No emotion, merely as an emotion, is a sin, because we cannot directly control the arising of an emotion in our soul.
Interpretation
Emotions themselves aren't sinful as we can't control their emergence in our minds.
Peter Kreeft's quote highlights the idea that emotions are natural responses that cannot be directly controlled, and therefore cannot be deemed sinful in their occurrence. This suggests a nuanced understanding of morality, where the responsibility lies not in the feeling itself, but in how we choose to act upon those feelings.
In practice
During a discussion about the nature of morality, this quote can be used to emphasize that feeling emotions isn't inherently wrong.
Trusting God's grace means trusting God's love for us rather than our love for God. [...] Therefore our prayers should consist mainly of rousing our awareness of God's love for us rather than trying to rouse God's awareness of our love for him, like the priests of Baal on Mount Carmel (1 Kings 18:26-29).
Remembering the facts of death and Heaven gives us an even more pressing reason to learn to pray: We do not have an infinite amount of time. We are one day nearer Home today than we ever were before. I guarantee you that after you die you will not say 'I spent too much time praying; I wish I had watched more TV instead.'
Like apes, we breed, sleep, and die. Yet like God we say, "I am." We are ontological oxymorons.
The modern mind always tends to reduce the greater to the lesser rather than seeing the lesser as reflecting the greater.
Our soul, like Mary's body, is to receive God Himself if only we, like her, believe, consent and receive; if only we speak her truly magic word fiat, "let it be." It is the creative word, the word God used to create the universe.
Protestants believe that the sacraments are like ladders that God gave to us by which we can climb up to Him. Catholics believe that they are like ladders that God gave to Himself by which He climbs down to us.
Anyone who hasn't experienced the ecstasy of betrayal knows nothing about ecstasy at all.
Each act is virgin, even the repeated ones.
Relativity applies to physics, not ethics.
One reason most people never stop thinking is that mental frenzy keeps us from having to see the upsetting aspects of our lives. If I'm constantly brooding about my children or career, I won't notice that I'm lonely. If I grapple continuously with logistical problems, I can avoid contemplating little issues like, say, my own mortality.
Man often becomes what he believes himself to be.
To be white in America is to have the confidence to say, without a second thought: this space, this neighborhood, this city, this county, this country is mine.
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