Doug Beaumont.Org

77 thoughts on “Roman Catholicism: The True Church or a Terrible Cult?”

1. I think that what you have been saying is true unfortunately. There are members of the Roman Clhurch as well as the Protestant Churches who have gone astray from their foundation. John Wesley, founder of the Methodist Church, who remained an Anglican minister until his death, took his own members to task as well as other Churches when he thought they were wrong theologically.

   Wesley believed that the Scriptures were the final authority, but they could be interepreted by reason, the by concensus of the faithful (The Church Fathers) and by the experience of the individual Christian.

   Will we all agree? Probably not, but we should be thinking of the vast majority of things we have in common and not the smaller amound of things that separate us. John Wesley has many interesting things to help us at this point. He said that there is a difference between doctrines and opinions. For example, we must believe that Jesus was both God and man, that is doctrine. But, how is was done is opinion and we don’t know. Or the doctrine of the Trinity. We are to belive in the Trinity but how the Trinity works is opinion.

   Many books in Methodism have this thought, even mine, “John Wesley, Natural Man, and the Isms” found many places.

2. Thank you Doug – very nice post. I’ve thought the very same things for the last 4 years or so now. A rough situation brought me out of a church I had been to for 12 years and I was fed up with American Evangelicalism so I started looking into RC. I read a couple of books by Karl Keating and found that a lot of what I had heard about RC was just demonization by Protestants and not necessarily what they actually believed. And, like you said, many of their “weird” beliefs are deeply rooted in the early Church and are more orthodox that you might think…not just things that popped up after Constantine came around. However, the one thing that stopped me from looking further was found in the Catechism in section 841 which says: “The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day.” That did it for me. We are told in Colossians that Jesus Christ is the creator, and Muslims deny this so how could that be? I just couldn’t get past that – I believe anything other than faith in Christ for salvation fits the “heresy” and “false gospel” criteria pretty darn well. Anyways, thanks again for a great read!

3. Doug – I didn’t care to read through that entire Joint Declaration on Justification. Can you summarize what caught your eye that doesn’t jive with you?

4. Doug,

   As evangelicals, we really should get past the juice and crackers thing and move toward the wine that was mixed 500 parts water and 1 part wine, which we’re commanded to not become drunk off of

5. Hey Doug,

   Yep, you were right. I did enjoy this post, and I hear you loud and clear. Much of these concerns were mine too. And I couldn’t agree more that the central issue here is one of authority. But as any non-Catholic attempts to tackle the enormous issue of authority within the historic Church, I would focus more on the idea of apostolic succession, than on the pope in particular. I mean the issue of the pope cannot be sidestepped, but that is a more particularized issue of the broader matter regarding whether God would have instituted safeguards for His revelation-people who would guard and protect it, who could pronounce finally what is orthodox and in other cases what is heretical.

   IOW, Whether there could be one bishop among bishops who held special primacy is interesting, but only after, I think, you have settled for yourself the issue of whether bishops really exist in the historic Church, as Catholics and Orthodox understand bishops. After all, how do we give such credence to the Niceno-Constantinoplan Creed without bishops to promulgate it? Outside that paradigm, I think you’re really just saying that you agree with that Nicene Creed (and someone else could disagree).

   You raise other issues as well here, and those were concerns for me too (eg, lack of unity, etc), but authority does have special place in the debate, I agree. You mentioned the work by Salmon, so let me mention a couple of sources on this issue from the other side. First, the dogmatic Dei Verbum from Vatican II is essential reading for just coming to understand the Catholic position in a short, clear, and authoritative work like Dei Verbum. It’s free online too. Second, and more polemical from the Catholic side, is the terrific book edited by Robert Sungenis, Not by Scripture Alone. It pulls together a collage of writers, many of whom I know you and your readers would respect, and is very well done. It is as much a positive apologetic of the Catholic position as it is polemical.

6. Nathan,

   Hey, just FYI, in case you don’t already know, the Catholic position on “salvation outside the Church” is what might be called a mildly inclusivist position. That is, yes, you are right to think that for a person who had a clear presentation of the good news of God, if that person rejects it, he cannot be saved. But, of course the question arises as to what to think regarding those who haven’t heard or didn’t comprehend when they did hear, right? That’s more of a problem for all Christians to grapple with and is in no way unique to Catholics. If anything, it seems a uniquely Protestant problem, as Catholics deal with salvation outside (or inside!) of the Church.

   You note that Muslims reject Christ as Creator, but as we all know that Muslim countries tend to be very closed countries, do you really think that the average Muslim living in, say, Lebanon has had an accurate and unbiased presentation of who Christians think Christ is? Even if so, in the rare cases where this would be true, has he then heard the entire Gospel message and is therefore accountable for it?

   So, the spirit behind the words you quoted earlier is in that sense. It’s not pluralism, a la John Hick or something like that, but it’s a rational response to the question of what to say about the theists who haven’t been confonted by a full-on presentation of the Gospel. …at least that’s one sense of it.

7. Nathan,

   I have not digested the entire declaration myself, so I just don’t know what I think about it as a whole yet. Further, part of the declaration is that other issues remain (i.e., further disagreements), so without an accurate understanding of both the Lutheran and Roman Catholic positions on jusitification one must be careful dealing with this affirmation.

8. Jeremiah,

   I really appreciate your thoughtful remarks (one reason I alerted you to the post!). Thanks for the clarification on inclusivism – could you bottom line it for us though? Are you saying the official position is that non-Christians in ignorance get an automatic “pass” or just that they “might” be granted salvation? I am going to order Sungeni’s book – I keep meaning to get it and keep forgetting.

9. Jeremiah,

   Thank you for your responses…very thoughtful. The issue of authority is one that I have looked into quite a bit, and to be honest I usually stop half-way through because it freaks me out! To see the way the early Church operated is pretty wild – the hierarchy and succession was all there.

   Regarding the issue of salvation for those who haven’t heard…I’m with the Reformed camp on this one. The problem I see is that salvation is not owed or deserved by anyone – not even someone who doesn’t know that. We are all deserving of hell and the fact that God chooses to save even some of us in a miracle. I am in no place to judge my fellow mankind. I’m just saying that if Scripture teaches ALL men are without excuse – and I believe it does – then I do not see that as “unfair” by any means. I like Koukl’s summary:

   “One question frequently stops Christians in their tracks: “If the Gospel alone saves, then what about the heathen in Africa who never heard?” Can God justly convict a man who hasn’t heard about Jesus? Some people hear the Gospel and reject it, but most never hear it. How can God condemn them? Christians are ill-equipped to respond because they don’t really understand something vital about sin and mercy. Sin brings guilt. Mercy is a gift. Anyone who is a sinner receives punishment he deserves. Anyone who is saved receives mercy he does not deserve and which is not owed him. Think of this question: How could the sheriff send anyone to jail if he didn’t offer him a pardon first? The answer is simple. If he’s guilty, the sheriff is justified in throwing him in jail. There is no obligation to offer a pardon to a guilty man. The same is true of God. He can justly convict a man who has broken His law even though the sinner has heard nothing about God’s pardon in Jesus. God owes no one salvation. He can offer it to whomever He wishes. That’s why it’s called grace. -Gregory Koukl”

10. Let me just add to that…I believe that God can and very well may grant mercy to those who have not heard the Gospel. But, to have an “official position” that says so is questionable in my opinion. We simply do not know. Paul addresses the issue of “fairness” pretty well in Romans, I believe.

    Romans 9:14-16 “What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.’ It does not, therefore, depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy.”

11. Doug – check out this website: http://www.fisheaters.com

    They have separate pages for Catholics and Protestants…there’s even a test for you to take as a non-Catholic Christian that I found quite difficult to answer without second-guessing my own Protestant background. Anywho, you’ll probably enjoy it if this is an issue you are digging deeper into right now.

12. Doug,

    Good question. It would be the second option you mention-that there is just a possibility of being saved for those who haven’t encountered the actual Gospel. The only “free passes” would be in cases of underdeveloped minds/souls (eg, babies, young children, imbiciles, etc). Outside of this particular group, salvation just becomes possible for everyone, including Catholics!

    And this possibility, to address Koukl’s comments for a moment has everything to do with the Ideas brought forward by the likes of Chesterton and CS Lewis. We all have a sense that we were made for something greater, and that we’re survivors of a shipwreck (to use the Titanic metaphor), a glorious ship that went down long ago.. The problem I have with Koukl’s line of thinking is you would get the impression that we’re all more or less scumbags deserving of so little. That view, though I used to hold it myself, doesn’t properly account for the sense of ourselves that Lewis was so good in bringing out–that man is meant for greatness, he is meant for Eden. He is not meant for the dungeon. So, whereas, I could agree with Koukl that salvation is not a debt owed to man, Koukl goes further to take the hard line that man doesn’t even “deserve mercy.” that’s pretty radical, I think. What parent would take such a hard line even with his own children?

13. Yes, one can fairly easily overstate the case here for the Catholic Church with phrases like “official position.” I used the phrase “Catholic teaching,” but even that may be too strong. What I’ve articulated here is what I understand the teaching to be, taking into account major Church teachings on this issue, including the most recent teaching from Vatican II (especially Lumen Gentium) and the Catechism.

    In a very real sense Nathan, as you said, who could know in this or that case? But, if you can find within your own thinking an openness to God being able to be merciful and extend His grace where he sees fit (including outside of clear expressions of the Christian message), then that’s precisely what I was getting at (and what I think the Church is getting at in comments like the one you quoted re Muslims).

14. Nathan – JOhn Wesley thought that God’s prevenient grace was given to all men. Prevenient grace or preventing grace was the grace given to all men by God which allows them to turn to Him, or not accept His grace.

    Wesley also thought that if one were true to the lights they had been given by God, they could be saved – even your African example.

    Naturally, all of the grace was from God and salvation was through Christ, whether they recognized it or not.

15. I think I’ll be the one who is going to disagree. While you are right that the EARLY church did believe in succession and was catholic, I think you miss one major point and that is: the possibility to fall from true doctrine at an early point.

    I’m not surprised that there were these doctrines in the early church already I mean there was so mich false doctrine when the apostles were alive how much more then after their deaths! So i believe in the absolute falshood of these doctrines like icons infant baptism apostolic succession and so on.

    The fact that it’s going on at an early point doesn’t make it orthodox since it’s in disagreement with the Word of God, the only source of authority.

16. As for the problem of people not hearing of Christ: Once you look at nature and believe in a Creator God then God will make it possible for you to hear of Christ.

