"Why we Can't Change our Soul After Death" issue

[RealisticCatholic]

Karlo Broussard of Catholic Answers writes why hell is eternal, considering we are unable to change our wills after death:

If those things that motivate us to change our course of action are rooted in the body, then it follows that when the body is gone the disembodied soul will no longer be able to change its choice. The soul will be forever fixed on whatever it chose as its ultimate end.

Full article here.

The only problem with this, of course, is that we aren’t Platonists. We don’t remain disembodied souls. At the Resurrection of the last day, the damned receive bodies as well.

So this seems to contradict the reasoning of the article. Any ideas on how to solve the dilemma?

 

[Wesrock]

Karlo Broussard of Catholic Answers writes why hell is eternal, considering we are unable to change our wills after death:

If those things that motivate us to change our course of action are rooted in the body, then it follows that when the body is gone the disembodied soul will no longer be able to change its choice. The soul will be forever fixed on whatever it chose as its ultimate end.

The idea can be likened to workable clay. While continuing to be worked it is flexible, pliable changeable, but once it is allowed to set and fired it can’t be turned back to moldable clay.

The human will comes into being with the person; it doesn’t exist before. From it’s inception it is therefore workable, as a person is subject to change and discursive reasoning processes and the like. But once the body passes, the will sets in its direction, like the angels. Even being reunited to a body doesn’t change this.

 

[RealisticCatholic]

In your example of the clay, I don’t see the reasoning as much as just an image for the assertion.

There might be a reason behind your explanation, but it doesn’t fit with Karlo’s article. Because according to him, the soul apart from the body is just unable to think discursively or will differing goods. But the body precisely provides for this.

So what is it that turns off the body’s natural ability for discursive reasoning and the like for the damned?

 

[Wesrock]

Remember that the Resurrection of the dead is not a thing evident from natural philosophy, nor is the Resurrection a natural event. The immutability of the will even after the Resurrection is something we take on faith. As such, Aquinas replies

[9] For all that, one should not think that the souls, after they take up their bodies again in the resurrection, lose the immutability of will; rather, they persevere therein, because, as was said above, the bodies in the resurrection will be disposed as the soul requires, but the souls will not be changed by means of the bodies.

The resurrected body is tailored to the disposition of the soul.

So, natural philosophy can tell us what naturally happens to the will after death, and that (barring supernatural intervention) it would remain a disembodied soul with an immutable will for eternity. But yes, it doesn’t by itself explain in itself the immutability of the will after the Resurrection, for the Resurrection is taken on faith and is brought about supernaturally. So if there is a gap in a “philosophy alone” approach to the question of the will after the resurrection, that is only natural, for it is not a question that can be answered by a philosophy alone approach.

Or so I understand the issue.

I got hung up on this as well some time ago, accepting but not understanding how to bridge the gap… until I realized we’re no longer dealing with what the natural order can accomplish or explain on its own. It’s a resolution reached when one accounts for both what theology and doctrine tell us and what natural philosophy tells us.

 

[Wesrock]

Another explanation (not alternative, just additional) Aquinas gives is that the saints are happy and have their end, and so would not turn from what makes them most happy to what makes them unhappy, especially having the knowledge they have. As for the damned, it must be remembered that one cannot move from evil to good except by the grace of God, and the grace of God has deserted the damned, body or no, and so they continue in their own way.

 

[Richca]

Our choices are made with our intellect and free will which are spiritual powers of our immortal soul. The angels are pure spirits with intelligence and will and they were given a test either for God or against God. Those angels who chose God and to be obedient and submissive to his will were rewarded with the beatific vision in heaven for eternity while those who rebelled against God were cast out of heaven, though not the heaven of the beatific vision, to be punished for eternity.

One answer to your question here concerns supernatural grace. It takes God’s grace to be converted to him, his grace always precedes our conversion and growth in holiness. God offers his grace to human beings in their one life on earth and their acceptance or refusal of his grace determines their eternal destiny upon death. The time for God’s offer of grace is over for those humans who have refused God’s grace to the end or till their death on earth and without God’s grace no one can be converted and the same goes for the wicked angels in hell. The wicked angels and human souls in hell are filled with pride thinking they can do without God while the good angels and human souls in heaven are humble knowing God is everything and whatever good they possess they have from God. The beatific vision which is the end of humans and angels is entirely a supernatural and gratuitous gift of God and so is sanctifying grace by which we are made partakers in the divine nature.

