Teaching on Mary's sinlessness

[PRmerger]

By what criteria do you use to accept the authority of the Magisterium?

Clearly, we use the same criteria you do when you accept the authority of the Magisterium.

For that is what you do each and every time you quote from the NT as theopneustos—you are giving your tacit submission to the authority of Catholic bishops to tell you what belongs in the NT.

So…what criteria do *you *use to accept the authority of the Magisterium?

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Never worked in a Government or Law.

Interesting you can personally answer complete tangents but not the actual discussion you started .

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Greetings again my fellow truth seekers.
My dear Blue Horizon,
This is a Catholic forum…and? Have you forgotten what the forums are for? Let me refresh your memory from the forum home page,
“The Catholic Answers Forums (CAF) exists to provide a community for Catholics and non-Catholics of all levels of interest in and/or commitment to the Catholic Church where they may gather on the Internet for discussion in a safe and charitable environment. We do not require that members agree with the Catholic Church in order to participate; only that they remain charitable in their postings”
You speak to me as if because I am not a Catholic I either should not be permitted on here or have nothing of value to contribute since Catholics are incapable of further reasoning on their beliefs - having accepted that no further reasoning is possible or necessary. This doesn’t say much for defending the faith or testing the spirits. It does say a lot for arrogance and prideful behavior.

How is it you think I am “cherry picking” the bible? If you would not be accused of the same then give me examples of this as opposed to what you do. You make these accusations but give no examples. How are we to have a productive discussion if you don’t? I should be allowed to see where you think this is happening in error so that I may defend my position or accept yours. Why do you say influence people here? I’m not here to influence anyone. I’m here to ask questions, receive other view points, and reason things out. Is this unreasonable? Who doesn’t rely on their own reasoning to some extent? Did you not rely on your own reasoning to understand the reasoning behind the Magisterium’s interpretations of scripture? If no one ever did then conversion to Catholicism would be arbitrary and deference for the truth merely incidental.

Let me restate this, I am not here to influence anyone. I’m here to discuss my opinions. To weed out my errors and to get to truth. Limping and sterile? Really? So far your argument against my views seems to be to refer to the opinions of the Church Doctors without reasoning with me about why they are correct in their judgments. If you cannot reason from their stand point with me as to why I am in error how can you say you understand their standpoint to begin with?

This is baffling. I have “mounted” a discussion by quoting the RCC. However reasoning from scripture does not have to agree with the so called Magisterium nor certain Doctors of the Church if they are wrong. Your contention is they cannot be wrong. My contention is they are wrong and I’ve outlined my reasons why. I’ve quoted scripture and the RCC. I’ve mounted a reasonably coherent explanation of why Immaculate should feel fear. I’ve started with a definition of what it is to be immaculate, taken from the Catholic RCC and proceeded to reason from that point. You have not, that I can see, addressed my arguments except vaguely and peripherally.

Sertacos I am simply explaining some basic “laws of Catholic nature” as it were so that you may choose more effective means to achieve what I presume is your goal of being here.

By all means ignore my counsel and influence few Catholics of any education or intelligence .

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Seems whenever anyone cannot mount a reasonable argument for their position they resort to revelation.

You just don’t get it.
Its not a certain teaching allegedly based on reason but rather on revelation.
Its not “resorting” to revelation - it originates from revelation as defined by the Magisterium.
What else did you expect?

From a purely natural reason point of view there is no definitive conclusion re the Immaculate Conception etc either way. Therefore it is a reasonable possibility.

Therefore, as a Catholic, I feel no psychological pressure to gainsay what the Magisterium defines or what leading doctors of the Church assert which is of course my default mode in such circumstances.

You obviously are a less trusting “glass half empty” sort of person.
Go for it, it doesn’t worry me.

Now if you wanted to debate whether contracepting is always and everywhere morally unacceptable that’s another matter.

 

[Vico]

I would ask to what purpose?

What purpose would suffering the effects serve to those whose suffering has no cause when the whole goal of creation is for man to come back to harmony with God and no suffering?].