    Same was true of me who was raised in a Catholic home in the West. I hadn’t been brought to christ but I had always believed in a personal Creator God and prayed to Him. Only at the age of 21 did I get to know that Jesus is that God.

    Why do we always assume only those who are far away (like Africa) have no knowledge?

17. Excellent post… very even handed and charitable in my opinion.

    As a practicing Roman Catholic – one set to be ordained to the priesthood around 18 months from now – I find it refreshing to see this sort of honest reflection on the state of Roman Catholicism and Evangelical Christianity.

    I completely agree with your statement that what this all really comes down to is authority. As a Roman Catholic my position is that God is the ultimate authority who (by grace) allows certain human beings to participate in this authority (which is evident in Christ’s action of sharing His powers of binding and loosing with Peter). He collaborates with humanity in everything – even allowing us to help create new life. What an amazing God who lets us share in his very life.

    I think you began to layout a fair critique of Sola Scrilptura, the chief dilemma being that the doctrine itself is not contained in the Bible. Nor was it possible to determine which writings should be included in the Bible without some sort of non-biblical, human authority to judge their orthodoxy.

18. J.M.J.

    Allow me to begin with this simple fact. The Bible as we know it today came from the Roman Catholic Church. The Canon of the Bible, the 73 books were put together/tagged/numbered/titled by the early (Catholic) Christians. See the Council of Hippo (393 A.D.) and Carthage (397 A.D.)

    Even Luther himself said that (paraphrasing) had it not been for the “Papists” we would not have the Bible.

    Matt, there was a lot of ‘false doctrine’ then, so how sure are you then about your 66+7 apocryphal books of your Bible ? The ‘papists/romanists’ then could’ve gotten it wrong ?

    Suggest you go to Karl Keating’s Catholic Answers: http://www.catholic.com

    Live Jesus in our Hearts, FOREVER.

    Tom

19. In a comment left by Matt … I question what authority comes from a book, no matter how holy. Authority is something wielded by people. How is authority transmitted from a book to real life?

20. Ed,

    I think the idea would be that should a book be inspired by God then it is a pretty good bet that its content is authoritative because the author knows everything and cannot lie. At the very least, if the Church produced an authoritative collection of writings its authority for the Church would derive from the fact that it is an official statement of that group’s beliefs. For example, an autobiography could be considered an authoritative source on one’s thoughts because it is a record of one’s own thoughts.

21. Related to “outside the Church there is No Salvation”

    Moral theology divides ignorance into a general number of categories. The main two I will consider here are:

    1. Invincible Ignorance (non-culpable Ignorance): Ignorance is invincible if a person could not remove it by applying reasonable diligence in determining the answer. Beyond one’s control.

    2. Vincible Ignorance (culpable ignorance): if a person could remove it by applying reasonable diligence and decided not.The failure to exercise ordinary care to acquire knowledge of the law or of facts which may result in criminal liability. Ignorance as a result of willful ignoring.

    That is why the Catholic church clearly says “Those who through no fault of their own, do not know the gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do His will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience, those too may achieve eternal salvation”.

    The doctrine that “Outside the Church there is no salvation” is one that is constantly misinterpreted by those who won’t submit to the Magisterium of the Church. Faith does not depend upon our ability to reason to the truth but on our humility before the Truth presented to us by those to whom Christ entrusted that task. This is why the First Vatican Council taught that it is the task of the Magisterium ALONE to determine and expound the meaning of the Tradition – including “outside the Church no salvation.”

    Concerning this doctrine the Pope of Vatican I, Pius IX, spoke on two different occasions. In an allocution (address to an audience) on December 9th, 1854 he said:

    We must hold as of the faith, that out of the Apostolic Roman Church there is no salvation; that she is the only ark of safety, and whosoever is not in her perishes in the deluge; we must also, on the other hand, recognize with certainty that those who are INVINCIBLE in IGNORANCE of the true religion are not guilty for this in the eyes of the Lord. And who would presume to mark out the limits of this ignorance according to the character and diversity of peoples, countries, minds and the rest?

    Again, in his encyclical Quanto conficiamur moerore of 10 August, 1863 addressed to the Italian bishops, he said:

    It is known to us and to you that those who are IN INVINCIBLE IGNORANCE of our most holy religion, but who observe carefully the natural law, and the precepts graven by God upon the hearts of all men, and who being disposed to obey God lead an honest and upright life, may, aided by the light of divine grace, attain to eternal life; for God who sees clearly, searches and knows the heart, the disposition, the thoughts and intentions of each, in His supreme mercy and goodness by no means permits that anyone suffer eternal punishment, who has not of his own free will fallen into sin.

    These statements are consistent with the understanding of the Church contained in the documents of Vatican II, and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, as well as explaining why the rigorist position of Fr. Feeney (that all must be actual members of the Catholic Church to be saved) has been condemned by the Magisterium. It is ironic that precisely those who know their obligation to remain united to the Magisterium, and thus on whom this doctrine is morally binding, keep themselves from union with the See of Peter on this point.

22. Papal infallibility was the most difficult thing for my husband to accept. It was the last thing keeping him from becoming Roman Catholic. Then a friend handed him this book: Jesus, Peter and the Keys by Scott Butler, Norman Dahlgren, and David Hess .

    (To make a long story short we’ve both been RC for 12 years now with absolutely no regrets.)

23. Nathan-
    It seems to me that you were LOOKING for a snag in the Catechism. You should have no problem with section 841 because Christ died once FOR ALL. Section 841 says that Muslims are included in the PLAN of salvation. Isn’t every human being in the world included in God’s PLAN of salvation? The Catechism is NOT saying that Muslims are “saved.” My advice is to continue your search with an open mind and heart. God will show you that there is only ONE absolute truth, ONE Church, ONE body, ONE bread – The Catholic Church!

24. T-Bone,

    Obviously, I can’t speak for Nathan, not knowing him, but it seems a bit unfair for you to imply that he was LOOKING for a falsehood in the Catechism. As a Reformed Protestant of almost five years who is considering the claims of the Catholic Church again, #841 in the Catechism is problematic for me too, as it asserts that not only are Muslims “included in God’s plan of salvation” (in some sense, not necessarily savingly), but that they actually already “ADORE” the true God.

    According to the Catechism, Muslims, who believe that Jesus was no more than a prophet and who, hence, deny the deity of Christ and the doctrine of the Trinity, “adore” the true God. I really struggle with this statement from the Church– given that Jesus Himself said that if you don’t know Him, you don’t know the Father. (!)

    How, then, can Muslims adore the true God? Again, I am considering anew the claims of the Church. I was once Catholic. However, the Catechism’s (apparent) position on Muslims really troubles me. Based on Jesus’s own aforementioned statement, does HE seem to think that Muslims “adore” the true God? I ask this question sincerely, for Catholics to consider and answer.

25. Hi Eric

    Regarding Moslems who are said to already adore God, my understanding is that this is simply a philosophical statement that they are not atheists, they are not pantheists, and that they have an existing belief in God. But it is also understood in the context of Christianity that their belief is imperfect, similar to the faith of a child or one who only hears and understands a small fraction of the gospel. That’s sort of what we have here anyway, where elements of the Jewish and Christian faith can be found in Islam.

    Of course, we want their knowledge and faith to grow into fullness through the preaching of the gospel. To speak of their belief in God is simply a statement of optimism, since it is a step in the right general direction. But take that statement in the context of the entire catechism of the Catholic Church, which exists as a statement to the fullness of truth which can only be in Jesus our Lord.

26. To Eric:
    Muslims regard Jesus as a prophet and deny the Trinity. Jews regard him as a false prophet and deny the Trinity. And yet we can agree (maybe) that Jews adore the true God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. So the criteria of whether the person has a clear conception of the identity of Christ is not sufficient to establish whether someone adores the true God.

    The act of adoration is an interior orientation towards something or someone we perceive to be worthy of this adoration. The will of the Muslim is oriented towards the God of Abraham, who also happens to be the Most Holy Trinity. Now, their vision of the God of Abraham is certainly clouded by much error. And it is an arguable point whether or not this adoration ever reaches the ears of God, bent as it is by the various errors. However, the Muslim act of adoration nevertheless remains oriented towards the God of Abraham. Which is certainly not the case for those of other religions (e.g., Hindus).

    E.g., Cornelius was “a devout man”, a member of neither the old nor the new covenant people, who “prayed constantly to God.” And his prayers “ascended as a memorial before God.” In this case, his prayers were not to the Trinity explicitly, for he didn’t know the Trinity. Yet his prayers were heard. And though he was not praying explcitly for a revelation of the Messiah, nevertheless such a revelation was vouchsafed (through Peter). Let us hope that Muslim prayers are similarly heard, and that they are similarly rewarded. All the Church teaches is that, if they aren’t, God is both just and merciful, and will judge them accordingly. Some, indeed, may be saved, if “their conscience [...] bears witness and their conflicting thoughts [...] perhaps excuse them on that day when, according to [the] gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.”

27. T-Bone,

    You are quite mistaken in your assumption that I was just looking for a hang up, when in fact I was looking for the opposite of that. Eric’s articulation of his own “hang up” with section 841 echoes my own. If you pick that section apart and ask simple questions, you’ll see why it erks me.

    Do they acknowledge the Creator? If Christ is the Creator as Colossians tells us, then no they do not.

    Do they hold the faith of Abraham? No, they do not. Paul takes the promises that God gave to Abraham and tells us that all of those pointed to Christ – the Seed by which all nations would be blessed. So unless they have the same forward looking faith in Christ, its safe to say they do not hold the faith of Abraham.

    Do they adore the ONE, merciful God? Absolutely not! “And the Catholic Faith is this: That we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity;” The early Creeds give beautiful explanations of the Trinity – the ONE, merciful God – and Muslims flat out deny this.

28. Also, it takes a few minutes to read, but the following article, science fiction examples notwithstanding, is a pretty good discussion of how the Church could say what she does in CCC 841:

    http://jimmyakin.typepad.com/defensor_fidei/2006/12/allah_god.html

29. I understand the argument he’s trying to make, but imo it falls short. By the same reasoning, we can conclude that Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and a host of others also pray to the same God. Whey they profess to have faith in Christ, they must be talking about the same Christ, right? But that’s just it – the difference is obviously not in the name, its in the identity of the person being described. I’ve never seen nor met you Rob, but if I were to tell my friends I’ve been having a conversation with this cute blonde girl on Doug’s blog named Rob, I would clearly be missing the boat. I’ve got the name right, but the identity wrong. And isn’t the identity the most important part? Its almost as if people are saying the Trinity isn’t THAT big of a thing to miss….if you miss the Trinity, you’ve got a clear case of mistaken identity. The first several ecumenical creeds are all about nailing down the Trinity and that it is faith in THAT God, and that God alone that is correct.