I see Wesrock already mentioned grace but I posted my post and then saw what he just wrote.

 

[rinnie]

I believe what he is saying is this we have until the last day on this Earth in our human bodies to reject or accept Christ. I heard a story of a man who prayed for 73 years of his life for his dad to accept God the dad accepted God 3 minutes before his death.

 

[LittleFlower378]

I think so too. Once we die we get immediately judged by God and either go to heaven , hell , or purgatory. We dont get another chance after death to repent. We do however, if we are in purgatory, by way of purgation get cleansed from our faults…faults being venial sins or repented mortal sins that we committed in this life. Unrepentant mortal sin is what sends one to hell.

 

[Latin]

God offers his grace to human beings in their one life on earth and their acceptance or refusal of his grace determines their eternal destiny upon death.

Richca, if anyone would reject God’s gift of efficacious grace His call to eternal life in heaven in all Christian history, God would instantly lose His omniscience, (DE FIDE).
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The reply of St. Thomas to your above statement:

St. Thomas replies (C. G., II, xxviii) if God’s purpose were made dependent on the foreseen free act of any creature, God would thereby sacrifice His own freedom, and would submit Himself to His creatures, thus abdicating His essential supremacy–a thing which is, of course, utterly inconceivable.
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308 The truth that God is at work in all the actions of his creatures is inseparable from faith in God the Creator.
God is the first cause who operates in and through secondary causes: For God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

God effects everything, the willing and the achievement. … (Thomas Aquinas, S. Th.II/II 4, 4 ad 3).
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Aquinas said, “God changes the will without forcing it.
But he can change the will from the fact that He himself operates in the will as He does in nature,” De Veritatis 22:9.

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The grace of God’s Justification (CCCS 1990-1991)
Justification is God’s free gift which detaches man from enslavement to sin and reconciles him to God.

Justification is also our acceptance of God’s righteousness. In this gift, faith, hope, charity, and OBEDIENCE TO GOD’S WILL are given to us.
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The Grace of God’s Call (CCCS 1996-1998)
Justification comes from grace (God’s free and undeserved help) and is given to us to respond to his call.

This call to eternal life is supernatural, coming TOTALLY from God’s decision and surpassing ALL power of human intellect and will. End quote.
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John 15:16; You did not chose Me, but I chose you.

Acts 13:48; … As many as were ordained to eternal life believed.
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As you see above Richca, at our Initial Justification God’s gifts of faith, hope, charity, and OBEDIENCE TO GOD’S WILL are given to us to respond to God’s call and we all freely say yes to His call.
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COUNCIL OF TRENT Session 6 Chapter 8
. . . None of those things which precede justification - whether faith or works - merit the grace itself of justification.

.
As God operates in us and He effects everything, the willing and the achievement and if God does not neglect His Duty of Care everyone going to heaven, so we don’t need to change the soul after death because we all going to heaven.
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God bless

 

[Viv135]

Once we die, our soul separates from our body and so we become spirits (merely intellect and will) just like the angels and all other spirits in heaven and hell and so our will becomes fixed. Eternal life and eternal damnation is infinite and everything in those parameters are also infinite including how our will is set at the moment we die.

 

[leonhardprintz]

I don’t think you will find, in St. Thomas Aquinas, or in any other work a proper account for why our will becomes fixed after we die. We don’t have a science of the soul, that leads to us being able to predict this.

Scholastics are here content with explaining how Church Doctrine could make sense. It is Church Doctrine that the damned are damned for all eternity. So this raises the question why the damned don’t simply repent, and it seems that if they could repent they would be forgiven, because God’s mercy endures forever.

