Salvation By Grace Alone

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The following from the Catechism give some good discussion points. In Catholicism, it’s recognized that no sinners enter heaven, as Scripture makes clear. God’s purpose is to truly make just His wayward creation, rather than simply, suddenly in history, ignoring justice for those who “believe”-and bring it to even greater justice yet in a process of molding and perfecting it into the work He’s had in mind from the beginning. This is why the Church teaches that God made His creation “in statu viae”, in a “state of journeying” to perfection.

**1989 The first work of the grace of the Holy Spirit is conversion, effecting justification in accordance with Jesus’ proclamation at the beginning of the Gospel: "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."38 Moved by grace, man turns toward God and away from sin, thus accepting forgiveness and righteousness from on high. "Justification is not only the remission of sins, but also the sanctification and renewal of the interior man.39

1995 The Holy Spirit is the master of the interior life. By giving birth to the "inner man,"44 justification entails the *sanctification *of his whole being:
Just as you once yielded your members to impurity and to greater and greater iniquity, so now yield your members to righteousness for sanctification. . . . But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the return you get is sanctification and its end, eternal life.45

2002 God’s free initiative demands man’s free response, for God has created man in his image by conferring on him, along with freedom, the power to know him and love him. The soul only enters freely into the communion of love. God immediately touches and directly moves the heart of man. He has placed in man a longing for truth and goodness that only he can satisfy. The promises of “eternal life” respond, beyond all hope, to this desire:
If at the end of your very good works . . ., you rested on the seventh day, it was to foretell by the voice of your book that at the end of our works, which are indeed “very good” since you have given them to us, we shall also rest in you on the sabbath of eternal life.52**
 
Tomyris said:
Really? Declared saints? Mary? People in heaven who have not been declared saints? Holy angels?
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The angels made their choice, and that is irrevocable, being what they are. The saints have all been made just and perfected, and they now have reached their end in God. We seek our end in God in this life, we have that missing hole we seek to fill, and we try to fill it imperfectly with finite things that don’t fulfill us and grow stale. We are pulled at from all sides by different goods due to our animal nature. But anyone who has reached that end, who has found what they were searching for, perfectly, and not in any way that would grow stale, would not substitute it for a lesser thing, for it would mean opening that hole back up, and would be too much to bear. The urge to find newer and better things is gone, because that urge only exists to get us to God.

Or to just put it more simply as to what Catholicism says, no. Once our lives in this world are ended, our trajectory is fixed.
 
Tomyris said:
Really? Declared saints? Mary? People in heaven who have not been declared saints? Holy angels?
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Should’ve qualified it better. Any of our fellow fallen human beings here one earth, those whose salvation we’ve been discussing, at any point in time-of course. Presumably even Mary, since her free will was never taken away. The fact that she did *not *sin but remained faithful in humble obedience is all the more reason we hold her in such high esteem.
 
Rom 9:11 (For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth;)
Rom 9:12 It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger.
Rom 9:13 As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.
Rom 9:14 What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid.
Rom 9:15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.

Elect do not know who they are, but if you are and elect, (and only God knows), chosen by God before you were born, you will attain Heavenly Glory. God reveled to the Apostles that they will attain Heavenly Glory.

(Ecc 9:12 DRB) ** Man knoweth not his own end: **but as fishes are taken with the hook, and as birds are caught with the snare, so men are taken in the evil time, when it shall suddenly come upon them.

(Ecc 9:1 DRB) All these things have I considered in my heart, that I might carefully understand them: there are just men and wise men, and their works are in the hand of God:** and yet man knoweth not whether he be worthy of love, or hatred:
**
 
Tomyris said:
Y’all are wandering off the opening question. It’s like it is hard for you to admit that ‘Salvation by grace alone’ is something a Catholic can agree with.

But as for assurance of salvation, Reformed theologian Wayne Grudem says the way you know you are saved is by honestly examining your life: are you growing in faith, charity and hope and good works, or not.
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Can’t help but be amused as your observation because this happens too often. Many Catholics jump down the throats of pretty much anything that suspiciously affirms Protestant belief even if that Protestant belief is completely Catholic (case in point: predestination).

But again, we’ll be succinct: Catholicism teaches that man is saved by grace alone.

As for Grudem’s opinion, this is something Catholic theology also affirms. One’s love for God, neighbour, Church, Scripture, Blessed Mother, etc. are signs that one is of the elect (not proof though; we believe that one’s electedness cannot be known with the certainty of faith).
 
Tomyris said:
Can you lose your realized sanctification?
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Well…why don’t we turn back the question to you…since you have been sanctified…have you lost it?