    Am I missing something here?

30. Wow, great discussion!

    I would add to the part of the discussion concerning Muslims that, it is very important to read or listen to the precise wording. Recently Pope Benedict was talking about Muslims and said something like “we respect Muslims, who also _claim_ to trace their faith back to Abraham.” He didn’t emphasize “claim” in his statement, but it was intentionally there.

    Muslims claim Abraham’s patrimony, but it is a specious claim. Pope Benedict knows that, and so he speaks very precisely.

    As an Evangelical Protestant, I once said when asked that “all Muslims are going to hell,” to the shock of my (enlightenment) college professor. As a Catholic, I would not claim to say such a thing now, for God’s mercy is great, and as earlier posters commented, not all have the opportunity to know Christ in the fullness of the truth.

    Anyways, great respectful discussion! God bless in your search for him in spirit and in truth.

31. This is such an excellent topic and dialogue. Thank you, I mean all of you for adding more enlightenment on this important subject of salvation. It has provoked me to delve deeper in my understanding of our God. As much as I would like to add my “2 cents” to the debate I find myself at awe with many of the great thinkers who have already commented therefore causing me to just shut up! Hahaha! Anyway, I am just so glad to know Jesus Christ as Lord, Savior, and God, and as a Catholic and former Evangelical I am always praying that we will be one again and learn how to peacefully dialogue with one another. Great blog!

32. On Dec 21 Nathan wrote: ” However, the one thing that stopped me from looking further was found in the Catechism in section 841 which says: “The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day.” That did it for me. We are told in Colossians that Jesus Christ is the creator, and Muslims deny this so how could that be? I just couldn’t get past that – I believe anything other than faith in Christ for salvation fits the “heresy” and “false gospel” criteria pretty darn well.”

    Well, here is a question for you, Nathan.
    Do you believe that God created everything, every single human being?
    Now we know that some will be born and die never coming to know Jesus. Isn’t it rather unjust of God to condemn them to hell when they were never given a chance to come to know Christ in the first place?

    Millions will die and have died, who, through no fault of their own will not know and have not known Jesus. So that means that God purpsoely created them just to send them to eternal torture. Does that sound like a loving God to you? Does that sound like the God who died so that we may live?

33. Pingback: St. Joseph’s Vanguard And Our Lady’s Train » Blog Archive » Humility: A Required Ingredient for Seeking the Truth

34. What of C. S. Lewis’s “good Calormen” at the end of The Last Battle? I’ve always liked Aslan’s response to the question, “How am I here?”–”All good you did in the name of Tash was done for me, and all evil done in my name is done for Tash, for Tash can accept no good and I can accept no evil.”

    As far as I understand it, the current understanding of the Church is that it is true no one is saved by any other name than that of Jesus. But, looking at the witness of Scripture, it does not seem that the person saved need have believed in Jesus themselves. In some circumstances, the faith of another was sufficient.

    Mark 2:3-5 (New International Version)

    Some men came, bringing to him a paralytic, carried by four of them. Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus and, after digging through it, lowered the mat the paralyzed man was lying on. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”

    Their faith–not his faith. Similarly, granting that God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son, not just the chosen people of Israel or those people who were good enough for him, could not the purpose of the Church in the world be to act as the priestly intercessor for all? We are to go and baptize all nations, true. But could one not say that the presence of the believing Church–the elder son of the story of the prodigal son–in the world could act as an avenue of grace for the whole world, even for those who do not explicitly profess Christ?

    Again, no one could be saved through any other name aside from Christ, and all are called to repentance, conversion, and faith. But perhaps God is more creative in his application of that truth than is commonly discussed. In those instances where the faith has been proclaimed very badly, or not at all, perhaps God depends on the faith of the Church to extend his salvation to those who seek him, but do not know him.

35. I sincerely thank everyone for their thoughtful replies to my question about Muslims “adoring the one, merciful God” (to quote, almost verbatim, section #841 in the Catechism)… but I also notice that literally no one even *attempted* to engage Jesus’s words, stating that if you don’t know Him, you don’t know the Father. Could someone please explain to me how Muslims “adore the one, merciful God, in light of Jesus’s words on the need to know Him, if one wants to know the Father?

36. Hi Eric,

    I don’t think that anyone would deny that the Muslim conception of God is grievously flawed. They do worship one God, and so are also a monotheistic religion. The Jews worship one God as well, and we would say the same God that we worship, even though their understanding of him is handicapped due to their rejection of Christ.

    Mormons claim to worship Jesus and the Spirit and the Father but also have a grievously flawed conception of the Trinity.

    So it seems the question is “how do we speak about these religions, which have varying degrees of closeness to Christianity (and some even claim to be in Christianity) and who worship one God with varying levels of error in their teachings about God and his nature?”

    For ecumenical purposes, I think it is fine to affirm that we both worship the one God, even while also affirming that “only through Christ is anyone saved” and that “Christ reveals the Father to us in a full and unique way.” So we do not affirm the errors in their beliefs but do give them credit for trying to adore the same one God who is over all the universe.

    Hope this helps. I can understand why you find the language problematic, but keep in mind, too, that Pope Benedict has engaged Muslims in dialogue (after the uproar of his Regensburg address), and when they wanted to talk about God and God’s love, he said “no, we first talk about the dignity of the human person”–knowing that before we can even talk about our similarities and differences about “the one God” we first have to start at the human level of “let’s agree not to murder each other.” Benedict constantly affirms that Christ alone is our savior and the face of the Father.

37. Devin,

    I thank you for engaging my question at greater length. Please excuse me for the following lengthy sentence; it might need to be read twice (it’s a complex question).

    By implicitly comparing the monotheism of Muslims with that of Mormons (both of them rejecting Christian doctrine of the Trinity), are you meaning to say that in the eyes of the Catholic Church, any monotheism which bears *any* surface resembalance to that of Christianity is, in fact, an “adoration” of the “one, merciful God?” That is really my problem here with section #841 in the Catechism. If it merely said that Muslims also worship one God, as Christians do, that might be more understandable– but the Catechism clearly states that Christians, Jews, and Muslims all “adore THE one, merciful God (my emphasis).” Not just one God, in terms of being monotheists, but THE one God– clearly implying the one, true God. How can one read Jesus’s clear words (“If you don’t know me, you don’t know the Father”) and then affirm the clear implications of #841 in the Catechism?

    I’ll be brutally honest here about my own situation. If I were to return to the Catholic Church (I once was Catholic), I sense that it would be largely out of a deep desire for epistemological certainty. However, I also fear that in the process, I would have to force myself to redefine some of Jesus’s clear statements about how one really knows God (so that those statements could conform to the Catechism’s teaching)– and that is not a price that I can pay.

38. Eric,

    I think the answer to your question is really simple.

    Isn’t there only one God? Therefore when muslims adore Allah, then they adore the same God though they may not perceive Him as we do.

    Simple example: your wife, friends, mother, sibblings, will have slightly different perceptions of you even though there will be points of convergence. But when they refer to Eric, it will still be you.

    Though other religion’s grasp of God may be deficient, He is still the same God.

    It is hard to take Jesus’s statement about knowing the Father only by knowing Him in the way you take it, since Abraham and Moses and the old testament patriarchs did not know Jesus and yet they did know the Father.

    That is why the Father was referred to as the God of Abraham, the God of Jacob, etc.

    But at this stage, God’s self revelation has not yet come to fulfillment, which of course happened only with the Advent of the Messiah, the Son of God.

    So really, the Catholic position on this is the more correct position.

39. Maria,

    Thank you for your response. I understand your point, when it is applied to Jews in the Old Testament– Christ had not yet been revealed in the Incarnation, so Jews adored the Father God who *had* revealed Himself and waited for the Messiah. However, for Muslims, the situation is different. Christ *has* been revealed in the Incarnation, and they *explicitly reject* Him as God.

    Again, Jesus says that if you don’t know Him, you don’t know the Father. According to Jesus’s *own logic* here, how can Muslims “adore” (the word used to describe their worship in the Catechism) the God whom they don’t even know?

40. Hi Eric,

    I think you only need to explore your own logic further. You allow for Jews having adored the one God from before Christ revealed himself to them in the Incarnation. I do not see much of a difference with Jews today, after the Incarnation, who do not hear the gospel. Or an infant or child who is invincibly ignorant of knowledge of God revealed in Jesus Christ, or any adult today who never hears the gospel.

    Muslims have been taught that they adore the God of Abraham. They do not have the fullness of truth because they do not know Christ, and are actually taught things contrary to the truth about him. But as with Jews, Muslims have some (albeit smaller portion of) knowledge of God. It is a good starting point that they know there to be only one God, who is creator and judge.

    When St. Paul saw in Athens an altar to the unknown god, he saw no harm in saying that they worship this God, but not fully knowing — and then he goes right into proclaiming this God fully. One of the principles of doctrinal teaching in the Church is that everything holds together as a whole. While the Catechism states what it does about Muslims who “together with us adore the one merciful God” (#841), it also states that such knowledge, along with other non-Christians, is a “search, among shadows and images” (#843), and what little they have is but a “preparation for the Gospel.” In short, we acknowledge what good there is in other religions, because all good things come from God. Belief that God exists is good, and as St. Paul notes about observing the visible world around us, can be the starting point for preaching the Gospel. And then we preach the Gospel.

    I would also not equate “not knowing” to “rejecting”, nor to automatically imply damnation as a result. I think a culpable rejection of Christ would be one in which the truth is heard and still rejected. Think of the Jews who put Jesus on the cross: Christ said they knew not what they were doing. What more the Muslims who grew up only with the Koran? As St. Paul wrote, how are they to believe in him of whom they have not heard?

41. Maria,

    Your question is a very common one. In short, no I do not believe that would be unjust of God. Let me explain:

    Original sin condemns all of us. It is the state in which we exist as human beings – even those who have “never heard” the Gospel. If we are all born with a “guilty” verdict, then isn’t punishment due? I rather think its quite a miracle that he chooses to save anyone at all, since NONE of us deserve it. If God had decided that everybody would be sent to hell for being wicked sinners – again, which all of us are – without offering any chance of redemption, that would have been perfectly just. But, we do have a merciful God who has provided the means for some of us to be saved. Why he chooses some and not others, I have no idea. I do not know the mind of God.

    Read Romans chapter 9, particularly verses 17 – 24. Paul address this beautifully and head on.

