Charity through the Spirit of Saint Vincent de Paul
In this article, São Vicente de Paulo brings a great reflection on the charity.
Let us analyze, in addition to the necessary moral application that this text brings, its form and content, since it is a communication attributed to this Spirit. What is in these but spiritual elevation?
“See the multitude of good men, whose pious memory your history recalls. I could cite thousands of those whose morals were aimed only at improving your globe. Has not Christ told you everything concerning the virtues of charity and love? Why are your divine teachings set aside? Why are the ears closed to his divine words and the heart closed to all his soft maxims?
I would like the reading of the Gospel to be done with more personal interest. But they abandon that book; they transform it into an empty expression and a dead letter; leave this admirable code to oblivion. Your evils come from the voluntary abandonment in which you leave this summary of divine laws. Read, then, these fiery pages of Jesus' devotion and meditate on them. I myself feel ashamed to dare to promise you a work on charity, when I think that in this book you will find all the teachings that should lead you to the heavenly regions..”
Charity, in Kardec's context, was understood differently:
[…] rational morality is based on psychology and the definition of an active human being. That is, the moral act is characterized by a free and conscious act, which is defined as the act of duty. It is the morality of freedom, therefore absolutely free, by definition, from any reward or punishment. In this way, as defined by the thinkers of Rational Spiritualism, duty grounds charity as free and disinterested action. The beauty of charity lies precisely in its freedom, said Victor Cousin, the main leader of this school at the Sorbonne University in Paris. (Figueiredo 2019)
Does this mean that we only need the Gospel?
Assuming the Gospel of Jesus very well understood, without sophistry and adulteration, yes, we only need it. However, it is necessary to take into account that its teachings, even if scientific, have a moral aspect, according to the Moral Sciences. Therefore, it is a mistake to abandon this study to fall only in the Evangelical study, given the present needs of Spirits of our category.
Continuing in the article about Charity, according to São Vicente: “Strong men, arm yourselves; weak men, forge your weapons of your sweetness and your faith; have more persuasion, more constancy in the propagation of your new doctrine. We only come to bring you an encouragement; it is only to stimulate the zeal and virtues that God allows us to manifest to you. But if you wished, you would need only the help of God and your own will.. “
Does that mean that we don't need Spiritism?
Morally speaking, if we knew how to apply all the lessons presented so far, we wouldn't even be talking about it now. But that's not how spiritual progress happens – in jolts. It is slow and gradual and, as far as we know, it is everywhere in the Universe. Therefore, the Spiritist Science, which, in the limit, is the science of Creation, is a necessary part of our progress, as knowledge develops morality.
Let's look a little more critically at the content of this message. The following passage caught our attention:
“When you allow your heart to open to the supplication of the first unfortunate person who reaches out to you; when you give it to him without asking whether his misery is feigned or whether his illness has a vice as its cause; when you leave all righteousness in God's hands; when you leave to the Creator the punishment of all false miseries; finally, when you practice charity for the sole pleasure that it provides, without questioning its usefulness, then you will be the children that God will love and that he will call to himself.“
This Spirit, who goes on saying to congratulate himself on the beginning of a movement (São Vicente de Paulo Society), a very important and necessary movement, suggests that we must respond to any request, without verifying whether it is something faked or not. In reality, can we and should we do this, especially nowadays?
We must not blindly follow any Spirit, especially when it makes no sense to our own reason. But Kardec comes to our rescue:
Continuing the conversation with S. Vicente de Paulo, through the psychography of an assistant medium, Kardec informs himself that, in this previous passage, this Spirit speaks specifically of alms. The teacher then asks:
“[…] it seems to us that giving without discernment to those who do not need it or who could earn a living by honest work is to encourage vice and laziness. If lazy people found someone else's purse easily open, they would multiply to infinity, to the detriment of the truly needy.”
SVP responds:
"You can identify those who can work and then charity obliges you to do everything to provide them with work. However, there are also poor liars, who know very well how to simulate miseries that they do not suffer. These are the ones to be left to the righteousness of God.”
Kardec continues with some questions of interest:
6. – Jesus said: “May your right hand not know what your left hand is doing.” Do those who give out of ostentation have any merit? ─ They only have the merit of pride, for which they will be punished.
7. Doesn't Christian charity, in its broadest sense, also include sweetness, benevolence and indulgence towards the weaknesses of others? ─ Do like Jesus. He told you all this. I listened to him more than ever.
8. ─ Is charity properly understood when it is exclusive among creatures of the same opinion or of the same party? ─ No. It is above all the spirit of sect and party that must be abolished, since all men are brothers. That's what we focus our efforts on.
9. ─ Let us admit that a person sees two men in danger, but cannot save but one. One is your friend and the other your enemy. Whom should you save? ─ You must save your friend, because that friend could accuse you of not being friends with you. As for the other, God will take care of it.
It was a consensus that this last question (9.) seemed strange to us, but it must have a reason for being at that moment.