by sensation. Instead of affection shaped by faith, feelings dominate judgment. What it looks like * Chasing emotional highs * Dependence on retreat experiences * Constant need for stimulation * Measuring holiness by intensity of feeling * Fixation on private revelation and signs The obsessed soul is not cold. It is flooded. Emotion overtakes reason. Affectus is faith-informed affection.Obsession is affection untethered from faith. 🪞 My Life In my youth, I leaned toward obsession. My faith depended on emotional highs and social energy. I chased retreat moments instead of cultivating steady affection shaped by truth. Now, as a husband and father, my struggle is the opposite. I can assent intellectually while remaining internally cold. I can recognize what is good without allowing it to penetrate my heart. Affectus requires intention. It is the habit of willing good because it is good. 🌍 The Secular Perspective Our culture is ruled by the sensitive appetite. Emotion becomes the measure of truth. When objective truth is denied, reason weakens, and sensation dominates. Without truth, there can be no rightly ordered affection. The world chases feeling.Affection requires truth first. 🌟 Example Saint: St. Bernard of Clairvaux Lived: 1090–1153From: Fontaine-lès-Dijon, FranceMission: Cistercian reformer and Doctor of the Church St. Bernard exemplifies Affectus as faith that moves the heart. He refused to let faith remain cold or merely intellectual. For Bernard, belief in God must awaken love for God. Truth that does not stir affection is incomplete. Why he fits Faith that ignites loveIn his sermons on the Song of Songs, Bernard teaches that faith must lead to longing and devotion. Warmth without excessHe warned against coldness and against emotional instability. True affection is steady and governed by truth. Love flowing from belief“The measure of loving God is to love Him without measure.” St. Bernard shows us that faith should set the heart on fire without losing balance or reason. 💬 Tell Me What You Think Where do you struggle more — coldness or excess?Share your thoughts in the comments. 🌿 Continuing the Journey Through Faith Chastity is not an isolated virtue. It is one branch growing from the theological virtue of Faith. When faith orders the intellect toward divine truth, the rest of the person begins to come into right order as well. Chastity governs sexual desire according to that truth, but the Christian life requires the full integration of all the sub-virtues flowing from faith. To better understand the foundation of this virtue, return to: * Faith (Fides) → The Theological Virtue of Faith As we continue growing in virtue together, remember that these virtues are deeply connected: * Chastity (Castitas) → Ordering sexual desire according to reason, divine revelation, and authentic love * Continence (Continentia) → Strengthening self-control and resistance to disordered desire * Religion (Religio) → Rendering proper worship and obedience to God * Reverence (Reverentia) → Forming respect for God, the human person, and the dignity of the body * Obedience (Obedientia) → Submitting the will to rightful authority and divine law * Decorum (Decorum) → Ordering outward behavior so our lives reflect truth inwardly * Affection (Affectus) → Rightly ordering the emotional life toward authentic love rather than impulse Together, these lively virtues help restore the human person through faith, hope and charity. And they continue preparing us for the broader journey through the seven virtues, the cardinal virtues, and the full Christian life rooted in Jesus Christ. ✝️ Act of Affectus O my God, I believe in You with my mind and with my heart. Keep my faith from growing cold or distant. Let it be alive with love and holy desire. Guard me from hardness of heart and from obsessive excesses. Order my emotions under reason, and my reason under You. May I grow in affection for what I know to be true. Warm my heart with steady devotion, so that my belief may be living, faithful, and whole. Amen. 🙏 Closing Prayer Lord, bless us with faith, hope, love, prudence, temperance, fortitude, and justice that we may live as you intended man to live, in all virtue and righteousness. Help us to flee from sin, and avoid all temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil. Protect us with a spiritual hedge in front of us, behind us, above us, below us, to our right, and to our left, within us, and all around us, and seal it with the blood of your precious Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Help us to keep you in everything that we think, say, and do. Amen. 🕊️ Go out and fill the world with virtue. Deus vult. Follow Us on Social Media and Popular Podcast Networks: Get full access to The Social Catholic at socialcatholic.substack.com/subscribe