Is the justice of Hell accepted on faith?

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otjm said:
1037: God predestines no one to go to hell; for this, a willful turning away from God (a mortal sin) is necessary, and persistence in it until the end.
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Yes it is true, in Catholic Soteriology God predestines no one to go to hell.

In Catholic Soteriology God predestines some people with an absolute decree not to go to heaven as follows:

“Merely implies the absolute will not to grant the bliss of heaven, though not positively predestined to hell, yet they are absolutely predestined not to go to heaven (cf. above, I, B).”
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So, what is the practical differences between God predestined Alex to hell or He predestined Alex with an absolute decree not to go to heaven?

In either case, Alex damnation is certain.

There is another way God has, to send Alex to hell if He wills as follows:

Without the special help of God the justified cannot persevere to the end in justification. (De fide.) – It is God’s responsibility TO KEEP US SAVED by his Gift of Perseverance.

God only need to do if He wants to send Alex to hell not to give him His gift of Perseverance and it is absolutely certain, Alex ends up in hell. – Infallible teachings of the Trent.
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Those who received God’s gift of PERSEVERANCE can newer end up in hell, and those who did not received it is absolutely certain they all end up in hell.
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I don’t want to repeat what I have written in my above post on this subject No. 18, please read it and I like to have your view on it.

Thank you in advance.
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God bless
 
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Vico said:
Yes, and also God gives sufficient grace to all such that the person can prevent his own salvation through free will because God has given the permission for the human free will choice. So this will is permissive not active and because of that God is not responsible for a person’s damnation, and also a person is partly responsible for salvation, because efficacious grace is not irresistible.
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IN THE MYSTERY OF PREDESTINATION by John Salza explains.

Page 121; “Fr. Most identifies the metaphysical issue as follows:

Sufficient grace gives man the potency to do good, but do not give the application.

For the application efficacious grace is required to move him from potency to act.

Therefore, sufficient grace is insufficient to move him to act.
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Page 77; When God wills a person to perform a salutary act (e.g., prayer, good works), He grants him the means (an efficacious grace that infallibly produces the end ( the act willed by God ).

If God wills to permit a person to resist His grace, He grants him a sufficient, and not an efficacious grace.

The distinctions between these graces reveal that God is responsible for man’s salvation.

FOR EXAMPLE
Page 113: However, the Church teaches that God infused Adam with sufficient grace to resist temptation and to perform his duties with charity.
God, however, willed to permit Adam to reject His grace and to sin.” – Reason described in CCC 310; 314; etc.

God’s permissive will is NEVER OUTSIDE His active will.
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God bless
 
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Latin said:
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God’s permissive will is NEVER OUTSIDE His active will.
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God bless
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The theories are not dogmas and many have been proposed using the terms sufficient and efficacious. They are not all using the same definitions.

The dogmas of the Church show that a person cannot attain salvation without the grace of God, but having free will may cooperate with that grace or may refuse to cooperate with it, and since God has universal desire for all to be saved, “God predestines no one to go to hell; for this, a willful turning away from God (a mortal sin) is necessary, and persistence in it until the end.” (Catechism 1037).

Catechism
1730 God created man a rational being, conferring on him the dignity of a person who can initiate and control his own actions. "God willed that man should be ‘left in the hand of his own counsel,’ so that he might of his own accord seek his Creator and freely attain his full and blessed perfection by cleaving to him."26
Man is rational and therefore like God; he is created with free will and is master over his acts.27
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Council of Trent, Session VI (~The Council of Trent - Session 6~)
CANON I.-If any one saith, that man may be justified before God by his own works, whether done through the teaching of human nature, or that of the law, without the grace of God through Jesus Christ; let him be anathema.

CANON IV.-If any one saith, that man’s free will moved and excited by God, by assenting to God exciting and calling, nowise co-operates towards disposing and preparing itself for obtaining the grace of Justification; that it cannot refuse its consent, if it would, but that, as something inanimate, it does nothing whatever and is merely passive; let him be anathema.

CANON VI.-If any one saith, that it is not in man’s power to make his ways evil, but that the works that are evil God worketh as well as those that are good, not permissively only, but properly, and of Himself, in such wise that the treason of Judas is no less His own proper work than the vocation of Paul; let him be anathema.

CANON IX.-If any one saith, that by faith alone the impious is justified; in such wise as to mean, that nothing else is required to co-operate in order to the obtaining the grace of Justification, and that it is not in any way necessary, that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will; let him be anathema.