This leads us to suspecting that something fundementally changes when you die. We don’t understand how the soul of a human works. Aristotelian metaphysics would imply that the soul would vanish entirely when you die. Its not inherently immortal. So Catholic scholastics, again working backwards from the conclusion (our souls are immortal), claim that our souls were made a bit like that of the angels. A spiritual being, that goes on after death (though incomplete without the body - whereas the angels are complete already).

This leads to questions about how such a spiritual being would make choices, and what would limit the will of those choices. And since there’s nothing inherent that restricts the will of such a spirit, it becomes perfectly fixed on whatever it chooses. If that is God, you choose God 100%, something you’re not able to right now. That’s why you won’t sin ever again Purgatory or Heaven.

 

[Viv135]

You Shouldnt tell people that. now people will think it is okay to sin we are still going to heaven.

You will go to heaven if the state of your sould at the moment of your death is clean. If it is stained you go to purgatory, if it is in a state of mortal sin you go to hell. Thats why you must repent for your sins, frequent confession.

Yes you can talk about Gods mercy etc. but if you offend God and reject him through sin how could you be saved? God does not neglect his duty of care but we also have free will. God entrusted us with the should we have right now, we need to protect it .

God operates in us when we allow him in through the sacraments. If we constantly sin we bind ourselves to the devil and if we die and the state of our soul is unclean and we have attachments to the devil how could we enter heaven.

Does the Gospel not say that the path to heaven is narrow

 

[RealisticCatholic]

Thanks @Wesrock and others.

This is the kind of question, I think, that leads many people to think of hell more in terms of possibility rather than actuality. We can hope that most – even all – people be saved.

For who on Earth actually has a finalized will set against God?

 

[Wesrock]

Richca:

God offers his grace to human beings in their one life on earth and their acceptance or refusal of his grace determines their eternal destiny upon death.

Richca, if anyone would reject God’s gift of efficacious grace His call to eternal life in heaven in all Christian history, God would instantly lose His omniscience, (DE FIDE).
.
The reply of St. Thomas to your above statement:

St. Thomas replies (C. G., II, xxviii) if God’s purpose were made dependent on the foreseen free act of any creature, God would thereby sacrifice His own freedom, and would submit Himself to His creatures, thus abdicating His essential supremacy–a thing which is, of course, utterly inconceivable.
.
308 The truth that God is at work in all the actions of his creatures is inseparable from faith in God the Creator.
God is the first cause who operates in and through secondary causes: For God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

God effects everything, the willing and the achievement. … (Thomas Aquinas, S. Th.II/II 4, 4 ad 3).
.
Aquinas said, “God changes the will without forcing it.
But he can change the will from the fact that He himself operates in the will as He does in nature,” De Veritatis 22:9.

.
The grace of God’s Justification (CCCS 1990-1991)
Justification is God’s free gift which detaches man from enslavement to sin and reconciles him to God.

Justification is also our acceptance of God’s righteousness. In this gift, faith, hope, charity, and OBEDIENCE TO GOD’S WILL are given to us.
.
The Grace of God’s Call (CCCS 1996-1998)
Justification comes from grace (God’s free and undeserved help) and is given to us to respond to his call.

This call to eternal life is supernatural, coming TOTALLY from God’s decision and surpassing ALL power of human intellect and will. End quote.
.
John 15:16; You did not chose Me, but I chose you.

Acts 13:48; … As many as were ordained to eternal life believed.
.
As you see above Richca, at our Initial Justification God’s gifts of faith, hope, charity, and OBEDIENCE TO GOD’S WILL are given to us to respond to God’s call and we all freely say yes to His call.
.
COUNCIL OF TRENT Session 6 Chapter 8
. . . None of those things which precede justification - whether faith or works - merit the grace itself of justification.

.
As God operates in us and He effects everything, the willing and the achievement and if God does not neglect His Duty of Care everyone going to heaven, so we don’t need to change the soul after death because we all going to heaven.
.
God bless

Just to be clear, do you deny that those who receive initial justification can lose it?

Do you deny that for some God gives sufficient grace but not efficacious grace?

Do you deny that God allows for man’s free response to his call?

Yesses and nos will suffice.

 

[Latin]

Just to be clear, do you deny that those who receive initial justification can lose it?

