Predestination is really confusing me

[hamburglar]

I’m so confused about predestination in a Catholic understanding. Here is what I have gathered so far:

God enables us all the possibility of being saved. He knows who will be saved and who will not be saved. We are not to believe in double-predestination, which says God not only chooses elect, but chooses others to be damned.

How close am I?

 

[Pax]

Good summary.

 

[VociMike]

Call me dumb, but the only predestination that makes sense to me is double predestination. What does it mean that God chooses the elect but doesn’t choose the damned? Can any of the non-elect ever be saved “on their own” so to speak?

 

[tm30]

Call me dumb, but the only predestination that makes sense to me is double predestination. What does it mean that God chooses the elect but doesn’t choose the damned? Can any of the non-elect ever be saved “on their own” so to speak?

God cannot affect the absence of love (hell, defined). Since God is love, this would be an act of self-destruction, and so, He does not will any soul to be damned.

On the other hand, God can use anything at His disposal to draw humanity closer to Him. Since God proved His willingness to use the human form as a means (the Incarnation), as well as a mortal (Mary) as the vehicle to this means, the precedent is evident that God will raise some mortals to accomplish His will by giving extraordinary grace to choose a saintly path in life.

God has one will, and Jesus verbalized that in the Garden of Gethsemane:

John 17:21

That they all may be one, as thou, Father, in me, and I in thee; that they also may be one in us; that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.

There is no prayer that some may be damned and others not. Jesus wills that all should be one.

 

[Pax]

God desires that all men be saved. We know, however, that not all men are saved. God provides sufficient grace to all for salvation, but not all accept God’s gracious gift. Likewise, God gives particularly efficacious grace to the elect unto their salvation.

In one case the efficacious grace brings about salvation, but in another that same grace may only be sufficient. Each person is different. Judas is a great example. Judas was given an extraordinary amount of grace. He was “chosen” by Jesus. The term chosen in this case is derived from the word “elect” in Greek. Likewise, Judas was one of the twelve and Jesus said that the twelve would “sit on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.”[Matt 19:28]

There are many other things in the gospels that were granted by grace to Judas as one of the twelve. Judas had an ample supply of grace for salvation, but God does not force us and He always allows our free will to have a place in his plan. Judas chose to betray Jesus, and did so freely and willfully. Judas could have been among the elect. Judas was given sufficient grace, but Judas was lost by his own doing.

In contrast, the other apostles remained faithful or at least returned after having been scattered at the time of Jesus’s arrest. God’s grace was sufficient and efficacious for them, and should have been the same for Judas. The other apostles chose Jesus. Judas chose to betray Jesus.

There is an element of mystery in predestination and the interplay of free will and grace is not fully understood. National Israel, as the “chosen people,” is an example of a type of predestination in God’s divine plan of salvation. The history of the Jews shows us the many times that they strayed to idol worship and failed as the recipients of the grace and status granted to them.

The book of Romans gives a pithy summary to the issue when Paul says:

Romans 6:23
“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Sin is what we do unto death.

Salvation is what God does for us as the free gift of eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

In all of this there is room for predestination for glory, but there is no room for predestination to damnation. The latter would mean that God was committing an evil act which would be against his nature.

 

[hamburglar]

So does God already know which of us will go to Heaven?

 

[VociMike]

So does God already know which of us will go to Heaven?

Definitely yes.

 

[CentralFLJames]

So does God already know which of us will go to Heaven?

God is timeless and sees all of time (past, present and future) as “now”. So “yes” - God knows who will choose to respond to His Grace.

But Predestination mostly only applies to God since we do not know what God explicitly knows. None of us knows who of us will choose to cooperate with grace and who of us will ultimately reject it and not persevere to the end.

We can gain some confidence in our own salvation by various “signs” of predestination such as:

The following are some of the criteria set down by the theologians: purity of heart, pleasure in prayer, patience in suffering, frequent reception of the sacraments, love of Christ and His Church, devotion to the Mother of God, etc.

Some of the various devotions of the Catholic Church have signal promises of predestiny to salvation by sticking with the devotions over ones life. Thus the devotions become a “signal” of one’s predestiny.

James

 

[Texas_Roofer]

I’m so confused about predestination in a Catholic understanding. Here is what I have gathered so far:

God enables us all the possibility of being saved. He knows who will be saved and who will not be saved. We are not to believe in double-predestination, which says God not only chooses elect, but chooses others to be damned.

How close am I?

sounds good to me

Call me dumb, but the only predestination that makes sense to me is double predestination. What does it mean that God chooses the elect but doesn’t choose the damned? Can any of the non-elect ever be saved “on their own” so to speak?

In class we teach it as image you were with God watching a car chase as from a helicopter. You see one car is speeding to a busy intersection and know a bad wreck will surely happen. The problem is for God to intervene he must suspend the free will. Once he suspends the free will ( turns off the engine, push the brake, etc) he prevents the crash however now he has suspended the action be which we show we follow the commandments. So God sees all, thus knows all, to us that is the future however to God it is not the future.

hope that helps