How would it make sense that the person who has reached this goal, harmony and perfect communion with God should suffer still?

What sense would it make for God to create the miracle of painful burn scars on a person even though that person was never burned by anything if the point of the person is to show the Glory of perfect, undefiled, communion and harmony with God?

A beacon, a light to others who would seek out salvation?
…

What is an immaculate if not in full communion and harmony with God?

If so what has an immaculate to fear? Death?

No. Death is a result of sin. Pain? No. An immaculate would know no pain being in full harmony with creation. Nor would an immaculate be allowed to suffer any pain, being in full communion and harmony with God who would protect them. The bible says “what have we to fear if God is with us?”

What then? The potential to sin?
…
Would they be capable of fear from some faulty perception of reality?

A Psychosis or phobia perhaps?
…
Would they be fearful of Gods judgment?
…
When and why might we find fear in the immaculate?

The purpose for which man was created is to know, love, and serve God in this world, and to be happy with Him forever in heaven. It is a journey.

Catechism 302 Creation has its own goodness and proper perfection, but it did not spring forth complete from the hands of the Creator. The universe was created “in a state of journeying” (in statu viae) toward an ultimate perfection yet to be attained, to which God has destined it. …

Full harmony with creation is called original justice. Adam and Eve had both original holiness and original justice and lost them both through exercise of their free will, and we, the descendants, do not have them at our birth. Baptism results in holiness, however the consequences of sin remain in the baptized, such as concupiesence, suffering, illness, death, and such frailties inherent in life as weaknesses of character, and so on.

In the Immaculate Conception the stain of original is not present, like one baptized. It is commonly believed that the Blessed Virgin Mary was free from concupiscence that remains in the baptized, however.

Catechism
399 Scripture portrays the tragic consequences of this first disobedience. Adam and Eve immediately lose the grace of original holiness.280 They become afraid of the God of whom they have conceived a distorted image - that of a God jealous of his prerogatives.281

400 The harmony in which they had found themselves, thanks to original justice, is now destroyed: the control of the soul’s spiritual faculties over the body is shattered; the union of man and woman becomes subject to tensions, their relations henceforth marked by lust and domination.282 Harmony with creation is broken: visible creation has become alien and hostile to man.283 Because of man, creation is now subject “to its bondage to decay”.284 Finally, the consequence explicitly foretold for this disobedience will come true: man will “return to the ground”,285 for out of it he was taken. Death makes its entrance into human history.286

417 Adam and Eve transmitted to their descendants human nature wounded by their own first sin and hence deprived of original holiness and justice; this deprivation is called “original sin”.

1473 The forgiveness of sin and restoration of communion with God entail the remission of the eternal punishment of sin, but temporal punishment of sin remains. While patiently bearing sufferings and trials of all kinds and, when the day comes, serenely facing death, the Christian must strive to accept this temporal punishment of sin as a grace. He should strive by works of mercy and charity, as well as by prayer and the various practices of penance, to put off completely the “old man” and to put on the "new man."84

1263 By Baptism all sins are forgiven, original sin and all personal sins, as well as all punishment for sin.66 In those who have been reborn nothing remains that would impede their entry into the Kingdom of God, neither Adam’s sin, nor personal sin, nor the consequences of sin, the gravest of which is separation from God.

1264 Yet certain temporal consequences of sin remain in the baptized, such as suffering, illness, death, and such frailties inherent in life as weaknesses of character, and so on, as well as an inclination to sin that Tradition calls concupiscence, or metaphorically, “the tinder for sin” (fomes peccati); since concupiscence "is left for us to wrestle with, it cannot harm those who do not consent but manfully resist it by the grace of Jesus Christ."67 Indeed, "an athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules."68

 

[setarcos]

You just don’t get it.
Its not a certain teaching allegedly based on reason but rather on revelation.
Its not “resorting” to revelation - it originates from revelation as defined by the Magisterium.
What else did you expect?