Yes I deny that those who receive initial justification can lose it. – I believe only one predestination, predestination to heaven. - It is an IRREVOCABLE gift of God, (DE FIDE).

Do you deny that for some God gives sufficient grace but not efficacious grace?

Yes I deny that for some God gives sufficient grace but not efficacious grace.

Some teachings on this subject:

A TIPTOE THROUGH TULIP James Akin

While the grace it provided is sufficient to pay for the sins of all men, this grace is not made efficacious (put into effect) in the case of everyone.

This is something everyone who believes in hell must acknowledge because, if the atonement was made efficacious for everyone, then no one would end up in hell. – Something to think about. End quote.

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THE MYSTERY OF PREDESTINATION John Salza

Hence, a sufficient grace has an operating effect only ( empowering the will to act),

whereas an efficacious grace has both an operating and cooperating effect ( applying the will to act).

Sufficient grace remains an interior impulse, whereas an efficacious grace produces an exterior act.

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Sufficient grace gives man the potency to do good, but efficacious grace is required to move him from potency to act.

Therefore, sufficient grace is insufficient to move him to act, the power remains in potency and is never actualized.

The distinctions between these graces reveal that God is responsible for man’s salvation.
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Because God’s love is the cause of all goodness in things, God favors the elect because He gives them more, and not because of anything independently in them.

Although God grants man both sufficient and efficacious graces, He grants the efficacious grace of perseverance only to His elect. End quote.

If God would grant the efficacious grace of perseverance to everyone, then everyone would be saved. - Another proof God is responsible for man’s salvation.

Do you deny that God allows for man’s free response to his call?

307 God thus enables men to be intelligent and free, causes in order to complete the work of creation, to perfect its harmony for their own good and that of their neighbors.
Though often unconscious collaborators with God’s will, they can also enter deliberately into the divine plan by their actions.

St. Thomas teaches that all movements of will and choice must be traced to the divine will: and not to any other cause, because Gad alone is the cause of our willing and choosing. CG, 3.91.
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I don’t deny that God allows for man’s free response to his call but as we see above probably most of the time, we do what we want to do and we don’t even realise that we are cooperating with God’s efficacious graces.
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God bless

 

[Gab123]

We don’t remain disembodied souls. At the Resurrection of the last day, the damned receive bodies as well.

The fallen angels lost their brilliance and were transformed into wicked spirits of the dark; unlike the angels, human beings are both body and spirit. The saved will have a resurrected glorified body; the damned will have a corrupted body that will have been demonized, reflecting the state of the soul. In this life we are either rising, being sanctified and transformed, or sinking, being demonized and disfigured, depending on how we respond or reject God’s sanctifying grace in our limited time on earth.

 

[Vico]

Karlo Broussard of Catholic Answers writes why hell is eternal, considering we are unable to change our wills after death:
…

There is no direct scriptural proof of the particular judgement. The question was settled by the decision of Pope Benedict XII, in 1336, Benedictus Deus.

 

[Magnanimity]

You raise a very good question, one which has been pondered by the Church over the centuries. I sympathize with your misgivings @RealisticCatholic.
As I understand him, Saint Thomas Aquinas reasons like this. The only way for a rational creature like a human to change his mind is to have new information added, or the ability to consider old information in a new light. But at the moment of death when you enter the afterlife, especially if you are bound for hell, there will be no more new information given to you and your mind will be made up in such a way that you will not be able to consider old information in a new light. This is a very reasonable argument.

However, when I studied epistemology in college, I learned that there are at least five sources and grounds for knowledge. They are as follows: perception, testimony, memory, introspection, and reason. Now, even if we were to assume that there would be no perception and no testimony in hell, there would still be the other three sources and grounds for knowledge, all three of which can lead to either new information or the reconsideration of old information in a new light. Introspection, memory and reason all serve these functions in our minds right now. All three extend our knowledge into new places. In other words, they move the mind from what is known to the unknown. So, I think there is good reason for rejecting Saint Thomas’ psychological argument for why a rational mind could not change in hell. At least, I do not find it successful.

