I agree totally that all vocations are good and chosen by God. For me, the discussion is fruitful because I need to understand the fallacy in my thinking…this is really troubling me because I happen to be married and converted to the Catholic faith after I married. So, I never had the opportunity to choose the religious life and didn’t know about graces, etc., needed for the different vocations.
My gut also says that something must be wrong with my way of thinking because God is just and would never hold anyone accountable to something he or she did not know. And, He graciously gives grace to those who ask (James 4:2-6) and will not reject anyone who comes to Him (John 6:37). If someone can point out my error, please do. I really want to know.
St. Paul is very opinioned in his discouraging marriage which makes one possibly think that it is a lesser vocation. But, Genesis 2:18 also says that it is “not good that man should be alone.”
Any thoughts on this would be appreciated.
houston1
Okay… I think I have the answer. Graces are not given
per vocation but
per individual. What matters is what that particular individual does with those graces. The merit earned by the use of those graces is first based on initial graces given by God through no action on the part of the individual Who then allows the individual to merit good works by cooperating with those graces. Here is what that Catechism says:
2009 Filial adoption, in making us partakers by grace in the divine nature, can bestow true merit on us as a result of God’s gratuitous justice. This is our right by grace, the full right of love, making us “co-heirs” with Christ and worthy of obtaining “the promised inheritance of eternal life.”(~ Council of Trent) The merits of our good works are gifts of the divine goodness.(~ Council of Trent) “Grace has gone before us; now we are given what is due. . . . Our merits are God’s gifts.” ~ St. Augustine
2010 Since the initiative belongs to God in the order of grace, no one can merit the initial grace of forgiveness and justification, at the beginning of conversion. Moved by the Holy Spirit and by charity, we can then merit for ourselves and for others the graces needed for our sanctification, for the increase of grace and charity, and for the attainment of eternal life. Even temporal goods like health and friendship can be merited in accordance with God’s wisdom. These graces and goods are the object of Christian prayer. Prayer attends to the grace we need for meritorious actions.
2011 The charity of Christ is the source in us of all our merits before God. Grace, by uniting us to Christ in active love, ensures the supernatural quality of our acts and consequently their merit before God and before men. The saints have always had a lively awareness that their merits were pure grace.
“After earth’s exile, I hope to go and enjoy you in the fatherland, but I do not want to lay up merits for heaven. I want to work for your love alone. . . . In the evening of this life, I shall appear before you with empty hands, for I do not ask you, Lord, to count my works. All our justice is blemished in your eyes. I wish, then, to be clothed in your own justice and to receive from your love the eternal possession of yourself.” ~ St. Thérèse of Lisieux
Any thoughts?
houston1
