tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1938983304459855111.post3896549426565078916..comments2023-04-02T07:03:21.099-05:00Comments on Principium Unitatis: Why Did Adam Originally Need Grace?Bryan Crosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13269970389157868131noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1938983304459855111.post-45971079595772994282013-04-28T14:42:50.947-05:002013-04-28T14:42:50.947-05:00Bryan,
I agree with Mateo. Wow! Amazing! I real...<br /> Bryan,<br /><br /> I agree with Mateo. Wow! Amazing! I really enjoyed this article, thank you.<br /> <br /> I have a question. Is grace and attribute of God or do we speak of grace as "being", as we say of love; "God is love"? If grace is a quality added, does a person sense a lack of supernatural grace when they sin mortaly and does the sense mean a reasoned recognition, or a pained emotion of conscience? I ask this because it seems to me that to grieve the Holy Spirit means to cause Him to leave. I gather this from King David's "take not they Holy Spirit from me".<br /> I have to admit, upon becoming Catholic I have a hard time "seeing" the second person of the Holy Trinity, I seem to think more abstractly and I'm not sure this is so good considering the incarnation showed us God. My mind works to reconcile what I have learned about antiquity's notions of God and piety; that is, things like grace, virginity, elements of fire and water,mysticism. I used to concentrate my minds-eye on Jesus but now I tend to think of the beatific vision in terms of light.<br /><br />Thank you,<br />SusanSusanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12135596629008907889noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1938983304459855111.post-58677551733123764512009-10-07T14:57:57.836-05:002009-10-07T14:57:57.836-05:00Bryan Cross: But for Calvin, man, by his natural e...<b>Bryan Cross:</b> <i>But for Calvin, man, by his natural endowments, could have attained a supernatural beatitude. Calvin writes, "To this [i.e. intellect] he [i.e. God] has joined will, to which choice belongs. Man excelled in these noble endowments in his primitive condition, when reason, intelligence, prudence, and Judgment, not only sufficed for the government of his earthly life, but also enabled him to rise up to God and eternal happiness."<br /><br />In that respect, Calvin's position is Pelagian.</i><br /><br />I see why Calvin’s conception of the pre-Fall Adam is Pelagian. According to Calvin, the pre-Fall Adam had a human nature with “noble endowments”, and it was because of these <i>noble endowments</i> that the pre-Fall Adam had a natural potential that “enabled him to rise up to God and eternal happiness”. <br /><br />The “noble endowments” were lost by Adam’s exercise of his free will to disobey God. Does that mean that Calvin believed part of Adam’s <i>human nature</i> was lost in the Fall?<br /><br />Is that what Calvin is arguing, that there exist two distinct kinds of human nature, a pre-Fall human nature and a post-Fall human nature?mateohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03305462129353581361noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1938983304459855111.post-41916612161193440452009-10-03T14:25:53.840-05:002009-10-03T14:25:53.840-05:00Mateo,
Calvin's position is not that of Aquin...Mateo,<br /><br />Calvin's position is not that of Aquinas. For Aquinas, Adam, through his first sin, lost grace, but his nature was not destroyed. (See <a href="http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/03/aquinas-and-trent-part-3/" rel="nofollow">here</a>.) For Calvin, by sin man's nature was "vitiated and almost destroyed, nothing remaining but a ruin, confused, mutilated, and tainted with impurity."<br /><br />For Aquinas (and the Catholic tradition), heaven is a supernatural end, and man without grace could not have attained that end. To claim otherwise would be Pelagian. (I explain that in more detail in <a href="http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/09/horton-on-being-made-one-flesh-with-christ/#comment-3061" rel="nofollow">this comment</a>.) But for Calvin, man, by his natural endowments, could have attained a supernatural beatitude. Calvin writes, "To this [i.e. intellect] he [i.e. God] has joined will, to which choice belongs. Man excelled in these noble endowments in his primitive condition, when reason, intelligence, prudence, and Judgment, not only sufficed for the government of his earthly life, but also enabled him to rise up to God and eternal happiness."<br /><br />In that respect, Calvin's position is Pelagian.<br /><br />In the peace of Christ,<br /><br />- BryanBryan Crosshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13269970389157868131noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1938983304459855111.post-11709336006124906352009-10-03T13:49:22.242-05:002009-10-03T13:49:22.242-05:00I don’t know how to write the words that express m...I don’t know how to write the words that express my reaction to reading this article. Wow! Amazing! Aquinas is like a master gem cutter that uses his skills to bring forth a brilliant gem. Kudos to you, Bryan Cross, for doing a great job in explaining Aquinas’s line of reasoning.<br /><br />So many things I want to discuss after reading this article … <br /><br />Here is one thing I would like to discuss. Does Aquinas’ reasoning find resonance or opposition in Calvin’s ideas about the state of Adam before the Fall? <br /><br />http://www.ccel.org/ccel/calvin/institutes.iii.xvi.html<br /><br /><b>Institutes of the Christian Religion</b><br />CHAPTER 15. <br /><br />STATE IN WHICH MAN WAS CREATED. THE FACULTIES OF THE SOUL—THE IMAGE OF GOD—FREE WILL—ORIGINAL RIGHTEOUSNESS.<br /><br /><i>"… man, at his first creation, was very different from all his posterity; who, deriving their origin from him after he was corrupted, received a hereditary taint. At first every part of the soul was formed to rectitude. There was soundness of mind and freedom of will to choose the good. … Why He did not sustain him by the virtue of perseverance is hidden in his counsel; it is ours to keep within the bounds of soberness. Man had received the power, if he had the will, but he had not the will which would have given the power; for this will would have been followed by perseverance.</i><br /><br />I don’t understand what Calvin is saying in that last sentence quoted above.<br /><br />Is Calvin saying that the Fall would not have happened if God had willed to sustain Adam in the virtue of perseverance?mateohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03305462129353581361noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1938983304459855111.post-15143477489875569392009-01-28T20:18:00.000-06:002009-01-28T20:18:00.000-06:00Tim,They had free will, just as did the angels. Th...Tim,<BR/><BR/>They had free will, just as did the angels. That's the only answer. But, unlike the angels, they did not with that one choice choose their eternal destiny, because they were beings in time.<BR/><BR/>In the peace of Christ,<BR/><BR/>- BryanBryan Crosshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13269970389157868131noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1938983304459855111.post-75195798310147234032008-11-10T12:16:00.000-06:002008-11-10T12:16:00.000-06:00The difficulty in this question I think is why/how...The difficulty in this question I think is why/how they disobeyed God since disobeying God would be contrary to reason. <BR/><BR/>I heard Peter Kreeft talk about this problem but didn't really get to any strong conclusions. I guess they're hard to reach. Thoughts?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com