CANON XVII.-If any one saith, that the grace of Justification is only attained to by those who are predestined unto life; but that all others who are called, are called indeed, but receive not grace, as being, by the divine power, predestined unto evil; let him be anathema.
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Ludwig Ott noted (p. 245) in Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma that positive reprobation "was rejected as false doctrine … " and that “According to the teaching of the Church, there is a conditioned positive reprobation, that is, it occurs with consideration of foreseen future demerits (post et propter praevisa demerita).”
 
People who excessively use caps, bold, and italics typically are trying to sell opinions as facts.
 
Vico said:
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CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: EVIL
“We cannot say without denying the Divine omnipotence, that another equally perfect universe could not be created in which evil would have no place.”

www.newadvent.org/cathen/05649a.htm
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310 With infinite wisdom and goodness God freely willed to create a world in a state of journeying towards its ultimate perfection, 314 through the dramas of evil and sin. – So He had to CREATE in this world the dramas of evil and sin.

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I’m sure we all agree, if God would willed He could create this world in which evil would have no place.

We all would have free will in this world like we will have free will in heaven without even a smallest act of sin.

So, our free will is NOTHING to do that evil exists in this world.

It is evident, in this evil free world God would created Adam and Eve in the way they have free will but they would NEVER commit even the smallest act of sin.

So, Adam’s and Eve’s free wills are NOTHING to do that evil exists in this world.
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THE QUESTION IS: How God created in this world the dramas of evil and sin?

The answer is simple, God designed/ planned this world with the dramas of evil and sin, He sent the snake to the garden and created Adam and Eve the way to be deceived, for the benefit of the entire human race.

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IF WE SEE THE BIG PICTURE WE SEE

"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."

With infinite wisdom, goodness and out of love God created the dramas of evil and sin in this world, it is NO ONE’S fault, God created it for the benefit of the entire human race.

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I believe would be beneficial if we would stop the blame game and we get on with our job as it is described as follows;

307 God thus enables men to be intelligent and free, causes in order to complete the work of creation, to perfect its harmony for their own good and that of their neighbors.
Though often unconscious collaborators with God’s will, they can also enter deliberately into the divine plan by their actions.

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THE WAY GOD ENABLES/ CAUSES US TO COMPLETE THE WORK OF CREATION

There is a supernatural intervention of God in the faculties of the soul, which precedes the free act of the will. (De fide.)

2022; “The divine initiative in the work of grace precedes, prepares, and elicits the free response of man. …”

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.
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I CANNOT see anyone deserves any blame, His wisdom He so orders ALL EVENTS within the universe even evil and sin itself. – Can we stop God not to order even one event?
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God bless
 
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According to Aquinas, God loves all men, but does not love all men equally. And that is the reason for why some are predestined to Heaven and others are permitted to go to Hell.

Here, love refers not to passion or emotion, because passion is responsive, it is “moved” in a person,
(e.g. "I was moved to tears), but God is the unmoved mover.

To say God has an emotional love for men would imply that God is moved by another.

It would further contradict the doctrine of Divine Simplicity, on the basis of which Aquinas says that God has no parts, for things that have parts require a cause which holds these parts together, i.e. the assembly of the parts.

It would further contradict the doctrine of simplicity by implying that God is not pure act, but an admixture of act and potency, i.e. he is potentially sad, potentially angry, etc.

Remember that according to Aquinas, God is pure act and God’s love for men refers to his will. He wills the good of men.

But he does not will the same good for all men.

Also, according to Aquinas, the knowledge of God is not the knowledge of an observer, of one who “sees” what is happening. Neither, therefore, is foreknowledge of future events an observational knowledge.

For Aquinas, God’s knowledge is a causal knowledge. God knows his effects because he causes them.

Also for Aquinas, to say that God is the First Cause means that he is the First Cause of every effect, NOT that he is merely the initial cause in a series of secondary causes. God is not the finger who pushes down the first domino after which the rest of the dominos push each other down. Rather, God is the finger that pushes each individual domino down.

Given Aquinas’ views on the nature of God, you can understand the basis on which he holds his views on predestination.

I am not endorsing Aquinas views on the subject, but I am summarizing them because regardless of whether or not his conclusions about predestination are correct, one thing is quite clear: Aquinas was consistent in his thinking. He is taking his views on God to their logical conclusion.

Moral of the story: Your understanding of God’s nature will determine your views on the subject of predestination.
 
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Latin said:
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Q. I’m sure we all agree, if God would willed He could create this world in which evil would have no place.
A. That is in reference to metaphysical evil, and without mention of having mankind in the image with the possibiltity of likeness.

Q. We all would have free will in this world like we will have free will in heaven without even a smallest act of sin – that we be in the likeness of God.
A. No, free will allows for expression of love, which is necessary in order to be in heaven where there is not even a smallest act of sin.

