Understanding free will in light of God's sovereignty

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AugustineFanNYC said:
That may be more of an issue of the times, than actual theological differences. In public someone might shy away from the “hard” predestination, but in private, I’ve heard many of my Catholic friends say that they’re fine with it, and it does make sense. It’s not next to impossible to reconcile with God’s love and mercy, if you stretch out the concept of love and mercy to near extremes, which many modernists in the church do. I don’t get why the emphasis is on the stuff that makes us all feel warm and fuzzy, and more popular among the world, when there are realities that must be faced about this.
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I’m far from being a modernist. Show me how unconditional predestination and unconditional negative reprobation is compatible with God’s love and Mercy.
AugustineFanNYC said:
If the Catholic Church and Catholics started becoming more traditionalist and started emphasizing “hard” predestination and all the things Protestants claim to have a monopoly on, there would be a mass exodus of evangelical and Protestant churches, especially among the youth. Even in the protestant camp the Reformed Calvinists are gaining strength. You know why? Because they’re actually reading the Bible, and the Bible isn’t all roses, there are some harsh realities that cannot be overcome by modernist happy gospel.
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Again, modernism has nothing to do with it. St Francis De Sales was neither a modernist nor a Calvinist or a thomist.
 
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AugustineFanNYC said:
They want answers.
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What kind of answers? It’s hard enough to come to terms with the existence of Hell, why do we need to believe that those who go there, go there because God has decreed so from all eternity?

Why the existence of an harsh and cruel universe in which some people are simply born for the sole purpose of being tortured for all eternity in order to satisfy God’s wrath should be “uplifting”?

If God said to you “hurry up and have a child, i need another reprobate to condemn to Hell” would you be fine and dandy with that?

I’d rather not have been born if things were like that. And i really mean it. Because this universe would be worse than my worst childhood nightmares.

These are all sincere questions, so if you cared to answer i would appreciate it.🙂
 
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Robert1111 said:
i don’t give two figs about the Protestants, they aren’t even true churches.
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I disagree with that. I think it is better to be charitable to people of all religions and to care about them. Catholics and Protestants work together in many areas and many Protestants have it right, whereas there are Roman Catholics who have it wrong.
 
Robert1111 said:
I’m far from being a modernist. Show me hot unconditional predestination and unconditional negative reprobation us compatible with God’s love and Mercy.

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AugustineFanNYC:
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A Single Augustine
Robert1111 said:
Again, modernism has nothing to do with it. St Francis De Sales was neither a modernist nor a Calvinist or a thomist.
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I was mostly talking about that line of thinking which has always existed in the wings. We are free to disagree with each other, but I am just saying that the tide seems to be going the other way.
 
AlNg said:
I disagree with that. I think it is better to be charitable to people of all religions and to care about them.
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Yeah, i used the wrong words. I was talking about doctrine, not people per se, but i haven’t be able to convey the message, my bad.
 
Robert1111 said:
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Robert1111 said:
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The objections are precisely meant to be refuted by Saint Thomas.
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He does say that the New Law gives man sufficient help to avoid sin.

Summa Theologiae > First Part of the Second Part > Question 106. The law of the Gospel, called the New Law, considered in itself > Article 2. Whether the New Law justifies?​

Reply to Objection 2. Although the grace of the New Testament helps man to avoid sin, yet it does not so confirm man in good that he cannot sin: for this belongs to the state of glory. Hence if a man sin after receiving the grace of the New Testament, he deserves greater punishment, as being ungrateful for greater benefits, and as not using the help given to him. And this is why the New Law is not said to “work wrath”: because as far as it is concerned it gives man sufficient help to avoid sin.
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Robert1111 said:
What kind of answers? It’s hard enough to come to terms with the existence of Hell, why do we need to believe that those who go there, go there because has decreed so from all eternity?

Why the existence of an harsh and cruel universe in which some people are simply born for the sole purpose of being tortured for all eternity in order to satisfy God’s wrath should be “uplifting”?

These are all sincere questions, so if you cared to answer i would appreciate it.🙂
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Brother, that is Calvinism, not Augustine or Thomas Aquinas. That is “double predestination”, not the Catholic or traditionalist position of predestination.

That is the psychologically scarring part that I am talking about. That is what I believed for many many years. Yet, to go to Arminism or pelagianism was unthinkable to me. I had no where to turn, until I began reading Augustine, and this brilliant Saint helped me find my way to the Church because the way he put things into perspective, as well as his defense of the sacraments and all things Catholic, made me realize that this is THE ONE TRUE HOLY CHURCH.
 
Robert1111 said:
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Vico:
He does say that the New Law gives man sufficient help to avoid sin.
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Yeah, we all know what “sufficient” means in thomistic terms. 😉
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Modern Catholic Dictionary, (by Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J, 1999)
Sufficient Grace
Actual grace considered apart from the supernatural effect for which it was bestowed. It may therefore mean the grace that does not meet with adequate co-operation on the part of the human recipient, and then it is merely sufficient grace. It is enough to enable a person to perform a salutary act, but who freely declines to co-operate. Or it may simply mean the grace that gives one the power to accomplish a salutary action, as distinct from an efficacious grace, which secures that the salutary act is accomplished.
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Vico said:
Modern Catholic Dictionary, Sufficient Grace
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That is exactly what i was talking about. But i believe in the molinist understanding of sufficient Grace, which is allowed by the Church.
 
There are experiments which some scientists cite to support the idea that free will is an illusion. If there is free will, then conscious intentions should occur before the start of an action. However according to an experiment by Matsuhashi and Hallett the time of conscious intention to move occurred after the start of the action thus proving that the will or conscious intention to move does not cause the action.
 