    Verse 23 “What if God, wanting to show His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, and that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He had prepared beforehand for glory…”

42. Hi Eric,

    You wrote “By implicitly comparing the monotheism of Muslims with that of Mormons (both of them rejecting Christian doctrine of the Trinity), are you meaning to say that in the eyes of the Catholic Church, any monotheism which bears *any* surface resembalance to that of Christianity is, in fact, an “adoration” of the “one, merciful God?” That is really my problem here with section #841 in the Catechism.”

    I would say two things here (my own understanding):

    1. Upon what degree of error should we declare that someone is worshiping an “other” God than ours?

    Are Oneness Pentecostals worshiping a different God? Are any modalist believers worshiping a different God? What do you think?

    Note that the Catholic Church some years ago, after investigation and study, determined Mormon baptisms to be invalid. This decision is enormous, though most people didn’t even notice it, and I bring it up because it declares that Mormons are not brothers and sisters in Christ as you as Protestant are. Their theology is sufficiently erroneous as to render their supposed practice of the sacrament invalid.

    2. This statement in the Catechism is not dogmatic or even close to it; I would even conjecture that it is language that can be changed (and perhaps will be). I believe that the statement in the Catechism concerning our understanding of Jews is also undergoing a revision of language due to the ambiguity of the language with regard to them and the “covenant” and whether they were still considered part of it. I don’t recall the details now but just offer that this statement could be revised.

    I think that the language sounds a bit syncretistic, and so agree to large degree with your complaint against it. Maria’s argument (and Jimmy Akin’s in the link above) are decent and that’s the way I accept these statements.

    If you returned to full communion with the Catholic Church, I do not think you would have to change or water down anything you believe about Jesus revealing the Father to us. I would say, don’t make a mountain out of this one passage about inter-religious understanding, the language of which might not be the best, and let it trip you up.

43. Hi Eric

    Good point about original sin, which we can all agree to, and we can also agree to the abundant, generous mercy of God. Consistent with that is when Jesus prays on the cross that the Jews who put him on the cross be forgiven for their ignorance. But consistent also is consigning the invincibly ignorant non-Christian to God’s mercy, not because it is fitting for them to be saved due to invincible ignorance, but because God mercy is generous and abundant. This is not to say that evangelization is unnecessary, as the Catechism makes clear that it is.

    As for the statement about adoring the one God, I would still say that this is but an optimistic observation. Muslims who had never heard the preaching of the gospel would be no different from the citizens of Athens whom St. Paul proceeded to evangelize, with their altar to an unknown God as a starting point of dialogue. The Catechism as a whole does not declare that non-Christians are on the same footing as Christians in their knowledge of God. All it says is that they at least believe in a creator-God, which is a starting point. Then paragraph 843 cites their beliefs as a search in “shadows and images”, and provides a “preparation for the Gospel.”

44. Great discussion, everyone! Nathan, my main point to you was this: If you are seriously considering the Catholic Church, you must be willing to submit yourself to the Mystical Body of Christ and the Magisterium. Is section 841 a tenet of the Catholic faith? Of course not. Is it anti-biblical? Of course not. Should it stop you from becoming Catholic? Of course not. If I may, I would like to compare your journey, at this point, to deciding whether to marry a particular girl. You take into account her strengths: she is loving, kind, compassionate, generous, honest, loyal, and, of course, beautiful! Then you think of her weaknesses: she sings over the radio, she has a birthmark on her neck, and she doesn’t like football. In the same way that your family would think you were crazy not to marry this girl, I think you’re crazy for not marrying yourself to Christ through His Catholic Church. Instead, you’re allowing yourself to be tripped up on a seemingly small “blemish.” My experience, as a former Protestant who converted to Catholicism, is that you need to take that leap of faith, and your questions will be answered, just as the Church has consistently shown its truth to me in adaquately answering EVERY CONCEIVABLE problem I once had with Catholicism.

45. Jeff and Devin (and thank you again to every person who has engaged my questions),

    Perhaps you are both right, and I should not make the Church’s statement(s) on Muslims (and, to a certain extent, Jews) a big deal. This issue is one of the only true “sticking points” for me insofar as returning to the Church.

    However, I can honestly say that I *would* be greatly heartened if the language in the Catechism, in regard to both Jews and Muslims, were changed to sound (be?) less syncretistic. If one does not read the relevant sections extremely carefully, one could plausibly draw the conclusion that the Church does not see bringing the Gospel to Jews and Muslims as a matter of serious urgency. Indeed, I fear that even many faithful, practicing Catholics may view evangelization of Jews and Muslims in exactly that way– either no longer necessary at all, or not very urgent.

    Jeff, in all honesty, I can’t really know if most of today’s Jews or Muslims have actually heard of Christ and His Gospel in such a detailed way as to have culpably rejected it. Typing these words, I am convicted myself at how I have not shared the Gospel with many Jews and Muslims as I should (right practice obviously begins with oneself!). My concern with the some of the language in the Catechism is that it *almost* makes the situation seem as if Jews and Muslims may not deeply *need* to hear the Gospel, as they already know and worship (supposedly) the true God. Again, I would be encouraged to see this language at least reworded.

    Devin, to answer your question, as a convinced Protestant (at least until recently) in the Reformed theological stream, I probably would have said that Oneness Pentecostals and other modalists *do* worship a “different God” than Christians. To my understanding, this is the view of most Reformed/evangelical Protestants. Modalism is understood to be a serious heresy by both Catholics and Protestants. It seems that the Catholic Church would not necessarily say that accepting modalism equates to denying the true God, but most evangelical Protestants (I think) would say that if one is a modalist, then one is, by definition, not a Christian– which, in evangelical Protestantism, *means* that one does not know and worship the true God.

    As for the degree of error needed to not know and worship the true God, that’s a great (and very important) question. I still see Jesus saying in various Biblical passages that if you don’t know Him, you don’t know the Father. Perhaps I am misreading what He means by those statements though.

46. Hi Eric

    You’re right, the language in that particular paragraph could have been better written, but such is the earthen jar nature of the Church. And yes, I’m sure that many Catholics have been led astray, not so much by the language in the Catechism, but by teachers, parents, friends, journalists — whomever they actually have contact with. I say this knowing that many Catholics these days give little thought to the Catechism. I know there was a time in my adult life when I did not even have one.

    And yes, one cannot but agree to what the Lord said about knowing the Father by knowing the Son, but it’s a question of culpability and graduation of knowing. Consider that faith is a gift, which, once received initially, does not carry with it complete (nor even substantial) knowledge. But that seed of faith is enough to adore God, first like a child, but hopefully nurtured into a mature faith. Consider the Ethiopian eunuch, moved by God to search for Him, and the Church through Philip must rise up to assist in this search. At the point where the eunuch had yet to meet Philip, was he adoring the one God? Yes he was, with imperfect knowledge. Such are other monotheists, whose non-Christian religions we should see as a search as in “shadows and images” in “preparation for the Gospel.”

    And you’re right, we should not help but think about our work in the Lord’s vineyard. Do we bear witness? In the depths of Muslim lands, we can safely assume that what they hear about Christ is not the Gospel as we received from the Apostles. Not that it would be simple and easy to change that, but if we only had a stronger witness as Christians in the lands where there are no impediments to the preaching of the Gospel — that would help, wouldn’t it? And this is exactly what Christ seemed to pray in John 17, which echoes the prophets of the Old Testament who describe how the nations will be drawn to God through the consecrated people of God, but for one element that is now still missing: that we may be one! And before anyone allows cynicism to crush that thought, remember: these sentiments were uttered by Christ in fervent prayer.

47. I can hardly add to any of the great arguments for the Catholic Church. As a convert myself, along with my wife and children Easter 2005, I hit stopping points a couple of times like Eric on my rather quick journey. Some of the wording on baptism was completely unacceptable as I understood it. Finally, I found another explanation that gave more insight and allowed two seemingly contradictory points to coexist. I read a statement this simple, “God has bound salvation to the sacrament of Baptism, but he himself is not bound by his sacraments.” The lights came back on and the path was completely clear for me to enter.

    I respect Eric’s desire for the truth. I challange you to remain at this point until by God’s grace He resolves it for you. Pray about it. Ask for wisdom (Prov. 2, James 1). Ask for faith. Don’t back away as though the potential goal (Unity, Authority, Real Presence, Truth, Sacraments, etc.!!!!*all that the Catholic Church claims and is*) isn’t worth EVERYTHING.

    Please keep this in mind about the Gospel and mysteries of the faith such as the trinity. A mystery of the faith is infinitely knowable, like God Himself. Our understanding can always grow, our faith more solid. The Gospel is a mystery but revealed in definitive form in the person Jesus Christ, the Incarnation. The Incarnation is a mystery. It took hundreds of years to just get the two nature aspect of Christ clearly articulated. Concepts take time to understand.

    The Gospel is Jesus. Salvation is Jesus. Even when one, more evangelical, speaks of a plan of salvation, Jesus is the plan. Let every thought on theology go through Him. The moment of salvation is Jesus. The place of salvation is Jesus. Hope is a relationship with salvation himself. The more secure in that relationship with salvation, the more secure one’s salvation. To think catholic about salvation one has to move away from the limiting “moment only” concept of salvation to the process of knowing Jesus. Moments exist, but moments lead closer to or farther away from Salvation, because Salvation is a person. Simeon knew this as he held up the Salvation of Isreal at the presentation. Everything about the Catholic faith points to the God Man Jesus Christ and that is why you cannot go wrong becoming Catholic.

    Every symbol, every doctrine, every dogma about Mary, every rite, the Liturgy, the prayers, the Saints, and the Institution herself point to the person Jesus Christ. “Only in the mystery of the incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light.” John Paul II

    Come to the fullness and get closer to Jesus than you ever imagined possible in this life. Kneel before HIM and receive HIM. Consume Him in a way that blows the mind away – infinitely knowable.

48. Hi, Jeff,

    Thank you for another thoughtful and helpful response. I do see your point about the Ethiopian eunuch searching for God, and how, in this searching, there may have already been an “adoration” of the true God (at least in some sense).

    Part of what I’m struggling with, I think, is that I feel as if I am stuck between two worlds. I’ll explain. Over a decade ago, I was a covert to the Catholic Church. For various reasons, I left (it’s a long story, which I won’t put you through) and eventually became a Reformed (“Calvinist”) Protestant. During this time of being a “happy” Protestant, I was a member of a passionately and joyfully evangelistic Reformed church. So many members of this church were lovingly working to find ways to share the Gospel with those around them, in their community and elsewhere, and some members were even being trained and sent over to “closed” countries– countries where one is not “officially” allowed to share the Gospel. This kind of church atmosphere was so invigorating and inspiring– it’s hard to even describe. My current church is much the same.