Have you sinned since you were sanctified? And when you sinned, did you lose your sanctification?
 
Tomyris said:
Y’all are wandering off the opening question. It’s like it is hard for you to admit that ‘Salvation by grace alone’ is something a Catholic can agree with.

But as for assurance of salvation, Reformed theologian Wayne Grudem says the way you know you are saved is by honestly examining your life: are you growing in faith, charity and hope and good works, or not.
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Grudem also believes the Son is eternally subordinate to the Father.
 
pablope said:
Well…why don’t we turn back the question to you…since you have been sanctified…have you lost it?

Have you sinned since you were sanctified? And when you sinned, did you lose your sanctification?
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This makes no sense.

I am not sure you are really following or understanding this thread. Is this just supposed to be a stupid gotcha question? That is what it comes off as. 🤷
 
porthos11 said:
Can’t help but be amused as your observation because this happens too often. Many Catholics jump down the throats of pretty much anything that suspiciously affirms Protestant belief even if that Protestant belief is completely Catholic (case in point: predestination).

But again, we’ll be succinct: Catholicism teaches that man is saved by grace alone.

As for Grudem’s opinion, this is something Catholic theology also affirms. One’s love for God, neighbour, Church, Scripture, Blessed Mother, etc. are signs that one is of the elect (not proof though; we believe that one’s electedness cannot be known with the certainty of faith).
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Yep. If a Protestant says it, SOMETHING must be wrong with it. 🙂
 
Tomyris said:
Sigh.

This issue is irrelevant to the thread and Wayne Grudem has also responded to this.

I wonder about your motives in posting this.
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Yes, I’ve read his explanations, and I have yet to see him recant and apologize for this blasphemy. Have you?

My motive in bringing this up is to discredit him. The opinion of a polytheist is irrelevant on soteriology. No Christian cares what Arius thinks about justification.
 
PluniaZ said:
Yes, I’ve read his explanations, and I have yet to see him recant and apologize for this blasphemy. Have you?

My motive in bringing this up is to discredit him. The opinion of a polytheist is irrelevant on soteriology. No Christian cares what Arius thinks about justification.
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Well, I think your interpretation is incorrect. He is not a polytheist nor an Arian. Nor do I think he is blaspheming.

You have not discredited him. Rather, you have discredited yourself. I think it will be very hard to take you seriously from now on. I will keep you off my ignore list because of the comic value of your posts.

Please do not derail the thread with this or I will report you.

Do you agree that salvation is by grace alone?
 
Tomyris said:
This makes no sense.

I am not sure you are really following or understanding this thread. Is this just supposed to be a stupid gotcha question? That is what it comes off as. 🤷
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:eek:

It is a simple question, really…with a yes or no.

It is only a stupid question if you do not want to answer it.

So repeating, according to your theology…since you are still sinning…are you still sanctified?

Have you lost your sanctification?
 
Tomyris said:
Yep. If a Protestant says it, SOMETHING must be wrong with it. 🙂
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Something is wrong with it…because for a protestant, it has a different meaning than what the CC teaches…🤷

Again, repeating Mcgrath:

Thus the Roman Catholic term “justification” effectively includes both what Protestants refer to as “justification” and “sanctification.” This difference in definitions can result in confusion, effectively exaggerating the disagreement. However the difference in definitions reflects a difference in substance. In the Protestant concept, justification is a status before God that is entirely the result of God’s activity and that continues even when humans sin. Thus using different words for justification and sanctification reflects a distinction between aspects of salvation that are entirely the result of God’s activity, and those that involve human cooperation.
 
Tomyris said:
Well, I think your interpretation is incorrect. He is not a polytheist nor an Arian. Nor do I think he is blaspheming.
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Grudem is a polytheist. He admits as much in his latest post on the subject:

“I still want to guard zealously against greater ontological power – greater attribute – for Father.”

“Rather, in the eternal councils of the Trinity, there was a role of planning, directing, initiating, and choosing, that belonged specifically to the Father.”

“In process of creating universe, role of initiating, of leading, belongs not to all three members of the Trinity equally, but to the Father.”

waynegrudem.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/ETS-Presentation-on-Trinity-11-15-16.pdf

The above statements are pure polytheism. A single, simple, immutable, indivisible God does not have a member whose role is leading. That is a difference in essence of the three persons, which is polytheism.
You have not discredited him. Rather, you have discredited yourself. I think it will be very hard to take you seriously from now on. I will keep you off my ignore list because of the comic value of your posts.
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Forum rules prohibit insulting other members. Please discuss the topic, not each other.
Please do not derail the thread with this or I will report you.
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I have the right to discredit authorities you cite.
 
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