If we can ONLY be happy with God, then how is Grace a "Gift"?

  • Thread starter Thread starter RealisticCatholic
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
We don’t desire hell, we desire good things; but we might substitute created goods (say, physical pleasure) for the ultimate good (God). Our attraction to created good can cause us to forsake our Creator; but that won’t happen unless we actually make that choice using our free will.
 
RealisticCatholic said:
So then why should God create us such that we desire hell unless his grace intervenes?

Seems like an odd way to set things up.
Click to expand...
I think you are looking at this from the wrong perspective.

Grace in this context refers to sharing in the Divine Nature. Spiritual creatures, like angels and humans, are capable of sharing in the Divine Nature due to our spiritual nature; matter alone is not able to receive Divinity in the same way. It is impossible for any creature to have the Divine Nature naturally (the Divine Nature can’t be created) and the Divine Nature can’t be developed or “grown into” by the natural actions of creatures. The Divine Nature must be “gifted” to creatures; this is where the term Grace, or gratis, comes from.

God gives all spiritual creatures the ability to accept this Divine Nature. Some accept and others turn it away. The Divine Nature remains a gift because it must be given and received, but it is a gift freely offered by God.

Peace and God bless!
 
When I say desire hell, I meant shorthand for being being inclined to sin. In this sense, we desire sin, because we desire those goods in a disordered way.

The point being, you say only an infant or somehow without reason could obtain natural happiness. On the other hand, God’s grace is required for supernatural happiness. The alternative, eternal suffering, therefore, is the natural choice of man. How is that right?
 
RealisticCatholic said:
The alternative, eternal suffering, therefore, is the natural choice of man. How is that right?
Click to expand...
Why do you think choosing sin is natural and choosing grace is not? Consider the choice itself, not the object. Sin destroys our nature, while grace perfects it.
 
Yes the teaching of grace is beautiful. And I will always prefer the Catholic account of Original Sin and salvation over the Protestant.

However, what I’m hung up on is the fact that we need this grace to be truly happy. Aquinas argues for this explicitly, by saying no natural knowledge is sufficient for human fulfillment. But obviously, it is general Christian teaching as well.

We can only be happy with God. God made us — designed us — to only be happy with him.

Still, this fulfillment and happiness can only occur through God’s grace. Thankfully, God does offer this to everyone.

But it still seems odd that we should talk about grace as an “extra” something. For if God were good, he wouldn’t create creatures that could only be fulfilled by Him (via grace) and not actually give it to them. That would be equivalent to God creating creatures just so that they would never be fulfilled. Is that love?
 
It’s fine to say this. But then it becomes harder to see grace as a “gift” any different from man’s very existence. In a sense, it becomes hard to distinguish grace from nature. Because if we were meant to be fulfilled by God, then grace should be given to man, if that is the only thing that can fulfill this inborn desire, no?
 
Why isn’t free will a sufficient answer to this? God gives us a choice to accept grace or not, to love or not. That’s why it is ‘extra’ and not forced upon us. As @Cruciferi and @HopkinsReb said, grace is given to us all, so God demonstrates his love. Since our nature is spiritual and not entirely material, we respond in kind, or not.
 
RealisticCatholic said:
But it still seems odd that we should talk about grace as an “extra” something. For if God were good, he wouldn’t create creatures that could only be fulfilled by Him (via grace) and not actually give it to them. That would be equivalent to God creating creatures just so that they would never be fulfilled. Is that love?
Click to expand...
There is no other way to speak of Grace than as something “extra”, at least when we’re speaking of created essences. God doesn’t actually give Grace to all creatures because some reject it, but He offers it to all. He didn’t make us just to not even give us the choice to be fulfilled.

Peace and God bless!
 
But why would someone freely reject God’s grace, if God’s grace is what is needed to fulfill human nature?

The answer cannot be “Because someone desires not to fulfill his nature,” because that is a contradiction. Every rational creature is designed by God to seek goodness in general, which can only happen by choosing God.
 
Last edited:
RealisticCatholic said:
But why would someone freely reject God’s grace, if God’s grace is what is needed to fulfill human nature?
Click to expand...
Because they choose to.
RealisticCatholic said:
The answer cannot be “Because someone desires not to fulfill his nature,”
Click to expand...
Why? People choose self destruction all the time.
RealisticCatholic said:
Every rational creature is designed by God to seek goodness in general, which can only happen by choosing God.
Click to expand...
And some reject God.
 
I think the answer lies in our unique composition of spirit and matter. We can choose to fulfil our appetite, for example, but that harms us because it is contrary to our reasoning.

Aquinas described the cause of sin as “the will lacking the direction of the rule of reason and of the Divine law, and intent on some mutable good, causes the act of sin directly, and the inordinateness of the act, indirectly, and beside the intention: for the lack of order in the act results from the lack of direction in the will.”