    However, due to my studies of the early Church Fathers and other thological and historical sources, I am reaching the conclusion that there are simply some basic problems with Protestant thinking– problems which cannot be resolved *by* Protestantism. This conclusion has me considering either a return to the Catholic Church or, possibly, conversion to Eastern Orthodoxy. I sense, though, from the accounts that I read from many Catholics, and from my own memories of being in the Church, that I will not encounter anything resembling the joyfully evangelistic culture that I have seen in Reformed Protestant churches.

    This “sense” of mine is intensified when I read language in the Catechism which appears to be shaky, even as to the *need* to evangelize Jews and Muslims. Therefore, I feel stuck between two worlds. I don’t think that I can honestly call myself a Protestant anymore, but I face returning to a Catholic Church (or converting to EO and going to one of their churches) which has *serious* weaknesses, in evangelization and other areas (such as weak homilies)– and meanwhile, I struggle internally with fond memories of strongly Gospel-centered, evangelistic Reformed churches! Quite honestly, this is a very hard place, in which I find myself…

49. Sorry– I meant to type that I was a *convert* to the Catholic Church, not “covert!”

50. Hey Eric,

    for what it’s worth, I think it’s huge for you to admit that you may be “misreading what He means by those statements.” There’s a lot of humility in recognizing that danger. I hear a lot of worry and suspicion in your encounter with this passage from the catechism, and I happen to know how uncomfortable that is.

    For myself, at least, the process of conversion has also been a process of allowing the Holy Spirit to replace suspicion with faith. After all, the catechism wasn’t drafted and translated into English by people who meant well but really should have consulted ME before they made their decisions. Instead, this is the catechism of our Church, the Body of Christ, lead providentially by the Holy Spirit according to the sovereignty of God.

    When I find things—whether in dogma, the catechism, whatever—that make me suspicious, I know, now, that I’ve bumped into another opportunity for God to show me how my understanding of the issue is too narrow, too human, too blinkered by Calvin or Luther or whomever. In short, pray. I’m certain that I can’t give you a satisfying answer to your question, but I happen to know without any doubt that the Holy Spirit can, in the Church Christ founded, in the Shepherds he has so mercifully given us.

    Have you seen the Schonborn interview on the catechism? Search Amazon with AISN number B000PMG35Y (or choose department “Movies & TV” then search “Schonborn Catechism” and locate the DVD). Very good place to start.

    Peace

51. #

    Hi Eric,
    On 18 Jan you wrote: “Christ had not yet been revealed in the Incarnation, so Jews adored the Father God who *had* revealed Himself and waited for the Messiah. However, for Muslims, the situation is different. Christ *has* been
    revealed in the Incarnation, and they *explicitly reject* Him as God.”

    But the Jews are the same. They explicitly reject Jesus as God. And yet they do believe in God they just do not have a concept that God is a Trinity.

    You also wrote: “Again, Jesus says that if you don’t know Him, you don’t know the Father. ”
    But here again, I go back to the Jews. They do not know Jesus as God yet they do know the Father.

    [quote] According to Jesus’s *own logic* here, how can Muslims “adore” (the word used to describe their worship in the Catechism) the God whom they don’t even know? [/quote]
    There are different kinds of knowing the Father. Those who know the Father through Jesus truly know Him deeply. Those who know the Father but do not know Jesus know the Father nonetheless because there is only One God.

    It is not so much Jesus’s logic as Jesus revealing that the only real way to get to know the Father is through him. All the same when people adore One God they ultimately adore the one Father but their perception of him is impaired. Their knowing is deficient but it is still the same Him. They just need to get to know Him better.

    Here is another example. One father two children. One perceives the father as tender and loving the other sees him as strict and judgmental. These children will relate to him in different ways when they obey. One will probably obey out of love the other out of fear, but it is the same father that they obey. And so long as there is a movement towards God, God will use that to draw the person to Himself.

52. Hi Nathan,

    On 18 Jan you wrote: ‘But, we do have a merciful God who has provided the means for some of us to be saved. Why he chooses some and not others, I have no idea”

    But how can a God who creates people who from the beginning he has decided to condemn to hell be merciful and loving?

    Here is an example:
    A couple who has a terrible hereditary disease which means a life of horrible suffering. Every child they conceive is 100% guaranteed to be born with the illness.

    However, there is a medication that will cure the disease after birth.

    The couple decides to have ten babies. However, they also decide to medicate only 5 and the rest to suffer the ghastly fate. What more, they decide to willfully conceive the baby knowing full well that this is the kind of future the parents intend for them to have.

    Do they sound like kind and merciful parents to you?

    Every single human being is created by God. God knows that when they are born, they will be born into sin for which the punishment is eternal damnation. By your line of thinking, it seems that god willfully creates these additional human beings knowing full well that he has no intention of saving them from their sin even if he could. He does save some by his own choice but the others he will let rot in hell. And this choice to save and to let rot in hell he has already decided even before he made them. Does that sound merciful and loving to you?

    Do we just write that off as god’s supremacy?

    I think you misunderstand Romans 9 if you think that these verses support an unjust God.

    It says God will have mercy on whom He will have mercy. Even I who am a rotten sinner, had I the power to create people, will not create them just so I can damn them what more a omnibenevolent God. If God cared so much to die for us while we were sinners, why would he make exceptions even before we were born.

    John says God so loved the world. Not some of the world or part of the world, but God loved the world.

    And again in John 12. Jesus said that when He is lifted up He will draw all men to Himself. Not some, but ALL.

53. Hi Doug,

    You wrote” I think the idea would be that should a book be inspired by God then it is a pretty good bet that its content is authoritative because the author knows everything and cannot lie. ”
    The question is how do we know that Scripture is indeed inspired by God? The Bible does not even say so.

54. Maria,

    This is not my own logic, nor my own words but rather the Apostle Paul’s:

    “You will say to me then “Why does He still find fault? For who has resisted His will?” But indeed, O man, who are you to reply against God? Will the thing formed say to him who formed it, “Why have you made me like this?” Does not the potter have power over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel for honor and another for dishonor? What if God, wanting to show His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, and that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He had prepared beforehand for glory.”

    There are a million questions one could ask. Why did God create Hitler, knowing that he would kill millions of people? Does that seem like a kind and merciful God? What about Stalin & Mao? Why did God create the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah, knowing beforehand the path they would follow which would ultimately lead to their destruction? Why did God create Pharaoh, knowing that He would harden his heart? Why does God allow suffering in general? He is omnipotent and could stop suffering, and if he is truly loving then why doesn’t He?

    By your logic, you would almost have to say that if God condemns ANYONE to Hell, then he can’t possibly be merciful. But doesn’t God have other attributes besides love and mercy? What about justice, wrath and anger? We see a lot of that in Scripture too, don’t we? If punishment is due, then justice would be to punish.

    What I find most troubling about your arguments is that you, as a Christian, are reverting to the same exact logic that Atheists use today to deny that God even exists. I think you missed a vital part of my previous post. ALL of us deserve Hell. God is not required to show mercy to any of us – and if he didn’t, that would still be just by definition. However, God has chosen to be merciful to some of us. Why some and not others? Scripture doesn’t tell us and I believe we’re treading in dangerous waters to try and comprehend something that perhaps God had no intention of us knowing.

55. Hi Nathan

    In other places, the Bible tells us that “God our Savior .. desires all men to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth”.. and so we have “Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all..” (1 Tim 2:4). Do not say that “God has chosen to be merciful to some of us”, since Christ is the ultimate mercy that God offers to all of us.

    Say rather that in spite of God’s mercy, which He extends to all of us completely by grace, regardless of how much he has loved us, “as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings,” many are not willing to abide in him.

    So I would say that Scripture is clear enough on one thing: God’s love and mercy extends to all, but the choice is ours. His will is perfect, but because of his love, we must be willing to take it.

    Maria’s point may not have come across to you in that way, but based on Catholic theology from what little I know of it, it boils down to this: God is love, and an act that compels/designs a man to go to hell without any choice in the matter contradicts love, and so it cannot be something of God’s. What the fullness of Scriptures instead tells us again and again is that God acts first to love us, not because he has to, but because he is gracious, but it falls upon us to accept or reject this love. So I can clarify here that it is not coming from many atheist’s polemics to therefore rubbish the notion of an arbitrary God, but rather the notion from Christian orthodoxy that God is love and he will all to be saved but there will be many (even one is too many) who will not be willing to accept that love.

56. Maria,
    Nathan is simply using old Calvinist arguments that one might call specious. It sounds true but really isn’t. All one has to do is take those arguments to their logical ramifications. The Calvinist makes his choices and his beliefs irrelevent. If God has already made the choice then, whether I believe my choice to make any difference or not, doesn’t matter. The ultimate choice is made.

    Then, when the Calvinist doesn’t like the logical ramifications of their presuppositions, he simply disregards someone else’s reason as something of man, ie. “man’s reason” or the “world’s philosophy”. When someone points out a contradiction in Calvinist beliefs, like you did that a loving God would not make someone for the sole purpose of destruction, he counters that the “apparent” contradiction is simply something that is beyond our understanding and must be accepted by faith. In fact, we may be tredding dangerous ground trying to figure it out. That is why in an earlier post I pointed out that a real mystery of the faith is infinitely knowable. He says that you can’t know it.

    Some like John MacArther will go so far as to say that if someone doesn’t understand the “clear” meaning of scripture, which really means their own interpretation of scripture, then they don’t have the Spirit and aren’t one of the Elect.

    My point is that we can only love Calvinists out of their error. We can’t argue with them. They defeat every sound argument with their tiny circle of reasoning. Besides, good Calvinist are lovers of Christ and God has used them to bring many to Christ perhaps in a way like he used the heretics the Nestorians if I am remembering my history correctly. What is so sad is that they unwittingly place themselves diametrically opposed to that which gives mankind his dignity, his free will. This is core of Christianity and Catholic teaching.

    Hardcore Calvinists are the MOST anti-Catholic (ie Pyromaniacs) as they should be if they really believe what they say. We would have to be “unElect” to worship the Eucharist. They won’t even dialogue with a sound Catholic and delete all our arguments. We must pray and love. They make GREAT Catholics when converted, but I guess that Kreeft and Hahn weren’t very good Calvinists.

57. Nathan,
    As I reread my post I sound like I am attacking you. I did go off on a bit of an “antiCalvinist” rant. You seem like a genuine seeker of truth and not the type I was describing or you wouldn’t be on this blog I suppose. I was sounding off about your last comment and not trying to characterize you personally. The other posts have been considerate and generous and I don’t want to taint that.