Also, the analogy with the angels breaks down bc they (unlike us) are “fully actualized” at the moment of their creation. Just thought I’d throw that out there.

 

[Wesrock]

Wesrock:

Just to be clear, do you deny that those who receive initial justification can lose it?

Yes I deny that those who receive initial justification can lose it. – I believe only one predestination, predestination to heaven. - It is an IRREVOCABLE gift of God, (DE FIDE).

So you reject Canons XVII and XXIII of Session VI of the Council of Trent, which read:

CANON XVII.-If any one saith, that the grace of Justification is only attained to by those who are predestined unto life; but that all others who are called, are called indeed, but receive not grace, as being, by the divine power, predestined unto evil; let him be anathema.

CANON XXIII.-lf any one saith, that a man once justified can sin no more, nor lose grace, and that therefore he that falls and sins was never truly justified; . . . let him be anathema.

And Canon VI of Session VII

CANON VI.-If any one saith, that one who has been baptized cannot, even if he would, lose grace, let him sin ever so much, unless he will not believe; let him be anathema.

These canons quite explicitly state that there are those who are not predestined to eternal life who do receive the grace of justification but lose it. That it is possible to receive the grace of justification in baptism and lose it. You confuse predestination for eternal life and the gift of final perseverance with initial justification.

Even your own quote from Salza directly contradicts your denial that God gives sufficient grace, but not efficacious grace, to some. Read:

Although God grants man both sufficient and efficacious graces, He grants the efficacious grace of perseverance only to His elect.

Really, what exactly are you disagreeing with Riccha over? What you generally say about God’s Providence is often true, but you usually completely neglect to also mention man’s free will.

 

[Latin]

I BELIEVE AS FOLLOWS

IN THE MYSTERY OF PREDESTINATION John Salza explains;

God guides all his creatures with wisdom and love to their ultimate end.

Because God’s providence governs all things, God is in control of all things and can do all things.

.
If humans have an intellect and free will, then why is it necessary for God to order us to our final end?

The answer: because God created heaven as our final end, and attaining heaven is above our nature and the nature of every creature.

The Catechism also states, “The vocation to eternal life is supernatural … It surpasses the power of human intellect and will, as that of every other creature.

Because man cannot attain to eternal life by his own natural efforts, he must be predestined to that end by God.

Because we cannot attain the Beatific Vision by the power of our nature, God must direct us to this end by His power and grace.

Thus, predestination is a certain and infallible truth, revealed by Scripture and taught by the Catholic Church. End quote.

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St. Thomas teaches that all movements of will and choice must be traced to the divine will: and not to any other cause, because Gad alone is the cause of our willing and choosing. CG, 3.91.
.
St. Thomas replies (C. G., II, xxviii) if God’s purpose were made dependent on the foreseen free act of any creature, God would thereby sacrifice His own freedom, and would submit Himself to His creatures, thus abdicating His essential supremacy–a thing which is, of course, utterly inconceivable.
.
308 The truth that God is at work in all the actions of his creatures is inseparable from faith in God the Creator.
God is the first cause who operates in and through secondary causes: For God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

2022 The divine initiative in the work of grace PRECEDES, PREPARES, and ELICITS the FREE response of man. – FREE response of man.

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I strongly believe the fulfilment of 1058 that God saves everyone as it written in the Catholic Encyclopedia Divine Providence as follows:

This, the beneficent purpose of an all-seeing Providence, is wholly gratuitous, entirely unmerited.

It extends to every individual, adapting itself to the needs of each.

That end is that all creatures should manifest the glory of God, and in particular that man should glorify Him, recognizing in nature the work of His hand, serving Him in obedience and love, and thereby attaining to the full development of his nature and to eternal happiness in God.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12510a.htm

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Richca’s statement: God offers his grace to human beings in their one life on earth and their acceptance or refusal of his grace determines their eternal destiny upon death.
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Seems like Richca believes some people refuses God’s call to heaven.

I disagree that anyone refuses God’s call to heaven. – If even one person in all Christian history would refuse God’s call to heaven God would instantly lose His omniscience, (DE FIDE).
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God bless