C
Contarini
Guest
Not quite. Molinism is about how predestination interacts with free will, not about the basis for predestination or about the extent of free will per se. Arminian views on the former (predestination based on foreknowledge) are only possible for Catholics on the basis of Molinism, as far as I can tell. But if I’m not mistaken, Molina himself and other early Molinists held to predestination (to life) “ante praevisa merita,” without regard for foreseen merits. They believed that God choses whom to save and then uses His “middle knowledge” (His knowledge of how humans will behave in certain circumstances) to ensure that those human beings would be saved, while allowing others to die in mortal sin and be damned (all this without interfering with anyone’s free will). I could be wrong about this, however–certainly Molinism today is usually employed as the basis for what Protestants would call an “Arminian” position.
Conversely, with regard to the extent of free will after the fall, one can only come close to the Calvinist position if one holds an Augustinian or Thomist view. But Thomists, at least in rhetoric, do not believe the same things about the bondage of the will that Calvinists do.
Edwin