58. David,

    No offense taken. It would have been nice to see you address the issues I brought up, however, rather than say “oh he’s using Calvinist arguments and Calvinists are bad”. I’ve never even read Calvin! And I’m not anti-Catholic by any means hence my participation in this dialogue.

    Particularly the section of Romans I posted – I would genuinely love to see a Catholic interpretation of those verses instead of what appears, to me at least, to be plain as day. I realize that you can’t take one section of Scripture and pull it out of context. But, the NT speaks of Hell, judgement, condemnation, etc. throughout. If I’m not mistaken, Jesus himself spoke of Hell more often than he did love. And, isn’t Christ’s path the narrow one…not the broad path?

    Thanks,

    Nathan

59. Hi Nathan

    There is no question that there is Hell, and that the road is wide leading that leads that way, and that many (and even one is too many) will end up choosing Hell in rejecting God’s love.

    But I would suggest that, in Romans 9, St. Paul does not write to say that God wills anyone to Hell. He may will them to have hard hearts as an instrument against others, as with Pharoah and other pagan rulers of old, who persecuted Israel as a means of forming His people, but this does not mean that those rules are thus condemned, without any choice, to Hell. He also cites Esau, and indeed, Esau fell out of God’s favor, and this is the part which is not unjust, for we are God’s servants and are called by Him to different roles. This does not mean that He bears so ill a will against any one of us that we are born and compelled to Hell without any chance of redemption. In the end, Esau was reconciled with Jacob.

    St. Paul talks both of justice and mercy, aspects of God which coexist with His love. It is interesting to note his emphasis on God’s mercy, because it is great! Even a fraction of a second in his deathbed that draws a grave sinner back to God through sincere repentance is enough, because that mercy is of God.

    There is also justice: the notion of double predestination (if I understand that correctly) is unjust, and God is never unjust. To create a man who is incapable of anything except sin is to actually enable such sin, and God will never do that.

    But the final answer to your concern about Romans 9 is this: God is love. From this love comes his mercy, and so it is unthinkable that, in the length of a man’s lifetime, God would not extend to him His grace and love, giving that man a chance to be drawn into Him.

    As you said, the context should not be ignored. My impression of Scripture is that the love of God shines throughout, even in his expressions of justice. “What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means! For he says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.’” His mercy is from age to age on those who fear Him. To fear Him is a matter of choice (but a sincere one, not lip service).

60. Hi David,
    On 26 Jan you wrote: ” Nathan is simply using old Calvinist arguments that one might call specious. It sounds true but really isn’t. All one has to do is take those arguments to their logical ramifications. The Calvinist makes his choices and his beliefs irrelevent. If God has already made the choice then, whether I believe my choice to make any difference or not, doesn’t matter. The ultimate choice is made. ”

    This is exactly my point. It seems that Calvinists fail to exercise their God given reason when reading the Bible.

    We need to use our reason when reading the Bible. So many Christians fail to do this. God did not give us the gift of intellect for no reason.

    I think the problem stems from eisegesis rather exegesis. They already have a pre-conceived theology and so try to force the Bible to say what they believe rather the allowing the Bible to speak for itself.

    If a passage contradicts another, one must exert a little more rigour in trying to work out why this is so.

    Johh says God is love, and we need to understand pre-destination in that context.

61. Hi Nathan,

    I am replying to your post on the 25th of Jan.

    You wrote” This is not my own logic, nor my own words but rather the Apostle Paul’s:”

    True. But the Apostle John wrote God so loved the world. And John’s is a Gospel not a letter. I am find that a lot of Protestants quot heavily from Paul but not so much from the Gospels.

    You wrote: By your logic, you would almost have to say that if God condemns ANYONE to Hell, then he can’t possibly be merciful. But doesn’t God have other attributes besides love and mercy? What about justice, wrath and anger? We see a lot of that in Scripture too, don’t we? If punishment is due, then justice would be to punish. ”

    But that is just the thing. We do not say that God condemns anyone to hell. Rather we say that we condemn ourselves to hell by refusing God’s grace that He gives to all.

    Also, is God’s mercy and love contradictory to His justice? This is what I mean in my response to David when I said that when something does not seem to make sense (contradictions in God) we need to put a little bit more thought into our theology rather than just saying “Oh but Paul said this” because I can also so “Oh but John said this”.

    So let us go back to justice. In the example I have given you before (you might need to re-read my post back then), would you consider a god who creates human beings for the sole purpose of damning them to hell just?

    Would you consider a god who decides to save some but not others just? Isn’t that more an illustration of a capricious god?

    Just think about it, before they were created he already knows that they will sin. And since the punishment is eternal damnation, he already knows before he creates them that they are destined for eternal damnation. But he creates them any way. And the worst part is, he is more than capable of giving them the solution to this and he does give the solution but only to some. So here you can accuse him of favouritism, which you can hardly call just and fair.

    Wouldn’t it be more compassionate and just to just not create them at all?

    Furthermore, if Christ’s life death and resurrection is meant to destroy sin, then doesn’t that mean that sin is already destroyed.

    If through one man we are all doomed, then isn’t it that fairness and justice dictate that through one man we should be all saved?

    You did not choose to be born into fallen human kind. Yet by that very virtue, should you die without knowing Christ, you are condemned to eternal punishment. Rather unfair don’t you think?

    I think Calvinists ought to put a bit more thought into their understanding of pre-destination because as it stands, it contradicts a just, merciful and loving God.

62. Maria,

    I really do not see this issue that you do. Do you really think that God owes anyone mercy? Isn’t mercy undeserved by definition?

    Person A: Wicked sinner. Follows after his own rebellious will (sinful, opposed to God). Hell is just punishment (which we all agree on -hopefully). God leaves him to his own will which ultimately leads to this person’s judgment – Hell. He wants sin, and God is just in his judgment.

    Person B: Wicked sinner. Follows after his own will (sinful, opposed to God). Hell is just punishment. God miraculously intervenes in this person’s life, giving him a new nature – which is *not* deserved. He is imputed Christ’s righteousness – again *not* deserved – and free from condemnation.

    God has absolutely NO obligation to save us from ourselves! We have all chosen to live lives contrary to God’s perfect standard. Do you not agree with this? So if God chooses to save some, then he is merciful in that regard. But, mercy is not owed to anyone…seriously, it really is that simple.

63. Here is a good analogy I found on a forum online:

    “Two men commit an armed robbery and appear before the judge for sentencing.

    The first man, under the laws of the commonwealth, is sentenced to 10 years prison.

    The second man, appears before the judge and demands that the judge *not* punish him. Further, he asks the judge to send him to the penthouse suite at the Hilton Hotel for the rest of his life, all expenses paid.

    Did the first man get justice? Yes!

    Would the second man get justice if he got what he demanded? No! Is it “fair” if the second man got no prison time? Is it “fair” the second man got an all expenses paid luxury hotel stay forever? No! It’s not even reasonable.

    Yet, we are so blinded by sin, we have the audacity to think that is what we deserve, and “imagine” we are just (and impugn God’s character) in so demanding.

    Do you see why grace is indeed, so amazing and we have absolutely not claim on it? “

64. I think we’ve scared Doug away! Where are you Doug!?

65. Nathan,
    I’d be happy to discuss Rom. 9, but I think Jeff answered it just fine.

    The difference between what you are saying and Maria has to do with a difference in the view of Man’s fall. I’m sorry to nail this to Calvin again since you have not read him, but it is one of his 5 points of TULIP. Total depravity.

    A great place to look for the best answers are in the Catechism, Catholic Encyclopedia, and another good source is Father John Hardon. Just search for any on the web. You can read what the Catholic Church teaches about the fall.

    Total depravity is a heresy. Please understand that there are many pieces to this puzzle and they almost have to be put back into place one piece at a time for someone who does not understand the “economy of salvation”. Anyone who believes in a “moment” salvation, or as I like to say “moment only” salvation has to almost rethink everything.

    If you have a bucket of apples and one of them is rotten, the best way to find it is to dump out the whole bucket and put the good ones back one at a time. Protestants that hold to the moment only view have to do this to. I’ll have say more later if your interested.

66. Nathan,
    I’d be happy to discuss Rom. 9 more in depth if you like. You could email me personally, but Jeff’s response really hits the crux of the matter.

    The gap between what you and Maria are saying is differing views on original sin. The view you described on Jan 18 was clearly declared a heresy in the Council of Trent in direct response to those like Calvin who were teaching it. Since then, it has been resisted in various ways by other protestants such as Arminius, Wesley, and Charles Finney to name a few. This is a major issue in Evangelical theological discussion for those who care to know the truth. Sadly, in our relativistic culture today, even Evangelicals don’t care much for dogma any more. Since you don’t have monergism or TULIP as your montra and you claim to have not read Calvin you might listen to some common sense on this topic.

    It would be impossible to spell out all the aspects in one blog entry and I’ve personally spent about 20 years on the topic. Just go to google and type in total depravity and the wikipedia gives a reformed perspective with some fair objections. It wasn’t taught by Augustine, but that is the basis for Calvin’s claims. If you ever wondered why Evangelicals like Baptists who seem to only know one early church father, Augustine, basically reference him for this reason. Their church history goes like this: Apostles – Augustine – Luther.

    Read what the CCC says. It’s online in many places. One place to start is #385. Check the index for further reading. Read Trent on justification for that is the over riding issue or actually salvation itself, but if you don’t start to understand how the different camps define the words it can be a VERY confusing discussion. I love to discuss it so you can’t possibly put me out by any question.

    May God bless you on your journey.

67. Hi Nathan, this is a reply to your post on 29th Jan

    Nathan: I really do not see this issue that you do. Do you really think that God owes anyone mercy? Isn’t mercy undeserved by definition?

    Person A: Wicked sinner. Follows after his own rebellious will (sinful, opposed to God). Hell is just punishment (which we all agree on -hopefully). God leaves him to his own will which ultimately leads to this person’s judgment – Hell. He wants sin, and God is just in his judgment.

    Me: That is true mercy is undeserved. Your example however does not address the issue you raised. This is about knowing Jesus.
    Let me extend your example. Person A. Wicked comes to believe in Christ, tries to reform his life but falls back into sin and decided to rape Woman B. Person A.Wicked was shot during the assault.

    Now according to you, those who believe in Christ are saved. But Person A Wicked dies disobeying God. So where does that leave him?

