Virtues

[Grateful]

Would appreciate if someone can teach me "how" to obtain, improve, practice, or empower me upon the virtues, beginning with the virtue of Patience/Humility/Kindness/Gentleness.  Then moving on to the next virtue.  In the knowledge that the "Law came through Moses, but Grace and Truth came through the Lord Jesus Christ."  Living Word

[Anomaly]

Consciously and intentionally practice it on yourself first.  Virtures aren't sequential and are really only strived to temporarily achieve, not really obtained.   

Just having the disire is an indication you're headed in a he right direction.   

[Era Might]

Virtues aren't abstractions. There is no theoretical virtue to attain...virtue is exercised in each individual context. I think we often imagine virtues as some ideal we're trying to attain, rather than a sort of fire that we have to feed. Virtues burn away, they don't add, because there is nothing to add but Christ. As St. Paul puts it, "each man's work will become manifest; for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done" (1Cor 3:13). When we start to try to practice virtues, our natures aren't so much rebelling as burning away. We have to shed many skins until Christ is revealed in us, and then virtue isn't something we attain, some "currency" we use to get to Heaven. Virtue is just our annihilation and the birth of Christ.

There's a funny story I read about Dorothy Day, someone apparently told her she wasn't patient, and she responded something like she holds more patience in a moment than you will in a lifetime. Because she struggled with patience, that's exactly why she was on fire with it. She had a lot of impatience to burn away. That's why the sinful are closer to God than the saints, because where sin abounds, grace abounds more.

[Guest]

4 hours ago, Era Might said:

That's why the sinful are closer to God than the saints, because where sin abounds, grace abounds more.

That sure got my attention

[CatherineM]

Volunteering at a homeless shelter will teach you humility and kindness. 

[Grateful]

Your kind responses to the question on how to attain Virtues were useful and much appreciated.  Especially realizing that living a virtuous life is actually the annihilation of the ego as the birthing of the Word Incarnate upon our hearts, minds, and bodies are being transcending, transforming, and transfiguring through Grace.