Program of Priestly Formation 6th edition

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of the ministerial priesthood including a history and theology of celibacy, is required. 398 The Church enjoins pastors “to neglect nothing with a view to a well-organized and well-oriented catechetical effort”; and since “all pastors have the duty to provide” them, evangelization and catechesis should have a prominent place in the seminary curriculum. 399 A sound study of the content and methods of catechesis not only prepares the seminarian for his task as a minister of the Word but also provides the possibility of a synthetic moment in the curriculum when an integrated unity can be brought to his years of theological study. 400 Moral theology should be taught in a way that draws deeply from Sacred Scripture, Tradition, and the Magisterium, in particular Veritatis Splendor . The Christian moral life should be presented in light of the new law of the grace of the Holy Spirit, who transforms the human person, gives him a new heart, and enables him to follow the example of Christ and live according to the moral law. Moral theology should treat the path to happiness which consists in following the inspirations and the Gifts of the Holy Spirit and living according to the Beatitudes, the virtues, and the moral law, including absolute moral norms. Therefore, moral theology should illustrate that the ultimate end of graced human acts is the beatitude to which God calls us: a partic ipation in the life of the Blessed Trinity. The inseparable connections among moral theology, Sacred Scripture, spiritual theology, theological anthropology, and dogmatic theology should be evident, with particular attention paid to the synthesis of the Christian moral life in the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas. Moreover, an understanding of the moral sense of Sacred Scripture should be developed 401 to prepare future priests for preaching on Christian morality. The preparation of future priests to be ministers of the Sacrament of Penance should also be kept in mind in the 329. 330. In moral theology, the core must include fundamental moral theology, health care ethics, sexual morality, and social doctrine. 331.

398 See Sacramentum Caritatis , no. 24. 399 St. John Paul II, Catechesi Tradendae ( On Catechesis in Our Time ) (Washington, DC: USCCB, 1979), no. 64. 400 See Optatam Totius , no. 19; CIC, cc. 254, 256; CCEO, c. 352 §§2-3. 401 See Catechism of the Catholic Church , nos. 115-118.