Summaries / Resúmenes - Studia Moralia

404 BRIAN JOHNSTONE
Similarly it is not sufficient to consider only the significance of
the choice and act for the “perfection” of the one acting, we need
also to consider the impact of such acts on the “perfection” of
the person, the receiver, who is to receive them. Insofar as he
intends and acts in such a way as to enable the other to become
a better receiver and giver of gifts, the agent “perfects” himself
as a person, that is, as a giver and receiver of gifts.
The horizon within which we think and act may be designated
as givenness. But this is not to be considered as an
abstraction, as an horizon of mere thought. Givenness articulates
the meaning of the concrete giving of being by God in creation
and grace. Being is given being. All creatures have received
their being and with that the capacity to give to others. All
engage in a complex pattern of relationships of receiving and
giving.
The relationships between persons, that is between intelligent,
free givers and receivers, is inadequately expressed in
terms of “acts.” The concept of act expresses a movement of the
subject-agent, it does not adequately account for the other who
is affected by or receives the movement. In place of the analysis
of “acts” we take up the analysis of gift and consider the receiving
and giving of gifts. Thus, we move beyond a consideration of
the person as “agent” to an appreciation of the person as the
giver of gifts and as receiver of gifts. This in turn requires us to
take into account the capacities and dispositions of those persons
which enable and move them to give and receive, that is the
virtues.
The ideal gift is that which is totally gratuitous, but we,
being finite and sinful creatures cannot achieve such gratuity.
Only God is capable of that; only God made man is capable of
the ideal human act of gratuitous giving. That is, only one, Jesus
Christ, can carry out the ideal act. We can seek only to approximate
to that ideal of gratuitousness. It is in terms of receiving
and giving, that we make sense of our moral relationships.
The fundamental purpose of giving is to enable others to
become receivers and givers of gifts: the fundamental purpose of
receiving it to become capable of giving. To become a “self” is to
become a giver and receiver in relationship to others; selfhood
means giving self, but in giving we receive our “self,” as “recompense”
in becoming receivers and thus givers. Gratuitous giving