Apparently I don’t get it. Thankfully you do. I must say though that that kind of arrogant certainty has led many to death. And we know from proverbs that God hates arrogance. I’m also thinking of proverbs for instance 14:12 in which it states many take paths certain in their truth that lead only to death. This of course applies to me as well. This is why I say I am not trying to influence anyone. I’m trying to get Catholics on here to influence me as to why I am in error in my thinking. This is important stuff to one who believes in Christ and wishes to know him better. I would think given the charge over our neighbor’s welfare he has given us no Catholic would be disinclined to engage in discussion of contended beliefs with another. My point here is that you should be wary of stopping thinking and reasoning with others simply because you have become certain in your beliefs. As God has warned us, your beliefs may not be as certain as you think.
Reason with me on the Magisterium if your patience will allow. It states in the RCC that we can expect no more revelations apart from what Christ has given. Christ has said all that he deemed necessary concerning his revelation in his lifetime on earth. So for you to say the Magisterium’s teaching concerning Mary is based on revelation not reason is a little misleading. It cannot be new revelation itself. The dogma wasn’t even established until millennia after Christ had passed for gosh sakes. One wonders to what purpose for our salvation? So then what you mean to say is that it is based upon the reasoning of the Magisterium applied to what Christ did give us as revelation. We come back to reasoning again. After all our faith is a reasonable one according to the scriptures. If the Magisterium’s reasoning is not defensible we may conclude that we or they, if they do all your thinking for you, are on the wrong path. Of course Catholics would say that Christ’s revelation has granted the Magisterium all authority of interpretation, but of what? Of Christ’s revelations of course, and who is to interpret the revelation from Christ that this Authority is to be delegated solely to the Magisterium who cannot error in its interpretation? Why it’s the Magisterium of course! Being the only ones apparently capable of reasoning from the scriptures to truth. This seems somewhat circular to me and since you prefer their word to reasoning to an outsider this is hard to understand. I haven’t explored this so this is merely preliminary thinking. I’d love to reason it out with you if you would care to. Anyway, I am not talking about “they are right because they can’t be proven to be wrong”, how tenuous a way to truth that is, I am talking about showing, given the assertions they have made, that they may be shown to be incorrect. It is my assertion that the pertinent parts of my argument show that given the Magisterium’s definitions and assertions about Mary it cannot be correct to call her immaculate. I don’t have to show 100% certainty in which way a term is used, such as kecharitomene, if that term can be used in more than one way except to show with 100% certainty that because of this duality of uncertainty in the term it cannot be used to show my argument false. My argument must be shown to be false in some other way. For instance if it could be shown that the variable term kecharitomene must be interpreted with 100% certainty that it is defined as “full of grace” then this would show my belief as it stands now to be in error. I believe your mixing up the “variable terms” with the “dependent terms” of proving an argument correct or false. The variable terms are used to show cohesion within the argument if the argument is true. In this way Catholics define it as “full of grace” to show cohesion within their assertions about Mary. I use it as “highly favored one” to show the same within my assertions. Because both ways can be used the disproof must lay elsewhere. The dependent terms are used to prove or disprove the argument itself because of their accepted definitions by both those for and against the argument. I have to prove the argument with 100% certainty by both using these uniformly accepted dependent terms and show cohesion using the variable terms. I believe I have at least preliminarily done both.

 

[setarcos]

From a purely natural reason point of view there is no definitive conclusion re the Immaculate Conception etc either way. Therefore it is a reasonable possibility.

I disagree. Dogmas are not plucked out of thin air without making definitive conclusions. You’ve not addressed my arguments against the Immaculate Conception except to say “I just don’t get it”. I’ve tried to show why an immaculate would not be affected by nor show feelings of fear. I believed I had done that.

Therefore, as a Catholic, I feel no psychological pressure to gainsay what the Magisterium defines or what leading doctors of the Church assert which is of course my default mode in such circumstances.

What I get out of this statement is that your saying that you either do not care to engage in reasoning about the Immaculate conception since you’ve simply decided to pick a side and believe regardless of any arguments for or against, the way many cults get started, or you cannot mount a reasonable refutation of my assertions. The former is spiritually lazy, the latter is something you can possible rectify and should try to.

