Catena Fidei

Catechism of the Catholic Church · Part One › Section One › Chapter Three · Article 2 (§§166–184)

Paragraphs · 19

The Catechism's text is under copyright, so each paragraph is quoted briefly here with a link to the full text at vatican.va.

§166 — Faith is a personal act - the free response of the human person to the initiative of God who reveals himself. But faith is not an isolated act.vatican.va
§167 — "I believe" (Apostles' Creed) is the faith of the Church professed personally by each believer, principally during Baptism. "We believe" (Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed) is the faith of the Church confessed by the bishops assembled in council or more generally by the liturgical assembly of believers.vatican.va

§168 — It is the Church that believes first, and so bears, nourishes and sustains my faith. Everywhere, it is the Church that first confesses the Lord: "Throughout the world the holy Church acclaims you", as we sing in the hymn Te Deum; with her and in…vatican.va
§169 — Salvation comes from God alone; but because we receive the life of faith through the Church, she is our mother: "We believe the Church as the mother of our new birth, and not in the Church as if she were the author of our salvation."vatican.va

§170 — We do not believe in formulae, but in those realities they express, which faith allows us to touch. "The believer's act [of faith] does not terminate in the propositions, but in the realities [which they express]."vatican.va
§171 — The Church, "the pillar and bulwark of the truth", faithfully guards "the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints". She guards the memory of Christ's words; it is she who from generation to generation hands on the apostles' confession of faith.vatican.va

§172 — Through the centuries, in so many languages, cultures, peoples and nations, the Church has constantly confessed this one faith, received from the one Lord, transmitted by one Baptism, and grounded in the conviction that all people have only one God and Father.vatican.va
§173 — "Indeed, the Church, though scattered throughout the whole world, even to the ends of the earth, having received the faith from the apostles and their disciples.vatican.va
§174 — "For though languages differ throughout the world, the content of the Tradition is one and the same. the Churches established in Germany have no other faith or Tradition, nor do those of the Iberians, nor those of the Celts, nor those of the East, of…vatican.va
§175 — "We guard with care the faith that we have received from the Church, for without ceasing, under the action of God's Spirit, this deposit of great price, as if in an excellent vessel, is constantly being renewed and causes the very vessel that contains it to be renewed."vatican.va

§176 — Faith is a personal adherence of the whole man to God who reveals himself. It involves an assent of the intellect and will to the self-revelation God has made through his deeds and words.vatican.va
§177 — "To believe" has thus a twofold reference: to the person, and to the truth: to the truth, by trust in the person who bears witness to it.vatican.va
§178 — We must believe in no one but God: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.vatican.va
§179 — Faith is a supernatural gift from God. In order to believe, man needs the interior helps of the Holy Spirit.vatican.va
§180 — "Believing" is a human act, conscious and free, corresponding to the dignity of the human person.vatican.va
§181 — "Believing" is an ecclesial act. the Church's faith precedes, engenders, supports and nourishes our faith. the Church is the mother of all believers. "No one can have God as Father who does not have the Church as Mother" (St.vatican.va
§182 — We believe all "that which is contained in the word of God, written or handed down, and which the Church proposes for belief as divinely revealed" (Paul VI, CPG # 20).vatican.va
§183 — Faith is necessary for salvation. the Lord himself affirms: "He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned" (Mk 16:16).vatican.va
§184 — "Faith is a foretaste of the knowledge that will make us blessed in the life to come" (St. Thomas Aquinas. Comp. theol. 1, 2).vatican.va