Folia Theologica 19. (2008)

Hámori Antal: Human dignity in church Teaching

42

HÁMORI, Antal

Being in the image of God the human individual possesses the dignity of a person, who is not just something, but someone. He is capable of self-knowledge, of self-possession and of freely giving himself and entering into communion with other persons. And he is called by grace to a covenant with his Creator, to offer him a response of faith and love that no other creature can give in his stead.6

By his reason, man recognizes the voice of God which urges him „to do what is good and avoid what is evil."7 Everyone is obliged to follow this law, which makes itself heard in conscience and is fulfilled in the love of God and of neighbor. Living a moral life bears witness to the dignity of the person.8

The human body shares in the dignity of „the image of God": it is a human body precisely because it is animated by a spiritual soul, and it is the whole human person that is intended to become, in the body of Christ, a temple of the Spirit.9 The status of the Church is that of the dignity and freedom of the sons of God, in whose hearts the Holy Spirit dwells as in a temple.10 The People of God fulfills its royal dignity by a life in keeping with its vocation to serve with Christ.11

Man and woman have been created, which is to say, willed by God: on the one hand, in perfect equality as human persons; on the other, in their respective beings as man and woman. „Being man" or „being woman" is a reality which is good and willed by God: man and woman possess an inalienable dignity which comes to them immediately from God their Creator.12 Man and woman are both with one and the same dignity „in the image of God". In their „being-man" and „being- woman", they reflect the Creator's wisdom and goodness.13

6 CCC 357. Cf. GS 12, 24, 39.

7 GS 16.

8 CCC 1706 (1713).

9 CCC 364; GS 14. Cf. 1 Cor 6:19-20; 15:44-45.

10 Lumen Gentium (LG) 9; CCC 782.

11 CCC 786.

12 Cf. Gen 2:7,22.

13 CCC 369.