D
DL82
Guest
I’m a convert, ex-evangelical, and still sometimes struggle to get the faith/works distinction in Catholicism. This is having serious repercussions for my understanding of vocation discernment.
Here’s the basic gist of the confusion:
I think (may be wrong) that the basic gist of the Church’s teaching is that our works begin and end in God’s grace, but are nonetheless important in themselves.
For example, I go to Mass every day because God, in His grace, has given me a desire and joy in praising Him in this way. If He hadn’t given me this grace, I wouldn’t be going to Mass. My participation in the Holy Mass itself produces graces, some of which come to me, and some have a wider effect on the Church (in fact, all of them go to Our Lady in my case, since I’ve made the Total Consecration). If I didn’t go to Mass, even though I had received the grace to want to praise God in that way, that grace wouldn’t bear fruit without my works.
However, how does my going to Mass because I (by the grace of God) want to go, differ from someone who never goes to mass because they want to watch football instead? I want to be religious, so I’m religious, he doesn’t want to be, so he isn’t, how can God judge him as less worthy than me?
This is important, because there are lots of good and holy things I want to do. I really want to be a faithful husband and father, I really want to do my work with the Legion of Mary, I really want to use my academic talents in God’s service, I really want to go out and do some teaching at a mission college run by the Salesians in Africa, I really want to help organise pilgrimages and events in my parish, I really want to be a holy Deacon someday, I even want to do the works of fasting and penance that I offer up. Above all, I really want to never sin again, and spend my life in the joyful service of God.
However, all of this comes down to doing stuff that I (by the grace of God) have been given a desire to do. As such, it has no merit accruing to me, all the glory belongs to God, who has given me this grace. Am I actually doing anything to increase and magnify His grace, or am I just ‘coasting’?
There is something good and holy, better than all the things listed above, that I don’t want to do. I don’t want to enter Religious Life. I can see how it is the most perfect response to all the graces God has given, but I don’t want it. There is a side of me that thinks that only by doing this, only by doing the thing that I don’t want to do, will my own life be a life of sacrifice, a life that is objectively more meritorious than the man who never even comes to mass.
Or, to put it another way, all the other things I might do, are worth less than the man who feels no joy in holy things who forces himself to attend Mass once in his lifetime.
No joy=no call, or is sacrifice more important? Or, to put it another way, does God eventually call us to take a leap into earning merit for ourselves, without being preceded by graces of joy from Him? Help me out here.
Here’s the basic gist of the confusion:
I think (may be wrong) that the basic gist of the Church’s teaching is that our works begin and end in God’s grace, but are nonetheless important in themselves.
For example, I go to Mass every day because God, in His grace, has given me a desire and joy in praising Him in this way. If He hadn’t given me this grace, I wouldn’t be going to Mass. My participation in the Holy Mass itself produces graces, some of which come to me, and some have a wider effect on the Church (in fact, all of them go to Our Lady in my case, since I’ve made the Total Consecration). If I didn’t go to Mass, even though I had received the grace to want to praise God in that way, that grace wouldn’t bear fruit without my works.
However, how does my going to Mass because I (by the grace of God) want to go, differ from someone who never goes to mass because they want to watch football instead? I want to be religious, so I’m religious, he doesn’t want to be, so he isn’t, how can God judge him as less worthy than me?
This is important, because there are lots of good and holy things I want to do. I really want to be a faithful husband and father, I really want to do my work with the Legion of Mary, I really want to use my academic talents in God’s service, I really want to go out and do some teaching at a mission college run by the Salesians in Africa, I really want to help organise pilgrimages and events in my parish, I really want to be a holy Deacon someday, I even want to do the works of fasting and penance that I offer up. Above all, I really want to never sin again, and spend my life in the joyful service of God.
However, all of this comes down to doing stuff that I (by the grace of God) have been given a desire to do. As such, it has no merit accruing to me, all the glory belongs to God, who has given me this grace. Am I actually doing anything to increase and magnify His grace, or am I just ‘coasting’?
There is something good and holy, better than all the things listed above, that I don’t want to do. I don’t want to enter Religious Life. I can see how it is the most perfect response to all the graces God has given, but I don’t want it. There is a side of me that thinks that only by doing this, only by doing the thing that I don’t want to do, will my own life be a life of sacrifice, a life that is objectively more meritorious than the man who never even comes to mass.
Or, to put it another way, all the other things I might do, are worth less than the man who feels no joy in holy things who forces himself to attend Mass once in his lifetime.
No joy=no call, or is sacrifice more important? Or, to put it another way, does God eventually call us to take a leap into earning merit for ourselves, without being preceded by graces of joy from Him? Help me out here.