Stages of Awareness"Are there different levels or stages that people go through as they get more of the power of God in their life?" Chris asked. "The lives of Catholic Christian saints — Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, and others — indicate that Catholicism has much to share about spiritual stages and states." "Old-time writers in spirituality brought out that there are three stages in spiritual life. We don’t hear much about them nowadays but they’re more or less still there in our people’s lives. First is the purgative stage. Then the virtuous stage. And the third stage is the contemplative stage. "In other words, the idea is that the first stage of the spiritual life is purgative. At this level you are really trying to root out sin from your life — selfishness, greed, avarice, and all these things. "Then, in coming into union with the Lord, struggling hard to pass through the purgative way, you enter into the second stage: virtue. Once you’ve rooted out a good amount of sin within you, you begin to live more in a realization of God’s presence. You live with the idea of virtue in your life. The first stage’s emphasis is overcoming evil. Then the second stage is one of living more with virtue in your life — whether it be kindness, patience, forgiveness, or other virtues. |
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