Search for True Happiness PDF

UNIT II. CALLED TO HAPPINESS LESSON A: SEARCH FOR THE TRUE HAPPINESS LESSON B: THE MORAL GOOD OF HUMAN ACTS UNIT II. CALLED TO HAPPINESS LESSON A: SEARCH FOR THE TRUE HAPPINESS 1. WORLDVIEWS/TRENDS IN ACHIEVING HAPPINESS 2. GOD AS THE ULTIMATE HAPPINESS OF THE HUMAN PERSON STUDY Leo is rushi...

UNIT II. CALLED TO HAPPINESS LESSON A: SEARCH FOR THE TRUE HAPPINESS LESSON B: THE MORAL GOOD OF HUMAN ACTS UNIT II. CALLED TO HAPPINESS LESSON A: SEARCH FOR THE TRUE HAPPINESS 1. WORLDVIEWS/TRENDS IN ACHIEVING HAPPINESS 2. GOD AS THE ULTIMATE HAPPINESS OF THE HUMAN PERSON STUDY Leo is rushing to the nearest apple store in order to buy the recently released version of iPhone. It was just a year ago when he acquired his current iPhone but since he believes that keeping up with the latest trends and upgrades of his favorite device, would give him immense pleasure, there is nothing he wouldn’t do to get hold of one. However, given his meagre salary, he would sacrifice a lot of things just to save up for his highly anticipated tech device, not to mention that his credit card is on the brink of its limit and most of his bills are already passed their due. Leo doesn’t mind at all, what’s important is that buying the new iPhone makes him happy. QUESTION Where can I find true happiness? 1. Worldviews/Trends in Achieving Happiness Hedonism To seek the pleasurable is the primary reason of human behavior. Happiness equates with pleasure. Pleasure ranges from the physical exhilaration to the material things which the world cunningly offers. The hedonist chases physical pleasures as gateway to what will satisfy inner longings. In the end, after the fleeting feeling has welled up, the emptiness remains and the same cycle of chasing after pleasure continues without providing the authentic remedy to their insatiable yearnings. Materialism and Consumerism Material possession, success, and progress are the highest values in life. This doctrine highly values the material realm and is opposed to intellectual and spiritual values. An upshot of materialism is Consumerism, which believes that personal wellbeing and happiness depend, on a very large extent, on the level of consumption, particularly on the purchase of material goods. Like hedonism, buttressing one’s happiness on material things, in the end, only throws a person into a cycle of dissatisfaction and constant yearning for something that is temporal and fleeting. Consumerism, Retrieve April 9, 2018, https://www.ssc.wisc.edu/~wright/ContemporaryAmericanSociety/ c. Eudaimonism The highest form of happiness can be acquired through the practice of virtues. For Aristotle, these virtues are actions turned into good habits which lead a person to transcend his/her passions. ACTIVITY 1: BREAKOUT GROUPS ▪ Divide the group into groups of 6 members each. ▪ Choose from among the members a reporter during the plenary. ▪ Secretary will report for 5 minutes. ▪ Discuss the following points (10 mins.): 1. Salient points about the worldview. State whether the points are positive or negative. 2. Enumerate some present manifestations of the worldview. 3. Would you recommend a hedonism as a way of life to your loved ones? G1: Hedonism G2: Materialism/Consumerism G3: Eudaimonism G4:Hedonism G5: Consumerism 2. GOD AS THE ULTIMATE HAPPINESS OF THE HUMAN PERSON a. St. Thomas Aquinas on Happiness b. Happiness in God as the Ultimate Goal of Human Beings c. God’s Commandments: Criteria in Attaining Eternal Life d. Beatitudes: Call to Perfection a. St. Thomas Aquinas on Happiness Happiness as end. Human beings have the power of reason to determine what seems good for them and the power of free will to choose what goods they will seek and how they will go about obtaining them. Thus, according to Aquinas we are masters of our own actions.  Those goods that we seek are goals or ends, the things we hope to achieve by our actions. The angelic doctor adds, “although the end be last in the order of execution, yet it is the first order of the agent’s intention and it is in this way that it is a cause.” St. Thomas Aquinas on Happiness: What it is, What it consists, and How to obtain it (ST I-II, Q.2, Prologue). Kevin Vost, Psy.D., One Minute Aquinas: The Doctor’s Quick Answers to Fundametal Questions, (Manchester, New Hampshire, Sophia Institute Press, 2014). Pp 30-31.  St. Thomas asserts that human beings are not so much pawns who are pushed by the random events of their past as masters of their fates who are pulled by future goals of their own making. Aquinas insists that an end acts as a final cause, a cause for the sake of which human beings undertake to do something. Aristotle and Aquinas agree that although each individual has his/her own personal likes and dislikes, he/she acts, most of the time, for the very same final, last end. False happiness. According to St. Augustine, “all men agree in desiring the last end, which is happiness.” Why, then, do individual men and women act so very differently and achieve such differing degrees of happiness? St. Thomas notes that “to desire happiness is nothing else than to desire that one’s will be satisfied. And this is what everyone desires.” And yet, “all do not know Happiness; because they know not in what the general notion of happiness is found.”  