Community Outreach
Serving the Entire Community Together Hand in Hand. Please Help Us in Supporting the Following Charities:
What is Charity?
The word "charity" entered the English language through the Old French word "charité"
which was derived from the Latin "caritas".
Originally in Latin the word caritas meant preciousness, dearness, high price. From this, in Christian theology, caritas became the standard Latin translation for the Greek word agapē, meaning an unlimited loving-kindness to all others, such as the love of God. This much wider concept is the meaning of the word charity in the Christian triplet "faith, hope and charity", and notably as used by the King James Version of the Bible in its translation of St Paul's Letter to the Corinthians. However the English word more generally used for this concept, both before and since is the more direct word: love or agapē.
St Paul's agapē was specifically not primarily about good works and giving to the poor. "And though I feed the poor with all my goods, and though I give my body, that I be burned, and have not love [agapē], it profiteth me nothing". - 1 Corinthians 13:3, Geneva translation, 1560). But in English the word charity has steadily acquired this as its primary meaning since being first used in this sense in Old French at least as long ago as the year 1200.
A Concept From Ancient Times
"Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned".
(1 Timothy 1:5)
"Allah will deprive usury of all blessing, but will give increase for deeds of charity"
(Quran 2: 276)
Much has been written over the years about the importance of "paying it forward". It's a simple law; you must plant what you want to grow!