You obviously are a less trusting “glass half empty” sort of person.
Go for it, it doesn’t worry me.

I am a glass half empty sort of person. The emptiness is what motivates me to movement towards God so that my glass may be full.

Now if you wanted to debate whether contracepting is always and everywhere morally unacceptable that’s another matter.

I’m not sure what your argument here is? It’s never acceptable, in your understanding of scripture, to use contraception morally? I would have to think on that. Someday perhaps I will take you up on the offer to debate this, As a sort of devil’s advocate in order to learn more about your opinion, Just not now.

 

[setarcos]

The purpose for which man was created is to know, love, and serve God in this world, and to be happy with Him forever in heaven. It is a journey.

Hi, peace always be with you.
I absolutely agree. I have no argument against this. I would only say that it has “become” a journey.

Catechism 302 Creation has its own goodness and proper perfection, but it did not spring forth complete from the hands of the Creator. The universe was created “in a state of journeying” (in statu viae) toward an ultimate perfection yet to be attained, to which God has destined it. …

This is a vague statement. Perhaps you can clarify some things. The universe, the world, Eden, was made for man and eve so that man should not be alone and God called it good…”in its own goodness and proper perfection”, why is this not complete? What is the ultimate perfection? Life in Heaven? Having free will, the possibility of Eve not having made the wrong choice makes man’s dwelling in another environment called Heaven a consequent of her choice not an inevitable part of the “state of journeying” toward ultimate perfection. Unless we believe that because of the nature of free will every possible choice will eventually be made leading to the inevitability of this journey. Then if we are to avoid an eternal loop of having to retake the same journey and never reach this ultimate perfection then is ultimate perfection, once reached, a state of no will of one’s own? If God has destined the universe toward ultimate perfection and this is contingent upon Eve’s choice, then has he not destined Eve to make the wrong choice? If Eve has been destined to do this then what will of hers is free? Free will would be reduced to a mere delusion of having made choices ourselves of our own volition. I would say the journey is within us not without in the universe and this journey is taking us home not bringing us to a new existence. Just a first impression…this needs further and deeper thought.

Full harmony with creation is called original justice. Adam and Eve had both original holiness and original justice and lost them both through exercise of their free will, and we, the descendants, do not have them at our birth. Baptism results in holiness, however the consequences of sin remain in the baptized, such as concupiesence, suffering, illness, death, and such frailties inherent in life as weaknesses of character, and so on.

In the Immaculate Conception the stain of original is not present, like one baptized. It is commonly believed that the Blessed Virgin Mary was free from concupiscence that remains in the baptized, however.

Catechism
399 Scripture portrays the tragic consequences of this first disobedience. Adam and Eve immediately lose the grace of original holiness.280 They become afraid of the God of whom they have conceived a distorted image - that of a God jealous of his prerogatives.281

400 The harmony in which they had found themselves, thanks to original justice, is now destroyed: the control of the soul’s spiritual faculties over the body is shattered; the union of man and woman becomes subject to tensions, their relations henceforth marked by lust and domination.282 Harmony with creation is broken: visible creation has become alien and hostile to man.283 Because of man, creation is now subject “to its bondage to decay”.284 Finally, the consequence explicitly foretold for this disobedience will come true: man will “return to the ground”,285 for out of it he was taken. Death makes its entrance into human history.286

417 Adam and Eve transmitted to their descendants human nature wounded by their own first sin and hence deprived of original holiness and justice; this deprivation is called “original sin”.

1473 The forgiveness of sin and restoration of communion with God entail the remission of the eternal punishment of sin, but temporal punishment of sin remains. While patiently bearing sufferings and trials of all kinds and, when the day comes, serenely facing death, the Christian must strive to accept this temporal punishment of sin as a grace. He should strive by works of mercy and charity, as well as by prayer and the various practices of penance, to put off completely the “old man” and to put on the "new man."84

1263 By Baptism all sins are forgiven, original sin and all personal sins, as well as all punishment for sin.66 In those who have been reborn nothing remains that would impede their entry into the Kingdom of God, neither Adam’s sin, nor personal sin, nor the consequences of sin, the gravest of which is separation from God.

