Stupidity and Intelligence

Today, I have been musing on what makes people act in a stupid manner.

I know what intelligent actions involve-prayer, reflection, rational discourse, using the gifts of the Holy Spirit given in confirmation, getting advice from a spiritual director, reading, studying the Faith, doing penance.

Intelligence involves the entire person being focused on using the gifts at hand to learn the Faith and use it daily.

We are all made in the image and likeness of God, and the intellectual gift of thinking and decision making using will power-the will being one way we are like God, the other being our freedom and the third, which is the likeness, is grace.

I have written much on grace, so follow the tags, but using one's intellectual capacity to the fullest potential defines being human.

So, what makes people stupid and what does it mean to be stupid?

Second definition first-stupidity is dullness of mind, ignorance, and even obtuse, or stubbornness.

What makes people freely chose to be dull, ignorant and stubborn is, simply, sin.

Stupidity grows out of many sins, in fact, and here is an incomplete list:

lust
sloth
greed
anger
pride
gluttony
envy.....

I hope you recognize these as the seven deadly sins.

Lust consumes the imagination with false idolatry, thus making people dull of mind. Intemperance of thought, such as curiosity, and the chasing of emotional religious experience, are rooted in lust.

Sloth stops growth, makes one give up on holiness and ignores the virtue of studiosity.

Greed consumes one with false gods of money, things, status, power, making one into a beast instead of a thinking human being.

Anger brings about unforgiveness, rash judgements, prejudices, and intemperance, allowing the mind to dwell upon real or imagined hurts.

Pride creates an entire false world by which a person judges everything but themselves. Pride also dulls the mind, the soul, one's conscience.

Gluttony absolutely makes one stupid, as intemperance in food and drink slow down the thought processes and make a person dwell on satisfaction and comfort rather than study or reflection. Those who spend too much time on eating and drinking have little time or inclination for study.

Envy stops mental acuity by causing a person to dwell upon what others have and what others do. Envy causes shallow thinking and gossip, leading a person away from reflection and prayer.

I add fear to this list, as fear deadens the intellect. Fear makes a person fall back into the morass of negative emotions, protection, paranoia and self-preservation, all which stop intellectual growth.

Sin causes stupidity. Not facing and eliminating one's predominant fault causes stupidity. Refusing to follow the wisdom of the ages of Church guidance regarding holiness causes stupidity.

Wanting one's own way over and over and over is just plain stupid.

I incorporate the ideas of an old post to reveal how one can break out of stupidity. Humility is the answer.



Sunday, 22 July 2012

Perfection Series: Our Predominant Fault Two

Posted by Supertradmum

Newark Cathedral in England has some amazing stained glass. The Seven Deadly Sins plus one, 

show that the Medievals were being taught what we moderns have forgotten--that sin binds us to 

Satan and death.

Garrigou-Lagrange states that "it is of primary importance that we recognize our predominant 

fault and have no illusions about it. This is is so much the more necessary as our adversary, the 

enemy of our soul, knows it quite well and makes use of it to stir up trouble in and about us. In the 

citadel of our interior life, which is defended by the different virtues, the predominant fault is the weak spot, undefended by the theological and moral virtues." 

On this picture above,  Envy and Pride are depicted. 

Most of the characters have chains.


Many times we forget who is out to claim us for hell.

Lust and Sloth (who has beads) point to the need for deep, persistent prayer, as do all the other Deadly Sins. Garrigou-Lagrange writes that we must ask God, seek Him, for enlightenment as to one's predominant fault. We must ask him to remove the fault, help us to cooperate with Him is purification. We must be serious about our personal daily examinations of conscience.

What is really tricky is that the fault may seem like a virtue.

He gives us these questions to ask ourselves: "Toward what do my most ordinary preoccupations 

tend, in the morning when I awake, or when I am alone? Where do my thoughts and desires go spontaneously?"

For the sake of our souls, we must be brutally honest with ourselves.

Here is a great question from the Dominican: "What is generally the cause or source of my sadness and joy? What is the general motive of my action, the ordinary origin of my sins...a succession of sins or a state of resistance to grace, notably when this resistance persists for several days and leads me to omit my exercises of piety?" On the right, we see Violence and Gluttony. I would think that Gluttony is one of the most prevalent of the Deadly Sins in the West. That Violence is obvious in certain countries indicates certain people have this fundamental, predominant sin.

