Theosis

[ChristIsTheWay]

Hi,

I’m trying to better understand this doctrine from a Catholic point of view. I don’t have a lot of material to go on. I am wondering if someone could point me in the right direction. I also read a source that claims we begin theosis and become infant gods at our baptism and remain so as long as we are in state of grace. Is this correct? Thanks.

Has anyone here read Deification and Grace by Daniel A. Keating? I was thinking of starting there, since it is a specifically Catholic book.

 

[Vico]

Hi,

I’m trying to better understand this doctrine from a Catholic point of view. I don’t have a lot of material to go on. I am wondering if someone could point me in the right direction. I also read a source that claims we begin theosis and become infant gods at our baptism and remain so as long as we are in state of grace. Is this correct? Thanks.

Has anyone here read Deification and Grace by Daniel A. Keating? I was thinking of starting there, since it is a specifically Catholic book.

I can recommend this volume from the eastern Catholic adult catechism:

Light For Life: Part III, The Mystery Lived

store.godwithusbooks.org/the-great-fast-lent-readings/light-for-life-part-iii-the-mystery-lived/

 

[ChristIsTheWay]

Thanks for the suggestion. I will look into it. Do you know of any online resources that I could use to gain a better understanding? Do you know anything about this “infant god because of baptism” business? Thanks.

 

[Vico]

Thanks for the suggestion. I will look into it. Do you know of any online resources that I could use to gain a better understanding? Do you know anything about this “infant god because of baptism” business? Thanks.

“You have seen how numerous are the gifts of baptism. Although many men think that the only gift it confers is the remission of sins, we have counted its honors to the number of ten. It is on this account that we baptize even infants, although they are sinless, that they may be given the further gifts of sanctification, justice, filial adoption, and inheritance, that they may be brothers and members of Christ, and become dwelling places of the Spirit.”

– Saint John Chrysostom, Baptismal Instruction 3:6.

1. The Holy Spirit’s presence truly and inwardly transforms man: it is sanctifying or deifying grace, which elevates our being and our acting, enabling us to live in relationship with the Holy Trinity. This takes place through the theological virtues of faith, hope and charity, “which adapt man’s faculties for participation in the divine nature” (CCC, n. 1812). Thus, by faith the believer considers God, his brethren and history not merely from the standpoint of reason, but from the viewpoint of divine Revelation. By hope man looks at the future with trusting, vigorous certitude, hoping against hope (cf. Rom 4:18), with his gaze fixed on the goal of eternal happiness and the full achievement of God’s kingdom. By charity the disciple is obliged to love God with his whole heart and to love others as Jesus loved them, that is, to the total giving of self.

Blessed John Paul II - General Audience - Wednesday 22 July 1998

vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/audiences/1998/documents/hf_jp-ii_aud_22071998_en.html
St. **Athanasius, De Decretis, Chapter 3.14. …And if we wish to know the object attained by this, we shall find it to be as follows: that the Word was made flesh in order to offer up this body for all, and that we partaking of His Spirit, might be deified, a gift which we could not otherwise have gained than by His clothing Himself in our created body , for hence we derive our name of “men of God” and “men in Christ.” But as we, by receiving the Spirit, do not lose our own proper substance, so the Lord, when made man for us, and bearing a body, was no less God; for He was not lessened by the envelopment of the body, but rather deified it and rendered it immortal.
newadvent.org/fathers/2809.htm

 

[ChristIsTheWay]

So it is true we are “infant gods,” in a manner of speaking?

 

[Vico]

So it is true we are “infant gods,” in a manner of speaking?

Not just a manner of speaking, but as baptized adults we are “men in Christ” then as baptized infants we are “infants in Christ”. As stated by St. **Athanasius in De Decretis “and that we partaking of His Spirit, might be deified”.

We see this also expressed in the Catechism of the Catholic Church:**1987 **The grace of the Holy Spirit has the power to justify us, that is, to cleanse us from our sins and to communicate to us “the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ” and through Baptism:34

But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. For we know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves as dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.35
1988 Through the power of the Holy Spirit we take part in Christ’s Passion by dying to sin, and in his Resurrection by being born to a new life; we are members of his Body which is the Church, branches grafted onto the vine which is himself:36(God) gave himself to us through his Spirit. By the participation of the Spirit, we become communicants in the divine nature… For this reason, those in whom the Spirit dwells are divinized.37
34 ⇒ Rom 3:22; cf. ⇒ 6:3-4.
35 ⇒ Rom 6:8-11.
36 Cf. ⇒ 1 Cor 12; ⇒ Jn 15:1 4.
37 St. Athanasius, Ep. Serap. 1, 24: PG 26, 585 and 588.​