1264 Yet certain temporal consequences of sin remain in the baptized, such as suffering, illness, death, and such frailties inherent in life as weaknesses of character, and so on, as well as an inclination to sin that Tradition calls concupiscence, or metaphorically, “the tinder for sin” (fomes peccati); since concupiscence "is left for us to wrestle with, it cannot harm those who do not consent but manfully resist it by the grace of Jesus Christ."67 Indeed, "an athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules."68

I’m not sure what your purpose is in quoting the RCC. I’ve already quoted these things in my argument. If you are mounting a disproof of some sort against my argument about the Immaculate Conception you’ll have to explain to me because I do not see what it is. You haven’t addressed any of my questions in the quoted post, or even really addressed the post that I can see. We can go over it point by point instead of all at once in the same post if you wish.
Thank you so much for taking the time to respond to me.

 

[thinkandmull]

I don’t quite see your logic.
Just because someone has a potential for receiving and making use of another’s gift…why does that mean the giver is bound to give?

Can you quote exactly what you believe the mistake is?

If God created us with the need to be perfected in grace, than grace would be owed to us. This contradicts Church teaching. So original sin is not simply the absence of grace

 

[thinkandmull]

When the original sin (hereditary stain) dogma was defined (Council of Trent - Session V, 1546), the Blessed Virgin Mary and Our Lord Jesus Christ were excluded. Later the Church provided the dogma of the Immaculate Conception (1854).

There were three opposing ideas that had occurred:

1. 
   *]Theodorus of Mopsuestia - Adam’s sin did not bring death. Adopted by the Pelagians and condemned at Carthage.
   *]Pelagians later recanted and accepted that Adam’s sin brought death, but held that there was no inherited transmission of sin. Condemned at Council of Orange.
   *]Pelagians later recanted and adopted that Adam caused sin in us, but by imitation only. Condemned at Council of Trent.
   
   Death and Suffering are purely physical evils and cannot be called sin.
   The rebellion of the lower appetite transmitted to us by Adam (concupiscence) is an occasion of sin not necessarily a fault, so is not original sin.
   The absence of sanctifying grace (holiness) at conception is also an effect of the first sin, and is called the hereditary stain.

1. 
   Your post contradicts number three in your list. Also, if Trent excluded Mary from original sin, why did Pius IX define it

 

[thinkandmull]

It is not consent but assent to what the Church teaches that is required. When the Church does not call it irreformable then the assent is not to what is irreformable but something else of a different theological certainty.

No conflict between the following.

Deprivation of original holiness and justice is called ‘original sin’ by the Council of Trent, Session V:

DECREE CONCERNING ORIGINAL SIN

1. If any one asserts, that the prevarication of Adam injured himself alone, and not his posterity; and that the holiness and justice, received of God, which he lost, he lost for himself alone, and not for us also; or that he, being defiled by the sin of disobedience, has only transfused death, and pains of the body, into the whole human race, but not sin also, which is the death of the soul; let him be anathema:–whereas he contradicts the apostle who says; By one man sin entered into the world, and by sin death, and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned.

What was defined in 1954, Pope Pius IX:

“We declare, pronounce and define that the doctrine which holds that the Blessed Virgin Mary, at the first instant of her conception, by a singular privilege and grace of the Omnipotent God, in virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior of mankind, was preserved immaculate from all stain of original sin, has been revealed by God, and therefore should firmly and constantly be believed by all the faithful…”

What Pope Pius XII wrote in 1943 in Mystici Corporis:

It was she, the second Eve, who, free from all sin, original or personal, and always more intimately united with her Son, offered Him on Golgotha to the Eternal Father for all the children of Adam, sin-stained by his unhappy fall, and her mother’s rights and her mother’s love were included in the holocaust.

Trent called it death of the soul. One can be in a state of nature and have no grace, thus no death of the soul

 

[thinkandmull]

See if you can follow the explanation given in Catholic Encyclopedia.