    Nathan: Person B: Wicked sinner. Follows after his own will (sinful, opposed to God). Hell is just punishment. God miraculously intervenes in this person’s life, giving him a new nature – which is *not* deserved. He is imputed Christ’s righteousness – again *not* deserved – and free from condemnation.

    Me: So God intervenes in Person B but not in Person A. Since both are undeserving of his intervention, then doesn’t that make God unfair. That smacks of favouritism. Is that really the God that we find in Scripture.

    Furthermore, Scripture says that God died for us while we were sinners so God died for all. If as St Paul says death came through one man (meaning Adam) and that salvation from death came through one Man (Christ), does it not stand to reason, that if Adam’s sin caused death to flow to everyone, then Christ’s death caused salvation to everyone as well?

    Nathan: God has absolutely NO obligation to save us from ourselves! We have all chosen to live lives contrary to God’s perfect standard. Do you not agree with this?

    Me: Absolutely.

    Nathan: So if God chooses to save some, then he is merciful in that regard. But, mercy is not owed to anyone…seriously, it really is that simple.

    Me: But as I have said above, that smack of an unjust and an unfair God. Doesn’t scripture also say that God is just? How is He being just in liberating someone and leaving another in bondgage when they both deserve to be left in bondage. Where is the justice and fairness in that.

    Now it would be a different matter if He was not our creator. If say god A created us and god B chooses to save us then it is might grand of god B and there is absolutely no unfairness in this kind act.

    But because God is the one who created us (and He created us knowing full well that we will sin, knowing full well that punishment for sin is death) then a just and merciful God would have opted not to create the person considering that that person is destined for hell (that means he has no choice at all in the matter). But this God creates PersonAWicked with the FULL INTENTION of sending him to hell?

    So I ask you, is that something you would do? Would you purposely and with full intent bring into this world children for the sole purpose of sending them to a horrible punishment for ever and ever. Just think about that, creating human beings, eternal souls that you intended from day one to be tortured eternally.

    If your answer is no, then that makes you a more compassionate person and a more loving person than the god you describe.

    If your answer is yes, then you’ve just described yourself as an evil psychopath.

    This kind of god is not the the loving, just, and merciful God of Scripture.

68. Hi Nathan,

    This in reply to your other post on 29th Jan : the analogy of two armed robbers.

    This a bad analogy of the situation.

    Firstly, if the judge sends one to jail and and sends the other to a luxury penthouse, then it shows you that the judge is unjust and unfair. He is supposed to dispense of the law equally but he played favourites. If you are saying that the god you believe in is like this, then your god is unjust and arbitrary. Not exactly the kind of qualities of God that we find in the Bible.

    Secondly: Suppose we say, fair enough, the judge was being unfair but at least he had mercy on one of them. One thing that this analogy does not address is that the judge did not create these men. The judge was the not the author of these men’s lives.

    Let us change the analogy so that it fits with our discussion better.

    Let us suppose that the judge created this men. Now the judge knows that there is no other way for them to be but bad. Before he even creates them, he decides that when they commit the crime he will treat them differently. One he will allow to live with him in luxury forever, the other one he will put in this dungeon to be beaten and starved daily and to be tortured with all kinds of torture known to man.

    Now, if he had not created them in the first place, there would not have been a crime to speak of. But not he decides to create this other guy just so he can torture him for eternity.

    Think about that. That is the kind of god that comes from your post. Very far from the God of the Bible.

69. Maria,

    To be clear, the RC position on predestination is not nearly as cut and dry as you would make it out to be. Somewhat of a “here’s the evidence, you decide” type thing. The Molina camp and the Aquinas camp teach two very different things (conditional vs. unconditional election, etc.) but at the same time you would be hard pressed to claim either are un-catholic. We can all agree that predestination exists, its just the how, what, when, and why that we disagree on.

    Read this as a whole (there’s a lot there!) to get a better idea of what I believe…it’s from the Summa: http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1023.htm

    Here are a few things that stand out to me:

    1 -It is fitting that God should predestine men. For all things are subject to His providence, as was shown above (Question 22, Article 2).

    2 -God does reprobate some….God loves all men and all creatures, inasmuch as He wishes them all some good; but He does not wish every good to them all. So far, therefore, as He does not wish this particular good–namely, eternal life–He is said to hate or reprobated them.

    3 -The number of the predestined is certain. Some have said that it was formally, but not materially certain; as if we were to say that it was certain that a hundred or a thousand would be saved; not however these or those individuals. But this destroys the certainty of predestination; of which we spoke above (Article 6).

    He also goes on to refute the idea that God’s predestining some is somehow based on His foreknowledge of a particular person choosing to accept or reject God’s grace. In other words, it is unconditional. Also – somewhat surprising and contrary to what others have said here – Aquinas says regarding invincible ignorance “Therefore as regards some, blindness is directed to their healing; but as regards others, to their damnation;” He elaborates quite a bit more than that. I may be misunderstanding what previous posters have said, but according to the good Doctor at least, “invincible ignorance” is not a free pass to heaven for everyone. For some – those that God predestined – yes, but not all.

70. Hi Nathan

    Regarding predestination and St. Thomas Aquinas, please note: the good saint was never a pope. St. Thomas was brilliant, a holy and sincere theologian, but that doesn’t mean that everything he said was dogmatic. Second, I don’t see that St. Thomas was talking about God actually taking away a man’s free will to choose or reject Him.

    I think that article from the Summa needs further reading, as your choice of those three notables are not what you might them to mean. There is no problem with #1 that I can see, and #2 is answered quickly by looking at the entirety of Article 3, where St. Thomas clarifies that it continues to be the choice of a man to turn away and commit sin in the first place. This is sensible because we cannot conceive of God actually *making* man commit sin. Such material cooperation with evil is simply inconceivable for God.

    As for the number of the predestined being certain (Article 7), and actually, for anything else that leads you to think that God actively causes evil and sin in a person, thus causing his damnation, go back to what the good doctor said about free will and sin. God may withhold extra grace (hardening hearts as a result), which is as sensible as finally giving up on someone who, at death, definitely rejects grace anyway. He may bring sin unto a good end, but He does not and cannot be the cause for sin. That would fly in the face of who and what God is.

    Regarding predestination, I googled and found this brief discussion:

    http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/05/predestination-john-calvin-vs-thomas-aquinas/

    Please, have a read of the Summa once again. I think I understand your emphasis is on God’s power and man’s weakness, and certainly, we cannot resist if God compels us, but that is not what God does when it comes to sin. He does not compel us to commit sin because that is simply contradicting Himself.

    (I’m almost sure what I’ve written above is confused or confusing in places. If so, please excuse me, but having had no formal training in theology, I can only offer the above and my prayers.)

71. That Aquinas sees God’s causality even in free human acts is clear from several of his writings. He sees divine sovereignty as being made “quite plainly by the texts from Sacred Scripture [that] we receive not only the power of willing from God, but also the operation.”

    In fact, “Divine causality is not only extended to the power of the will but also to its act. . . . God not only gives powers to things but, beyond that, no thing can act by its own power unless it acts through His power, . . . . Therefore, God is for us the cause not only of our will, but also of our act of willing. . . . every movement of the will must be caused by the first will, which is the will of God. . . . God is the cause of every action . . . He operates in every agent. . . . He is the cause of the movements of the will.”

    Although Aquinas notes that God “is the cause of our act of choice and volition, our choices and will-acts are subject to divine providence,” he is not opposed to human freedom. Aquinas is quite clear that God cannot force free will, for the voluntary and the violent are opposites. However, this does not mean that God does not move the will. “God can change the will with necessity but nevertheless cannot force it. For however much the will is moved toward something, it is not said to be forced to it. The reason for this is that to will something is to be inclined to it. But force or violence is contrary to the inclination of the thing forced. When God moves the will, then, He causes an inclination to succeed a previous inclination so that the first disappears and the second remains. Accordingly, that to which He induces the will is not contrary to an inclination still extant but merely to one that was previously there. This is not, then, violence or force.”

    Aquinas likens this to the way God can make a stone fall naturally simply by making it what it is. “If God were to subtract from the stone the inclination of its heaviness and give it an inclination of lightness, then it would not be violent for the stone to be borne upward.” In the same way, “God can change the will because He works within it just as He works in nature. . . . every action of the will, in so far as it is an action, not only is from the will as its immediate agent but also is from God as its first agent, who influences it more forcefully.” God internally causes humans to will particular things, and yet this does not destroy human freedom because “the will is moved by its Creator toward what its nature naturally demands, that is to its good.”

    So God rules through His active causation. His sovereignty is not due to His foreknowledge but through His irresistible will. While it may be counter-intuitive to put the two together, Aquinas believes that, “From the very fact that nothing resists the divine will, it follows that not only those things happen that God wills to happen, but that they happen necessarily or contingently according to His will.”

    God, according to Aquinas, actually guarantees human freedom by His act of creation. He is, the first cause that makes secondary causes free. In causing, God does no violence to our human free will, for it is by His existence that free will exists and takes the form that it does. Since God is, therefore, not an external agent working on the will with no act on the part of the willer, no violence is being done to freedom and the alleged contradiction is said to be resolved.

72. jeffersontan,

    For some reason, people keep assuming that I’m a staunch Calvinist and believe that God actively causes/wills people to sin, and/or in “double-predestination”…

    I realize St. Thomas was not a pope, but I don’t think that’s a relative point to this discussion. The magisterium – at least from what I’ve read on the Catholic Answers forums – does NOT have a formal, dogmatic teaching on predestination that goes into the detail we are discussing. As one poster said on the link you referred me to:

    “As for the question concerning why in some persons sufficient grace is efficacious, and in other persons, sufficient grace is not efficacious (is it because of a qualitative difference in the grace given, or because of a difference in the willed response), the Church has left that question open. That entails that a Catholic may believe that God gives sufficient grace to all, but gives efficient grace only to some. A Catholic may, alternatively, believe that what makes sufficient grace efficient is the free acceptance by the will, and what makes sufficient grace not efficient is the free rejection by the will.”

    Aquinas’ position – which I agree with for the most part even though I am not a Catholic – is widely accepted by many Catholic theologians and scholars, so I don’t understand why I’m getting so much flack from Catholics on this blog.

    If you read my post several posts back, I talked about Sinner A and Sinner B – God “passes over” one and elects the other. One is positive, the other negative. God actively elects certain people, and in doing so passively withholds that same grace from others…I’m sure that could be worded better, but you get the point I’m trying to make. That is what I believe and that is what many Catholics believe – there is nothing unloving, unjust, or unmerciful about it.