Q. I CANNOT see anyone deserves any blame, His wisdom He so orders ALL EVENTS within the universe even evil and sin itself. – Can we stop God not to order even one event?
A. Some of the events are the permission for our foreknown free will actions, for which we are fully responsible when resulting in damnation, and because of the dependency on grace, partly responble with resulting in salvation.
Catechism 1861 “Mortal sin is a radical possibility of human freedom, as is love itself. It results in the loss of charity and the privation of sanctifying grace, that is, of the state of grace. If it is not redeemed by repentance and God’s forgiveness, it causes exclusion from Christ’s kingdom and the eternal death of hell, for our freedom has the power to make choices for ever, with no turning back. …”

Catechism Compendium 213
God, while desiring “all to come to repentance” ( 2 Peter 3:9), nevertheless has created the human person to be free and responsible; and he respects our decisions. Therefore, it is the human person who freely excludes himself from communion with God if at the moment of death he persists in mortal sin and refuses the merciful love of God.
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Catechism - Compendium 363
Freedom is the power given by God to act or not to act, to do this or to do that, and so to perform deliberate actions on one’s own responsibility. Freedom characterizes properly human acts. The more one does what is good, the freer one becomes. Freedom attains its proper perfection when it is directed toward God, the highest good and our beatitude. Freedom implies also the possibility of choosing between good and evil. The choice of evil is an abuse of freedom and leads to the slavery of sin.
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http://www.vatican.va/archive/compendium_ccc/documents/archive_2005_compendium-ccc_en.html
 
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Vico said:
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I SHOW YOU VICO THE THEOLOGICAL IRRELEVANCE OF 1037; 1861.
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CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Predestination of the elect explains.

“Consequently, the whole future membership of heaven, down to its minutest details, has been IRREVOCABLY FIXED FROM ALL ETERNITY. Nor could it be otherwise.
For if it were possible that a predestined individual should after all be CAST INTO HELL or that one not predestined should in the end REACH HEAVEN, then God would have been MISTAKEN in his foreknowledge of future events; He would NO LONGER be omniscient.

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.”
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BY THE ABOVE PRINCIPLE if God would will, He could save the entire human race!!!
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THE TEACHIGS OF THE LARGE MAJORITY OF CATHOLIC THEOLOGIANS ON THIS SUBJECT

“For the absolute predestination of the blessed is at the same time the ABSOLUTE will of God NOT TO ELECT a priori the rest of mankind (Suarez), or which comes to the same, to EXCLUDE them from heaven (Gonet), in other words, NOT to save them.

How can that will to save be called serious and sincere which has DECREED from all eternity the metaphysical impossibility of salvation?

Moreover, in order to realize infallibly his decree, God is compelled to frustrate the eternal welfare of all excluded a priori from heaven, and to TAKE CARE that they die in their sins.”


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As follows, the way God takes care that all those who are excluded from heaven all MUST die in mortal sin.

Without the special help of God the justified cannot persevere to the end in justification. (De fide.) – It is God’s responsibility TO KEEP US SAVED by his Gift of Perseverance.
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THE MYSTRY OF PREDESTINATION by John Salza
“He grants the efficacious grace of perseverance only to His elect.” – Without it, there is NO SALVATION (infallible teachings of the Trent), this fact alone proves, God is responsible for our salvation.
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1037; God predestines no one to go to hell; for this, a willful turning away from God (a mortal sin) is necessary, and persistence in it until the end.

1861 “Mortal sin is a radical possibility of human freedom, … for our freedom has the power to make choices for ever, with no turning back. …”

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As we see above Vico, the theological significance of 1037; 1861; and the same kinds are absolutely zero because NO ONE goes to hell for the reason by their negligence they die in mortal sin, BUT BECAUSE, “in order to realize the infallibly His decree, God is compelled to frustrate the eternal welfare of all excluded a priori from heaven, and to TAKE CARE that they all die in their sins.”
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God bless
 
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I think a question that warrants study, is the following:

Is there a true and meaningful distinction between Double Predestination (Calvin) and Single Predestination (Aquinas) or is it ultimately a distinction without a difference?

It seems to me that on either view, God gives grace to all men in one form or another (people divide this grace up into different categories, common grace, actual grace, sanctifying grace, sufficient grace, efficacious, etc.) – bottom line, all men experience grace.

But the Catholics come along and say that your free cooperation with this grace is necessary for salvation.

Hmmm.

But if God is “the first cause of every effect” then even your cooperation is a grace of God.

So, in one sense, it seems to make a greater mystery out of human freedom than God’s grace.