In determining what will bring happiness, St. Thomas starts by enumerating some common false contenders, which are as popular and alluring today as they were in the thirteenth century, namely: wealth, power, honor, fame and glory. These are only means to the end of happiness itself and none of them ever completely brings satisfaction. Two Kinds of Happiness: An imperfect happiness while here on earth. A perfect happiness consisting of the beatific vision of the Uncreated Good (i.e., God) in heaven. Augustine expressed this so beautifully in his writing, “Our hearts are restless until they rest in you.” Augustine refers to God who is the ultimate source of every good thing and the end towards whom human beings ought to direct all their actions. b. Happiness in God as the Ultimate Goal of Human Beings Happiness is associated with the meaning of life. JPII “In the depths of his heart there always remains a yearning for absolute truth and a thirst to attain full knowledge of it. This is eloquently proven by man's tireless search for knowledge in all fields.” JPII St. Thomas Aquinas points out: “every agent acts for an end; otherwise, one thing would not follow more than another from the action of the agent.” St. Thomas Aquinas clarifies the how rational beings differ from irrational beings in their pursuit of an end: Irrational creatures seek their end by means of natural inclination. In rational creatures, this inclination is caused by the deliberation of the intellect, which knows the end as good, and the free decision of the will.” As the faculty that chooses, the will empowers the person to choose which path to take on the way to happiness: whether right or wrong. Relationship between the Human Person’s Rationality and the Totality of His Being: All human persons are oriented towards the good, in virtue of their rationality. This good is broken down and made up of the basic goods of the person, which are perfective of him, or her. The knowledge, right ordering, and harmonizing of the human goods by reason, and the moral effort to pursue them throughout a lifetime, are necessary for human happiness. If disorder enters in here it upsets the balance of a person’s life and affects their happiness. E.g., housing and nourishment and material well-being serve human life and not vice verse. (Peter Bristow, Christian Ethics and the Human Person) “Man seeks his last end in his actions by knowing that last end (God) and wanting it.” “How is it, then, that I seek you, Lord? Since in seeking you, my God, I seek a happy life, let me seek you so that my soul may live, for my body draws life from my soul and my soul draws life from you. God alone satisfies.” St. Augustine, Confessions Jesus brings the question about morally good action back to its religious foundations, to the acknowledgment of God, who alone is goodness, fullness of life, the final end of human activity, and perfect happiness. “Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect” (Rom 12:2). c. God’s Commandments: Criteria in Attaining Eternal Life JPII elucidates the connection between eternal life and obedience to the decalogue in his remark: “God's commandments show man the path of life and they lead to it.” the decalogue sheds light on the dignity of the human person, and consequently our obligation to respect it, to wit: The 10 Commandments are: Reflections about the good of the person at the level of the many different goods which characterize his identity as a spiritual and bodily being in relationship with God, with his neighbor and with the material world. Teach us man's true humanity. They shed light on the essential duties, and so indirectly on the fundamental rights, inherent in the nature of the human person. “You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness” are negative precepts, which express with particular force the ever urgent need to protect human life, the communion of persons in marriage, private property, truthfulness and people’s good name. d. Beatitudes: Call to Perfection The Beatitudes respond to man’s natural desire for happiness. This desire is of divine origin. God has placed it in the human heart in order to draw man to the One who alone can fulfill it.” The Beatitudes are more about basic attitudes and dispositions than about particular rules of behavior. There is no separation between them and the commandments since both are oriented to eternal life. The Beatitudes: Suggest commitment to live out the different suggested attitudes to attain the graces promised by God. Give an idea that the true happiness that we should pursue cannot be totally attained in this world through temporal things but eternally reside in heaven. Articulate that the destiny of man can be achieved through service and the contemplation of heavenly things. The first three beatitudes are dedicated to removing the obstacles, which purely material goods can present to be genuine happiness. Blessed are the poor in spirit, refers to the need for detachment either from riches or honors, which results from humility. The next two beatitudes restrain and moderate the irascible and concupiscible appetites respectively. Blessed are the meek, protects man’s irascible nature from falling into excessive anger and keeps it within the bounds of reason. Blessed are those that mourn, moderates man’s desire for pleasure by keeping it in proportion, which is the effect on us when we suffer trials, tribulations and the death of loved ones. The second group explains our duty to serve our neighbor. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness. The active life should be devoted principally to one’s duty and spontaneous inclination to serve one’s neighbor. Blessed are the merciful. But spontaneous inclination also leads us to go beyond what is strictly due to others and show them generosity, understanding and forgiveness, and indeed gratuitously without expecting anything in return. The third group brings forth the importance of living a contemplative life. Blessed are the pure of heart. We say of men who triumph over the passions, Blessed are the peacemakers. The virtues gifts, which perfect man in his relations with his neighbor, have peace as their effect, as we read in Isaiah: “The work of justice shall be peace” (32:17). The Beatitudes do not suggest certain actions but correct dispositions and attitudes they remain necessary in forming our will to choose the Good and turn to God. They are reminders that are given to us so that we can become “morally good persons and attain our integral human fulfillment (everlasting happiness) in Jesus Christ.” The Beatitudes indicate a way of life, a life that finds its full actualization in God, the one true source of happiness.