We may add an argument based on the principle of St. Augustine already cited, “the deliberate sin of the first man is the cause of original sin”. This principle is developed by St. Anselm: “the sin of Adam was one thing but the sin of children at their birth is quite another, the former was the cause, the latter is the effect” (De conceptu virginali, xxvi). In a child original sin is distinct from the fault of Adam, it is one of its effects. But which of these effects is it? We shall examine the several effects of Adam’s fault and reject those which cannot be original sin:

(1) Death and Suffering.- These are purely physical evils and cannot be called sin. Moreover St. Paul, and after him the councils, regarded death and original sin as two distinct things transmitted by Adam.

(2) Concupiscence.- This rebellion of the lower appetite transmitted to us by Adam is an occasion of sin and in that sense comes nearer to moral evil. However, the occasion of a fault is not necessarily a fault, and whilst original sin is effaced by baptism concupiscence still remains in the person baptized; therefore original sin and concupiscence cannot be one and the same thing, as was held by the early Protestants (see Council of Trent, Sess. V, can. v).

(3) The absence of sanctifying grace in the new-born child is also an effect of the first sin, for Adam, having received holiness and justice from God, lost it not only for himself but also for us (loc. cit., can. ii). If he has lost it for us we were to have received it from him at our birth with the other prerogatives of our race. Therefore the absence of sanctifying grace in a child is a real privation, it is the want of something that should have been in him according to the Divine plan. If this favour is not merely something physical but is something in the moral order, if it is holiness, its privation may be called a sin. But sanctifying grace is holiness and is so called by the Council of Trent, because holiness consists in union with God, and grace unites us intimately with God. Moral goodness consists in this, that our action is according to the moral law, but grace is a deification, as the Fathers say, a perfect conformity with God who is the first rule of all morality. (See GRACE.) Sanctifying grace therefore enters into the moral order, not as an act that passes but as a permanent tendency which exists even when the subject who possesses it does not act; it is a turning towards God, conversio ad Deum. Consequently the privation of this grace, even without any other act, would be a stain, a moral deformity, a turning away from God, aversio a Deo, and this character is not found in any other effect of the fault of Adam. This privation, therefore, is the hereditary stain.

Harent, S. (1911). Original Sin. In The Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. newadvent.org/cathen/11312a.htm

De Lubac’s error is far and wide

 

[Blue_Horizon]

I disagree. Dogmas are not plucked out of thin air without making definitive conclusions. You’ve not addressed my arguments against the Immaculate Conception except to say “I just don’t get it”. I’ve tried to show why an immaculate would not be affected by nor show feelings of fear. I believed I had done that.

What I get out of this statement is that your saying that you either do not care to engage in reasoning about the Immaculate conception since you’ve simply decided to pick a side and believe regardless of any arguments for or against, the way many cults get started, or you cannot mount a reasonable refutation of my assertions. The former is spiritually lazy, the latter is something you can possible rectify and should try to.

I am a glass half empty sort of person. The emptiness is what motivates me to movement towards God so that my glass may be full.

I’m not sure what your argument here is? It’s never acceptable, in your understanding of scripture, to use contraception morally? I would have to think on that. Someday perhaps I will take you up on the offer to debate this, As a sort of devil’s advocate in order to learn more about your opinion, Just not now.

Sertacos I am not interested in defending the certainty of the Immaculate Conception because I accept it because the Magisterium has most clearly defined it to be such.
If you do not accept that the Magisterium can ever clearly define anything then that likely explains why you are not a Catholic.

For me to reject this teaching I would therefore have to
(a) Reject the possibility that the Magisterium can so formally define
(b) be provided certainty by natural reasoning that this defined teaching could not possibly be true.

The success of (b) would likely lead to the success of (a). This would likely lead to me leaving the Catholic Church or at least treating its clearest De Fide teachings with the same “grain of salt” approach I do to its more controversial applied judgements (such as the alleged always and everywhere immorality of using contraceptives).