Because it isn’t discernible how a grace-to-cooperate (which is a causal grace) coordinates with a free-to-cooperate-or-not human action.
 
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Ana_v said:
Is there a true and meaningful distinction between Double Predestination (Calvin) and Single Predestination (Aquinas) or is it ultimately a distinction without a difference?
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CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA Predestination of the elect explains.

“Considering that not all men reach their supernatural end in heaven, but that many are eternally lost, there MUST EXIST a twofold predestination:

(a) one to heaven.

(b) one to the pains of hell.

However, according to present usages to which we shall adhere in the course of the article, it is better to call the latter decree the Divine reprobation so that the term predestination is reserved for the Divine decree of the happiness of the elect.

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The COUNTERPART of the predestination of the good is the decree the Divine reprobation.

Merely implies the absolute will not to grant the bliss of heaven, though not positively predestined to hell, yet they are absolutely predestined not to go to heaven (cf. above, I, B).

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Calvinistic reprobation means the absolute will to condemn to hell. ”


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As we see above: There is no practical differences between the Catholic Single Predestination (Aquinas) and the Double Predestination (Calvin).

Practically the decree the Divine reprobation is a negative predestination to hell, while the Calvinistic predestination to hell is positive predestination to hell.

Please Ana_v read my above post No.18 on this subject.
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God bless
 
Latin said:
Practically the decree the Divine reprobation is a negative predestination to hell, while the Calvinistic predestination to hell is positive predestination to hell.
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Yes, I understand that Predestination is construed as a positive decree, and Reprobation as a negative decree, however, there are two arguments I propose for why “negative” Reprobation is morally indistinguishable from positive Reprobation:
  1. Heaven and Hell are the only two eternal possibilities.
Therefore, positively willing someone’s condemnation to Hell, and willing that someone not go to Heaven, necessarily yields the same result (eternal damnation).

The key term here is “necessarily”.
  1. God is simple, pure act, and his will is causal. “Permissive will” is a human distinction. It doesn’t actually correspond to a “part” of God’s will.
(Unless, of course, the traditional understanding of Divine Simplicity is wrong).
 
Ana_v said:
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Latin:
Practically the decree the Divine reprobation is a negative predestination to hell, while the Calvinistic predestination to hell is positive predestination to hell.
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Yes, I understand that Predestination is construed as a positive decree, and Reprobation as a negative decree, however, there are two arguments I propose for why “negative” Reprobation is morally indistinguishable from positive Reprobation:
  1. Heaven and Hell are the only two eternal possibilities.
Therefore, positively willing someone’s condemnation to Hell, and willing that someone not go to Heaven, necessarily yields the same result (eternal damnation).

The key term here is “necessarily”.
  1. God is simple, pure act, and his will is causal. “Permissive will” is a human distinction. It doesn’t actually correspond to a “part” of God’s will.
(Unless, of course, the traditional understanding of Divine Simplicity is wrong).
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You won both arguments Ana_v, I believe both of your propositions are absolutely correct.

I don’t believe the traditional understanding of Divine Simplicity is wrong.

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At the “fall” God hardwired/ infused the “fallen” man/ us with the law of sin/ God enslaved us to sin, to all manner of evil desire, the inclinations for all kinds of sins, (Rom.7:8-23; CCC 314; etc.)

The events described above, at the “fall” God created the dramas of evil and sin (310; 314).

The infused power of the inclinations for all kinds of sins overrides the power of sufficient graces, while the power of efficacious graces overrides the power of the inclinations for all kinds of sins.

With the provisions of sufficient and efficacious graces God perfectly governs the human race and we all INFALLIBLY and FREELY will and act the way God wills us to will and to act.

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Father William Most Collection; St. Thomas on Actual Grace.

“There are two kinds of actual graces, sufficient and efficacious.
If God sends a sufficient grace, it gives the full and complete power to do something good; but it is infallibly certain we will not do good, but will sin.

If He sends an efficacious grace, it is infallibly sure we will do good.
Our sufficiency is from God. Phil 2:13: "It is God who works [produces] in you both the will and the doing."
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God bless
 
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How do you reconcile this with the doctrine of free will? It seems to me somewhat contradictory.
 
There is a Jewish concept (I wouldn’t call it doctrine) that we are the judge of our life in that we review our life after we die. Gd, however, passes sentence but does not carry it out if it is sending someone to hell. The execution of the sentence is carried out by HaSatan, the Angel of Death, for Gd cannot bring Himself to send someone directly to hell. This is surely not Catholic doctrine, and not Jewish doctrine either, but part of Jewish thinking on the issue.
 
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