 

[PJD1987]

Hmm…I was always under the impression that theosis was a heresy…is there a difference between the Mormon take on theosis and the Catholic? Because I only learned about theosis through apologetics debunking Mormonism…

 

[neokarny]

Hmm…I was always under the impression that theosis was a heresy…is there a difference between the Mormon take on theosis and the Catholic? Because I only learned about theosis through apologetics debunking Mormonism…

Mormons call it theosis in order to tie themselves to traditional Christianity. Their doctrine is officially called “Exaltation,” and has its foundations in the King Follett Discourse. In short: God is an “exalted man,” who was once human as we are now. Our objective then, is to become as God is now, through being exalted in the highest degree of glory in the Celestial Kingdom. In doing so, we create worlds as God created this one. We become literal gods that are separate yet resemble the God of this world.

Christian, both Catholic and Orthodox, understanding of theosis is humans being united with God (i.e. becoming God through unity with him). The particular ways of explaining this vary, but it is fundamentally different than the LDS view. We don’t actually become our own independent gods. We don’t create worlds. And so on.

The language used can sometimes be very similar, but the meanings are not at all.

CCC 460 The Word became flesh to make us “partakers of the divine nature”:“For this is why the Word became man, and the Son of God became the Son of man: so that man, by entering into communion with the Word and thus receiving divine sonship, might become a son of God.” “For the Son of God became man so that we might become God.” “The only-begotten Son of God, wanting to make us sharers in his divinity, assumed our nature, so that he, made man, might make men gods.”

 

[dzheremi]

It has occurred to me since years ago that Mormons seem to have it backwards in claiming that God was somehow a man like any of us but became exalted. Is not the reality of the incarnation of our Lord that God became man, and not the other way around? Indeed, I do not think that Theosis as the Orthodox (and also Catholics, as per neokarny’s link) teach it would be possible if Mormons were right about this, so how could it be that they’re nevertheless teaching the same thing? That’s not possible. The Mormon idea is heretical.

 

[GaryTaylor]

If it was not that God cloaked himself in flesh for the salvation of His creation in Love, then what is the purpose? How would it have been profitable to mankind, if the Word was not the True Son of God, or if the flesh God assumed were not truly mans flesh? Man, Gods creation, was captive, we are freed by the Love of Gods saving Grace, first by God becoming the Son of Man, then the Cross. We are free now, to become Brothers of Christ through Gods Grace, and out of Gods love, the same love which freed mankind and in Genesis created mankind…

The Mormon thinking on this has a new spin with divinization , I never heard a cohesive explanation since they refuse to impart information which they believe must be milk fed.

 

[Anthony86]

Christian, both Catholic and Orthodox, understanding of theosis is humans being united with God (i.e. becoming God through unity with him). The particular ways of explaining this vary, but it is fundamentally different than the LDS view. We don’t actually become our own independent gods. We don’t create worlds. And so on.

The distinction is crucial, because it is what sets the orthodox doctrine apart from the temptation by the serpent in the garden: “and you shall be as Gods…” (Genesis 3:5). We do not become separate gods, but through faith and self-sacrifice we are united to the one God and thus come to partake of His divine nature through grace: “By whom * He [God] hath given us most great and precious promises: that by these you may be made partakers of the divine nature.” (2 Peter 1:4). We thus become like Christ, i.e. truly Christian: “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me” (Galatians 2:20).*

 

[ChristIsTheWay]

Not just a manner of speaking, but as baptized adults we are “men in Christ” then as baptized infants we are “infants in Christ”. As stated by St. **Athanasius in De Decretis “and that we partaking of His Spirit, might be deified”.

We see this also expressed in the Catechism of the Catholic Church:**1987 **The grace of the Holy Spirit has the power to justify us, that is, to cleanse us from our sins and to communicate to us “the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ” and through Baptism:34

But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. For we know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves as dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.35
1988 Through the power of the Holy Spirit we take part in Christ’s Passion by dying to sin, and in his Resurrection by being born to a new life; we are members of his Body which is the Church, branches grafted onto the vine which is himself:36(God) gave himself to us through his Spirit. By the participation of the Spirit, we become communicants in the divine nature… For this reason, those in whom the Spirit dwells are divinized.37
34 ⇒ Rom 3:22; cf. ⇒ 6:3-4.
35 ⇒ Rom 6:8-11.
36 Cf. ⇒ 1 Cor 12; ⇒ Jn 15:1 4.
37 St. Athanasius, Ep. Serap. 1, 24: PG 26, 585 and 588.​

So we become partakers of the divine nature in this life by virtue of being “men in Christ?” That is really something.