73. Hi Nathan

    My apologies if you thought I was assuming you to be a staunch double-predestination Calvinist. That was not my intent at all. It is just that I’ve encountered more than once the assumption that the theology of one or other doctor of the Church is automatically embraced by the Church as dogma. If this was not your premise, then my apologies.

    I am not speaking as a theologian and can only offer my understanding of Catholic theology — as a true amateur who is still learning. When you raised the second point about reprobation, I thought you were referring to God actively causing a man to sin and be condemned. I see now that I was mistaken.

    Concerning a dogma on predestination, that comment may be correct. But to me, concerning predestination, I am happy enough with the certain faith that God wills that all may be saved, but that man makes his choice to abide by or reject Him.

    Regarding the last bit about passing over anyone, I would propose this: the one sacrifice of Christ is sufficient atonement for everyone, and by merit, that sacrifice passes over nobody. Everyone may avail of God’s mercy in Christ’s sacrifice. But temporally, one or another individual may receive extraordinary grace at a point of his/her life, while another individual may experience a dark night of the soul, when God’s grace may be dimmed for a time. Either course of action on the part of God may be a response to a man’s particular circumstance after some specific action or event. Say, a man has just lost his wife, or a man had committed murder, and so on. Also, the inefficiency (or non-efficaciousness?) of God’s grace may well depend on the man’s response to that grace in the first place.

    Or I may be entirely misreading what your point or St. Thomas Aquinas’ point is.

74. Hi Nathan

    Actually, there is one other point about a dark night of the soul, where God withholds certain graces for a time. There are probably other manifestations (not just a sense of emptiness or despair), but whatever it is, I think there are simply things we cannot know, or at least, may not know until all things are made clear in some future date. But it is important to distinguish between God withholding His grace for a time or for a man’s entire lifetime. I think I understand St. Thomas’s point that this does not make God unjust since the sin is still freely committed by the individual, but I just don’t see grace withheld for an entire lifetime. Even infant baptism is itself conferring certain graces to the individual, e.g., the gift of supernatural faith.

    Jeff

75. Nathan,
    It appears that Catholics are responding to what sounds like an attack on “free will”, rightly so. We are the guardians of man’s free will. Here is an example from St. Francis de Sales.

    “If thou didst know the gift of God, said our Saviour to the Samaritan woman, and who he is that saith to thee, give me to drink; thou perhaps wouldst have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.(3) Note, I pray you, Theotimus, Our Saviour’s manner of speaking of his attractions. If thou didst know, he means, the gift of God, thou wouldst without doubt be moved and attracted to ask the water of eternal life, and perhaps thou wouldst ask it. As though he said: Thou wouldst have power and wouldst be provoked to ask, yet in no wise be forced or constrained; but only perhaps thou wouldst have asked, for thy liberty would remain to ask it or not to ask it. Such are our Saviour’s words according to the ordinary edition, and according to S. Augustine upon S. John.”

    To conclude, if any one should say that our free-will does not co-operate in consenting to the grace with which God prevents it, or that it could not reject and deny consent thereto, he would contradict the whole Scripture, all the ancient Fathers, and experience, and would be excommunicated by the sacred Council of Trent. But when it is said that we have power to reject the divine inspirations and motions, it is of course not meant that we can hinder God from inspiring us or touching our hearts, for as I have already said, that is done in us and yet without us.”

    Perhaps the root problem is understanding what happened at the fall. Those (like Calvin) teach a “noetic effect” that most evangelical Christianity believes without knowing the specific theological or philosophical terms, in which man completely lost his ability to reason, or know truth. This is not the teaching of the Catholic Church. If we lost our ability to choose as well as the choice then we would need the divine election you describe. What you have described comes across as some type of “heteronomy” which JPII discusses in “The Splendor of Truth”. The choice was infinitely beyond our grasp without Christ, but because by his life, death, and resurrection He has purchased for us the rewards of eternal life, we may choose them. All grace strengthens our ability to choose, which was wounded in the fall. Autonomy is never lost for it is embedded in our dignity.

    41. Man’s genuine moral autonomy in no way means the rejection but rather the acceptance of the moral law, of God’s command: “The Lord God gave this command to the man…” (Gen 2:16). Human freedom and God’s law meet and are called to intersect, in the sense of man’s free obedience to God and of God’s completely gratuitous benevolence towards man. Hence obedience to God is not, as some would believe, a heteronomy, as if the moral life were subject to the will of something all-powerful, absolute, extraneous to man and intolerant of his freedom. If in fact a heteronomy of morality were to mean a denial of man’s self-determination or the imposition of norms unrelated to his good, this would be in contradiction to the Revelation of the Covenant and of the redemptive Incarnation. Such a heteronomy would be nothing but a form of alienation, contrary to divine wisdom and to the dignity of the human person.

    The frustration in the discussion possibly comes from having different presuppositions. Again, not saying you are a Calvinist, but using those points as reference. They believe in an “irresistable grace”. That is a contradiction to the autonomy or free will JPII is discussing. They also claim a “limited atonement” for only the Elect. This is a contradiction to clear Catholic teaching on many levels in relation to God’s love and mans dignity.

    The false dichotomy of general grace and saving grace seems to be embedded in your arguments. These are unbiblical concepts the way typical evangelical theologians teach them. These are related to the “moment only” teaching on a person’s salvation.

    The passing over analogy you mentioned doesn’t work, because the rewards of eternal life are available to all to choose or reject.

    The next logical question is about age of reason, or relative abilities, but that is clearly under God’s perfect justice and love and beyond our discerning abilities. That is why we commend all souls to God’s mercy as Catholics.

76. Hi Nathan,

    You wrote on 1st Feb: “To be clear, the RC position on predestination is not nearly as cut and dry as you would make it out to be. Somewhat of a “here’s the evidence, you decide” type thing. The Molina camp and the Aquinas camp teach two very different things (conditional vs. unconditional election, etc.) but at the same time you would be hard pressed to claim either are un-catholic. We can all agree that predestination exists, its just the how, what, when, and why that we disagree on.”

    My response : Before I proceed, I would like t point out that the Catholic Church has no clear cut dogma on the how and why of pre-destination. The Church states that God predestines to heaven but does not predestine to hell.

    The question for both the Molinist and the Thomist is how to reconcile the efficacy of grace and the infallibility of its effect with the freedom of the human will because they seem to be mutually exclusive.

    When does the infallible effect of efficacious grace come into effect without impairing the freedom of the will?

    There is also the subtler question of when does the will under the influence of grace, move from being a mere natural faculty to actuality.

    Thomists: start from the point of efficacious grace
    Molinists: proceed from a clear concept of freedom.
    Thomist: maintains that God gives the grace only to those He has chosen (the elect)
    Molinist: believes that God bestows the grace on everyone.
    Thomist: Grace is intrinsically efficacious
    Molinist: Grace extrinsically efficacious
    Thomis: The will moves from potency into act by will of God
    Molinist: The will freely consents to prevenient grace and this consent renders the completely sufficient grace efficacious.

    It seems to me that the Thomist position is almost similar to the Calvinist, because it posits that the will is moved to act by grace. To my thinking, if grace is efficacious such that it’s effect is infallible, the response from the will is therefore no longer free.

    If the will is not free, then God created puppets. If puppets we therefore cannot be held responsible for what we do. If puppets, then predestination to hell is therefore an evil and unjust act, which is irreconcilable with a loving God. We now have a Jekyll-Hyde for a god.

    I incline towards the Molinist view because to my thinking, this is more in line with a God who is Love (as revealed in Scripture). If we take the Thomist view, then damnation becomes the sole act of God and not contingent at all upon man’s response to grace. Since God is the creator and has infallible foreknowledge, the Thomist view paints a God that creates man for the sole reason of damning them (as explained by invincible ignorance).

    The expressed view of the Church is that God created us for himself. And this is something that we must bear in mind. What was the end for which God created us? If there is predestination to hell, therefore the end that God created some is for hell. Which again is not reconcilable with the God of the Bible, the God who is love.

    Unless I have misunderstood Thomism, its thesis could only be reconciled with a loving God who made us for Himself, if we posit that though there is a Hell, it is highly unlikely that anyone will end up there since grace is efficacious and God loves everyone equally.

    I think however that grace is not always efficacious but always sufficient.

    My biggest problem with the subject of predestination is that God’s Infinite Love, which should be one of the premises, does not seem to have been taken into consideration at all. To my mind, this should be the first premise and the other two (grace and free will) proceed from it.

    Thomism’s objection to Molinism is that the latter, due to its over-emphasis on man’s freedom of will, diminishes the supremacy of God over His Creation.

    However, I personally think that this objection is without basis because it can be argued that it is still God who wills that this is the way that grace and free will should play out. God is still the one who decided to effect salvation in this manner; that in pulling us out of the ravine, He would require us to place our hands on His, even though He could quite easily have yanked us out without our cooperation.

    The predestination of some to heaven, I believe is all part of God’s master plan. It is like in the battle for souls, God chose to predestine some to virtue so that they will be like the generals and the offers who will lead us – foot soldiers- to battle. The great saints who we can say have been pre-destined to heaven have been the ones who God raised to be our examples in the following of Christ.

77. Hi Nathan,

    Continuation of my comment on predestination.

    The Thomist and Molinist view I think can be reconciled if we situate the former as operative during our last moment, and the latter during our lifetime.

    The way I see it, the action of grace on the will in the Molinist view can be somewhat compared to building muscles. The more you exercise a particular muscle the more you increase the muscle mass and the easier the exercise becomes.

    To apply the Molinist view, sufficient grace is given so that the will can respond with a yes, and if the response is a yes, then the infallible conclusion to goodness ensues and so it goes during our lifetime. The more we say yes, the easier the following yeses become as the soul expands its capacity for yes. Sufficient grace is always given to elicit a yes from us. But not being efficacious, it is therefore fallible. Our assent to grace however effects a change in the soul such that the merely sufficient grace becomes efficacious. The more we say yes to God the easier it is to say yes.
    Such that at the end of our lives, saying yes is the only way we could have responded to God.

    The converse is true, the soul is narrowed, weakened by a no to God, such that when the next choice arrives, the no is an easier option. Still sufficient grace is given to enable us to give a yes. And so it goes in our lifetime.

    I was thinking about petty theft in the office (when we take home those little things home (pen, paper,clips,etc). I think some think this is a small matter but in fact I think it is qutie grave. It is precisely becuase the item is so small that the theft becomes worse because these items are easily purchased by us. At this stage it is so very easy to say yes to God and yet we say no, we choose to steal. The small offenses then makes it easier to commit the bigger offenses.

    That is why God does not damn us. We choose to damn ourselves. Our choices make us.

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