So when you can present an argument from reason that is so overwhelmingly coercive to reason that Mary could not possibly be Immaculate then I will likely initiate protocols a and b above.

To date all you have argued has, to my well educated Catholic mind, been quite underwhelming.
I get it that you think your arguments are brilliant.
As contradictory views based on reason alone rarely reaches the coercive levels needed to shift anybody out of the “ruts” they already track(whether they be religious or not) I suggest your current methodology here on CAF is doomed to complete failure - and not because Catholics are unreasoning or stupid. We are no more so than (allegedly) free thinkers.

Case closed, end of story.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

So original sin is not simply the absence of grace

If you mean the “sin” that we inherit is not simply the absence of grace then of course I agree.
It also involves loss of original justice, a missing perfection of our faculties that does not however, by its absence, cause us not to exist.

"If God created us with the need to be perfected in grace, than grace would be owed to us. "

There is a significant amount of emotive semantics that needs to be unpacked a little here methinks.
For starters: “need” could mean “right” or it could simply mean “hidden capability”.
If you believe its the former please quote a Magisterial source with strong pedigree (rather than a lonely side note from some Father or Council in the way distant dark ages as some do ).

This contradicts Church teaching.

See request above where it so contradicts?

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Your post contradicts number three in your list. Also, if Trent excluded Mary from original sin, why did Pius IX define it

I believe Vico has poorly made his point when he stated “The rebellion of the lower appetite transmitted to us by Adam (concupiscence)… is not original sin.”

It seems clumsy because he appears to be making a binary judgement about concupiscence and OS.

In fact we must bring in Aristotelian causality principles to understand the error of the Pelagions (and original Protestants) on this point as described by Aquinas.

Aquinas asserts that concupiscence IS a material component of OS.
He says the same of the body re a human being.

Is the body the full human being? Of course not. It needs a soul as well to vivify the body before it can truly be called human.
But that doesn’t quite mean that the body has nothing to do with being human!

Likewise with concupiscence and OS.
Our inheritance of OriginalSin cannot properly be called OS without mentioning concupiscence - just as we cannot say a human being exists without mentioning the presence of a human body.

Sure a soul can exist without a body - but a naked soul is not strictly speaking a human being…it is only a human soul.

 

[Vico]

Trent called it death of the soul. One can be in a state of nature and have no grace, thus no death of the soul

The soul is eternal but may be dead – without sanctifying grace the soul is spiritually dead, spiritually because the soul is immaterial. Being without sanctifying grace is the natural state – that without the supernatural gifts given by God to Adam and Eve. You can see how spiritual death it is used in the Catechism

2284 Scandal is an attitude or behavior which leads another to do evil. The person who gives scandal becomes his neighbor’s tempter. He damages virtue and integrity; he may even draw his brother into spiritual death. Scandal is a grave offense if by deed or omission another is deliberately led into a grave offense.

 

[Vico]

Interesting you can personally answer complete tangents but not the actual discussion you started .

I answer personal tangents personally, and non personal tangents impersonally, with the original sources.

 

[Vico]

…

The quotes from the Catechism before were so you could see which sources I was drawing on. I did not make notes of which ones you used, for it would take even more time.

It is a vague statement without the rest of it.

V. GOD CARRIES OUT HIS PLAN: DIVINE PROVIDENCE

302 Creation has its own goodness and proper perfection, but it did not spring forth complete from the hands of the Creator. The universe was created “in a state of journeying” (in statu viae) toward an ultimate perfection yet to be attained, to which God has destined it. We call “divine providence” the dispositions by which God guides his creation toward this perfection:

By his providence God protects and governs all things which he has made, “reaching mightily from one end of the earth to the other, and ordering all things well”. For “all are open and laid bare to his eyes”, even those things which are yet to come into existence through the free action of creatures.161
303 The witness of Scripture is unanimous that the solicitude of divine providence is concrete and immediate; God cares for all, from the least things to the great events of the world and its history. The sacred books powerfully affirm God’s absolute sovereignty over the course of events: "Our God is in the heavens; he does whatever he pleases."162 And so it is with Christ, “who opens and no one shall shut, who shuts and no one opens”.163 As the book of Proverbs states: "Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the LORD that will be established."164