So sin results in choosing some natural good that fulfils part of our nature, but rejects grace and our ultimate good. This is from the unique tension between our spiritual and material nature. Adam and Eve must have had some means of natural happiness that we have lost. [Edited]

I had a very similar question back in 2006 although the discussion didn’t conclude (I travelled to Rome, cliché I know). @itsjustdave1988 (I haven’t seen him in a few years on CAF) helped me a lot with poignant doctrinal resources, and pointed out that the fall from grace of Adam and Eve has left us in this (as you say, “odd way to set things up”) predicament of fallen nature, which may be uniquely flawed as it depends on God’s supernatural aid for natural fulfilment. God gives us everything we need to avoid sin, however, and perhaps our dependency on him is itself a gift, because he gave us a Redeemer.

Tolkien said something like this in one of his letters, that I like: although we have forever lost our natural paradise, we now have a means of attaining supernatural glory.
 
Last edited:
Danggggg he seemed very resourceful. I wish he was here too!

And wow I can’t believed you remembered that thread from that long ago!

And you’ve been a faithful CAFer for all these years haha
 
My understanding is that there is no dilemma. God asks us to do good, however we cannot even think good without God’s grace. Therefore God always gives grace to those who ask for it. (Ask so that you shall receive). The problem is not everybody either asks for it, or accepts it.

Just like you may refuse a gift given by another person, we can due to our free will reject God’s gifts.
 
I mostly don’t buy into the thread title. Many things are naturally fulfilling, like friendship and art. Yes, yes, natural, not supernatural, and yes we need God even to stay in existence. But still a quite a large amount of happiness is possible here on Earth. To me, heaven seems extra, a gift, not a due. However, I do experience anticipation of receiving it.
 
God DOES give each soul enough grace. It is up to each soul to agree to cooperate.
But, there is such a thing as “natural happiness”. Ultimate fulfillment does not mean it is part of our nature or that we are due it. But, we are all drawn to such grace.
 
We require grace to be happy; we require God to be happy. To seek God is to seek the highest good so the endeavor involves a moral choice. Any choice besides and before God is evil, relatively speaking.
’
Adam preferred himself to God, as the catechism teaches, thus effectively eliminating God as his God: the original sin was an act of unbelief just as much as an act of disobedience.

So the gift comes with a struggle, with our being perfected as the will comes into alignment with God’s will, as we choose Him, the true Good, IOW, forsaking all lesser, created things, including ourselves, as the highest good. God gives enough grace for us to be able to keep looking higher but it’s up to us if we will.
 
Last edited:
fhansen said:
God gives enough grace for us to be able to keep looking higher but it’s up to us if we will.
Click to expand...
I agree, God gives all of us enough grace.

ENOUGH GRACE IS AS FOLLOWS

CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Predestination of the elect explains.
ante prævisa merita
“Asserts that God, by an absolute decree and without regard to any future supernatural merits, predestined from all eternity certain men to the glory of heaven, and then, in consequence of this decree, decided to give them all the graces necessary for its accomplishment.”
.
As we see above, ENOUGH GRACE IS, all the graces necessary for its accomplishment.
.
308 The truth that God is at work in all the actions of his creatures is inseparable from faith in God the Creator.
God is the first cause who operates in and through secondary causes:
For God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.171
Far from diminishing the creature’s dignity, this truth enhances it.

.
CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Free Will explains;
“God is the author of all causes and effects, but is not the author of sin, because an action ceases to be sin if God wills it to happen. Still God is the cause of sin.”
.
CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Divine Providence explains;

“His wisdom He so orders all events within the universe that the end for which it was created may be realized.

He directs all, even evil and sin itself, to the final end for which the universe was created.”

.
Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma by Ludwig Ott,

For every salutary act internal supernatural grace of God (gratia elevans) is absolutely necessary. (De fide.)

There is a supernatural intervention of God in the faculties of the soul, which precedes the free act of the will. (De fide.)
.
CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Divine Providence also explains;
Life everlasting promised to us, (Romans 5:21); but unaided we can do nothing to gain it (Rom.7:18-24).

.
CCCS 1996-1998; “This call to eternal life is supernatural, coming TOTALLY from God’s decision and surpassing ALL power of human intellect and will.”

John 15:16; You did not chose Me, but I chose you.

Acts 13:48; … as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed. – Because God has given all of them all the graces necessary for its accomplishment.
.
“The will can resist grace if it chooses. It is not like a lifeless thing, which remains purely passive. Weakened and diminished by Adam’s fall, free will is yet not destroyed in the race.”
.
As we see above, as God gives ENOUGH GRACE FOR ALL OF US (all the graces necessary for its accomplishment), we all infallibly and freely choose the good.
.
301 God does not abandon his creatures to themselves.
He not only gives them being and existence, but also, and at every moment, upholds and sustains them in being, utter dependence enables them to act and brings them to their final end.
Recognizing this with respect to the Creator is a source of wisdom and freedom, of joy and confidence.
.
God bless
 
Last edited:
A few questions now. Is grace equivalent to the Holy Spirit? Are Christians the only ones who can receive grace? If Christians alone receive grace, then why do they still commit sins, that is, shouldn’t they be less prone to sin because of the grace they have received; or is it mainly the Christians who lack grace who are most sinful?
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top