Robert1111 said:
That is exactly what i was talking about. But i believe in the molinist understanding of sufficient Grace, which is allowed by the Church.
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I actually find it interesting that the Calvinist vs Arminian split, is reflected in the Catholic Thomist vs Molinism split among Catholics.

Surprisingly, Alvin Plantinga, the Reformed Protestant apologist is somewhat of a Molinist. Imagine that.

It should also be noted that Calvinists have tend to horribly distort what Augustine actually taught; which is much more in line with St. Thomas and more modern Catholics.

Then we read these modern spats back into the early thinkers and we end up with more confusion.
 
AugustineFanNYC said:
Brother, that is Calvinism, not Augustine or Thomas Aquinas. That is “double predestination”, not the Catholic or traditionalist position of predestination.
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Technicalities. Really.

If you are not predestined to Hell but simply passed over because God didn’t wish you eternal life, the end result is exactly the same. You will be denied the all saving and only saving grace which would bring you to Heaven, namely efficacious Grace.
AugustineFanNYC said:
That is the psychologically scarring part that I am talking about. That is what I believed for many many years. Yet, to go to Arminism or pelagianism was unthinkable to me. I had no where to turn, until I began reading Augustine, and this brilliant Saint helped me find my way to the Church because the way he put things into perspective, as well as his defense of the sacraments and all things Catholic, made me realize that this is THE ONE TRUE HOLY CHURCH.
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Well, i also appreciate Augustine, 90% of his theological work is spot on, just like Aquinas. I simply can’t get on board with his outlook on predestination anymore, lest i fall into heavy depression (I know what i’m talking about, it occurred to me in the past).
 
AlNg said:
There are experiments which some scientists cite to support the idea that free will is an illusion. If there is free will, then conscious intentions should occur before the start of an action. However according to an experiment by Matsuhashi and Hallett the time of conscious intention to move occurred after the start of the action thus proving that the will or conscious intention to move does not cause the action.
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Is this coming from people who presuppose a mechanistic materialist worldview though? Perhaps we have different views of what is meant by free will?
 
AlNg said:
There are experiments which some scientists cite to support the idea that free will is an illusion. If there is free will, then conscious intentions should occur before the start of an action. However according to an experiment by Matsuhashi and Hallett the time of conscious intention to move occurred after the start of the action thus proving that the will or conscious intention to move does not cause the action.
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If this is true, then the only option would be universalism (and i’m not a universalist).
 
AugustineFanNYC said:
I actually find it interesting that the Calvinist vs Arminian split, is reflected in the Catholic Thomist vs Molinism split among Catholics.
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This is most definitely true.
AugustineFanNYC said:
It should also be noted that Calvinists have tend to horribly distort what Augustine actually taught; which is much more in line with St. Thomas and more modern Catholics.
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But Saint Thomas taught unconditional election and unconditional reprobation. Summa Theologiae, First Part, Question 23, Article 5, reply to objection

“Why He chooses some for glory and reprobates others, has no reason, except the divine will”.

This is different from Calvinism only in that God doesn’t directly want your damnation but he “simply” reprobates by passing you over and not predestining you to eternal life. In other words, he doesn’t want to save.

Again, the end result is exactly the same. Or do you think that if God “simply” doesn’t want to save you things would be substantially different than they are in a scenario where God directly wants to damn you? The end result is absolutely the same, because you can’t save yourself.

Summa Theologiae, First Part, Article 3, reply to objection 1

“God loves all men and all creatures, inasmuch as He wishes them all some good; but He does not wish every good to them all. So far, therefore, as He does not wish this particular good—namely, eternal life- He is said to hate or reprobated them”.

And guess what happens if God doesn’t want you to go to Heaven? Sure, we can argue about tecnicalities until the cows come home, but i hope you understand why i see Calvinism as a pig and augustinianism/thomism as a pig with a hat and little bit of lipstick.
 
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Their teachings among others have helped reconcile absolute universalism and the crushing inevitability of an impersonal fate which the Greeks thought.

I can see evidence for Molinism though. I am not totally against it. But is it any less “depressing”? I mean Jesus told the Capernaum : And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted to the heavens? No, you will go down to Hades. For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Sodom, it would have remained to this day.

That tells me that God could’ve saved Sodom if He wanted to. He just had to have performed the miracles there that Jesus did in Capernaum. I can see where Molinism might come in to explain this paradox.

This is just my two cents though. I have not fully thought this through and am not claiming it is right in any way.
 
Robert1111 said:
And guess what happens if God doesn’t want you to go to Heaven? Sure, we can argue about tecnicalities until the cows come home, but i hope you understand why i see Calvinism as a pig and augustinianism/thomism as a pig with a hat and little bit of lipstick.
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I linked a paper which explains this too. The difference between Calvin and Thomistic thinking is that in the latter predestination and free will meet: God has a plan for us, but we must cooperate in that plan.** We must choose to accept a destiny that God has set out for us. The fact that we retain freedom in the face of such destiny is one marked difference between the Christian worldview and that of the ancient Romans and Greeks, who grimly resigned themselves to what they saw as the crushing inevitability of an impersonal fate.

What Does the Church Say About Predestination?

In the history of Christianity, few terms have stirred as much controversy and confusion as this one. Predestination is a bit of a thorny thicket for theologians, perhaps territory some think best avoided for greener pastures. But it is nonetheless worth venturing into that thicket for the...
catholicexchange.com catholicexchange.com

Calvinism literally has God determining everything to the point where we are almost robots. They wouldn’t put it like that, but that is essentially what they’re saying.

I just think that your battle might be emotional, and that’s ok. It’s hard to come to grips with this might being a reality. A possible reality, but a reality none the less. And people want to gravitate toward Molinism, or stress God’s love and mercy, almost to a point where they can border on liberal universalism. Not saying you, but some Catholics.
 
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