304 And so we see the Holy Spirit, the principal author of Sacred Scripture, often attributing actions to God without mentioning any secondary causes. This is not a “primitive mode of speech”, but a profound way of recalling God’s primacy and absolute Lordship over history and the world,165 and so of educating his people to trust in him. The prayer of the Psalms is the great school of this trust.166

305 Jesus asks for childlike abandonment to the providence of our heavenly Father who takes care of his children’s smallest needs: "Therefore do not be anxious, saying, “What shall we eat?” or “What shall we drink?”. . . Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well."167

At the Final Judgment, after the resurrection of all the bodies, the just will live in their glorified bodies with the Beatific Vision, in New Jerusalem.

Catechism

1042 At the end of time, the Kingdom of God will come in its fullness. After the universal judgment, the righteous will reign for ever with Christ, glorified in body and soul. The universe itself will be renewed:

The Church . . . will receive her perfection only in the glory of heaven, when will come the time of the renewal of all things. At that time, together with the human race, the universe itself, which is so closely related to man and which attains its destiny through him, will be perfectly re-established in Christ.63

…

1045 For man, this consummation will be the final realization of the unity of the human race, which God willed from creation and of which the pilgrim Church has been "in the nature of sacrament."636 Those who are united with Christ will form the community of the redeemed, “the holy city” of God, "the Bride, the wife of the Lamb."637 She will not be wounded any longer by sin, stains, self-love, that destroy or wound the earthly community.638 The beatific vision, in which God opens himself in an inexhaustible way to the elect, will be the ever-flowing well-spring of happiness, peace, and mutual communion.​

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=1047564&page=9

You ask If God has destined the universe toward ultimate perfection and this is contingent upon Eve’s choice, then has he not destined Eve to make the wrong choice? If Eve has been destined to do this then what will of hers is free?

Catholics do not believe in double predestination, but in predestination with free will. God knows what choice will be made, and God makes is possible for that choice to be made through the gift of grace, however when the free will does not cooperate with that grace the grace is called merely sufficient, but with cooperation it is called efficacious. Of course, God being unsubject to time, knows that Adam and Even will both choose to sin, also having the plan of salvation to recover mankind from sin. Catechism

412 But why did God not prevent the first man from sinning? St. Leo the Great responds, "Christ’s inexpressible grace gave us blessings better than those the demon’s envy had taken away."307 And St. Thomas Aquinas wrote, "There is nothing to prevent human nature’s being raised up to something greater, even after sin; God permits evil in order to draw forth some greater good. Thus St. Paul says, ‘Where sin increased, grace abounded all the more’; and the Exsultet sings, ‘O happy fault,. . . which gained for us so great a Redeemer!’"308

 

[thinkandmull]

The soul is eternal but may be dead – without sanctifying grace the soul is spiritually dead, spiritually because the soul is immaterial. Being without sanctifying grace is the natural state – that without the supernatural gifts given by God to Adam and Eve. You can see how spiritual death it is used in the Catechism

2284 Scandal is an attitude or behavior which leads another to do evil. The person who gives scandal becomes his neighbor’s tempter. He damages virtue and integrity; he may even draw his brother into spiritual death. Scandal is a grave offense if by deed or omission another is deliberately led into a grave offense.

We are born without grace AND with the stain of sin

 

[thinkandmull]

“The doctrine of the synod about the state of happy innocence, such as it represents it in Adam before his sin, comprising not only integrity but also interior justice with an inclination toward God through love of charity, and primeval sanctity restored in some way after the fall; in so far as, understood comprehensively, it intimates that that state was a con-sequence of creation, due to man from the natural exigency and condition of human nature, not a gratuitous gift of God” Condemned by Piux VI as “false, elsewhere
condemned in Baius and in Quesnel, erroneous, favorable to the Pelagian heresy”.

So that’s three Popes’ condemnation