JCE Religious Education key terms

The way God makes the divine known to humanity, especially through Scripture, tradition, and the person of Jesus Christ, inviting a free human response of faith.

The collection of sacred writings accepted by a religious community as inspired and authoritative for belief and practice, read within a living tradition of interpretation.

The living transmission of belief and practice from one generation to the next, carried in worship, teaching, and communal life alongside written texts.

The belief that sacred authors wrote under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, so their texts reliably convey what God intends to communicate for salvation.

The disciplined interpretation of a sacred text, attending to its language, historical setting, literary form, and place within the whole canon.

The theory and method of interpretation, asking how a reader's context and assumptions shape the meaning drawn from a text.

A recognizable category of writing such as poetry, law code, parable, or letter, whose conventions guide how a text should be read and understood.

The closed or settled list of books a faith community receives as authoritative Scripture, established through long processes of use and discernment.

The teaching office of the Church, exercised by bishops in union with the pope, which authoritatively interprets Scripture and tradition and guards the deposit of faith.

A binding agreement establishing a relationship of commitment between God and a people, carrying promises, obligations, and signs that mark the bond.

The account of God's saving activity unfolding through particular events, persons, and eras, read by believers as a coherent story of rescue and restoration.

The teaching that the eternal Son of God took on full human nature in Jesus of Nazareth, uniting divinity and humanity in one person.

The central Christian claim that one God exists as three distinct persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, sharing one undivided divine nature.

The doctrine that in Christ one divine person subsists in two complete natures, divine and human, without confusion, change, division, or separation.

The branch of theology that studies the identity, person, and work of Jesus Christ, including how his humanity and divinity relate.

The study of salvation, asking what human beings are saved from, for what purpose, and how the life, death, and resurrection of Christ accomplish it.

The unearned gift of God's own life and favour offered to human beings, enabling them to believe, act rightly, and grow in holiness.

The act by which God makes a sinner righteous and restores right relationship, understood differently across traditions regarding faith, works, and merit.

An outward sign instituted by Christ to give grace, a visible action of the Church through which believers encounter God's saving work.

The central Christian celebration of thanksgiving in which bread and wine are blessed and shared as the body and blood of Christ.

The public, official worship of the Church, whose ordered words, gestures, and symbols make present the saving mystery it celebrates.

The Catholic celebration of the Eucharist, comprising the Liturgy of the Word and the Liturgy of the Eucharist offered for the living and the dead.

A formal summary statement of essential Christian belief, professed publicly in worship and used to teach and safeguard the faith's core content.

The effort to restore visible unity among divided Christian communities through dialogue, shared prayer, and common witness.

The inner capacity to judge the moral quality of one's own acts, which must be formed by truth and followed when well informed.

The moral order knowable by human reason apart from revelation, grounded in the purposes and dignity of human nature as created by God.

The specific good or evil that an act deliberately pursues, judged together with intention and circumstances in assessing moral goodness.

A deliberate thought, word, deed, or omission contrary to God's law that damages the sinner's relationship with God and with others.

The sacrament of forgiveness in which a penitent confesses sin, receives absolution, and is restored to communion with God and the Church.

The moral obligation to ensure fair treatment, dignity, and access to resources for all people, especially the vulnerable, in social and economic life.

The sum of conditions in social life that allow individuals and groups to reach their fulfilment, requiring cooperation and respect for rights.

The inherent worth of every person, grounded in being made in God's image, which demands respect independent of ability, status, or usefulness.

The moral priority of attending to the needs and voices of those who are economically or socially marginalised when shaping decisions and practice.

The raising of the mind and heart to God in petition, praise, thanksgiving, or quiet attention, personal and communal, expressed in varied forms.

A simple, loving, sustained attention to God beyond words and images, often described as a gift of grace rather than an achievement.

A call to commit one's life to God through a particular form of consecrated or ordained service, discerned within community.

The personal calling by which a person is invited to live out faith in a specific state of life, whether married, single, ordained, or consecrated.

The prayerful process of weighing motives, feelings, and circumstances to recognise which course of action God is prompting.

The free human response to God's self-gift, involving trust, assent, and commitment, which grows through practice and community life.