If we deny something which someone else points out, it is probably our dominant fault fighting to 

remain hidden to our consciousness. We need grace. We need God.

Satan watches us. He hears us speak. He knows our predominant fault and uses temptations to lead 

us to yet another sin. And, here is the big point, quoting St. John 8:34, made by Garrigou-Lagrange.

"Whosoever committeth sin 

is the servant of sin."

Also, quoting Thomas Aquinas, 

the author states "Every man 

judges of what is good according to his good or evil interior dispositions."


The good priest gives us the example of how the predominant fault becomes our greatest virtue. He shows the text revealing the anger and vengeance of St. John, who later in life, wrote the most beautiful passages on love. 

The "son of anger" became the 

poet and apostle of love. Wrath and Avarice on the right from Newark show contorted souls. Notice 

again the chains.

We have much work to do. Let us pray for good spiritual directors, holy wives and husbands, excellent companions in monasteries and convents, and holy friends to point out our worst flaw and to work on 

the remedy.

For the sake of our souls...to be continued.

More Musings....

Well, my tech adviser, STS, has decided that my readers will be able, being so trained in arcane words, to follow a new blog called Recueillement. 

As he is traveling hither and yon for two weeks, this will not be in place until August 15th, along with the new forum. So, watch this space....

The reason, of course, I want Recueillement for a title is that the new blog will be based on reflections, meditations and contemplation. It also means a moment of reverence... or quiet absorption --perfect, for writings about God.

Musing, again, on this word, I discussed with STS the fact that the French, who invented the word, seem so much better at this act of recollection than the sons and daughters of the Anglo-Saxons, the Americans and British peoples.

STS claims it is part of the French character to be so inclined to reflection. I wonder...

Not having any bone, blood, or tissue of Anglo-Saxon in me, I can identify with recueillement and those of you who followed the various Maritain series will recognize the word. If you could remember Etheldredasplace, you can easily handle this label.

So, why is it that certain people's have a character for action and some for contemplation? Why is France the home of so many contemplative orders, even today, when these types of orders are becoming extinct in other parts of the West?

I suspect the French penchant for philosophy and art have something to do with recueillement. The last time I was in France, this past January, of course, my confreres and I ended up in a tavern drinking various things and talking about philosophy, liturgy, Pope Francis, and not the weather.

This type of discussion would be common in my experience of a certain type of Frenchman, as well as the British expats. Recueillement would be second-nature to such people. Needless to say, I am usually the only woman in these discussions, being interested in these topics rather than in food, fashion, or kids....Oh, well. But, therefore, I blog....

Musing on recueillement reminds me of a comment from Raissa:

All the sources are in You ...
Every great vocation gives one called the ability of a certain union with God, in particular relative to whose essence is transcendent to the multiplicity of his attributes; and very marked vocations are distinguished from each other by their relatedness to a particular the divine attributes...

Btw, would you have guessed that Garrigou-Lagrange was the spiritual director of the Maritain's Thomist Circle?

Framing Prayer 13 Carmelites and The Cross 2

How wonderful to have synchronicity in one's spiritual life. This type of thing happens to me frequently.

Deciding to use St. Teresa Benedicta is this series was a no brainer, as she lived in horrid times of persecution of the Jews and the Church. We are at the cusp of such a time now.

Her movement back into Thomism has been another reason why I have been attracted to her, as I studied Phenomenology for so many years, becoming more and more unhappy with the system, and moving into a more disciplined study of Aquinas.

But, it is St. Teresa Benedicta's love of the cross, and her great understanding of keeping the Faith under trials which makes her a person to emulate regarding prayer.

Prayer just does not pop out of nothing. We need frameworks of prayer. For many of the laity, the rosary and daily Mass, with the readings, (an excellent source for meditations, as I have shared on this blog), form the frame of prayer. But, the richness of the orders give us so much more.

Let me share one more part of a meditation of St. Teresa Benedicta's which she wrote for sharing on September 14, 1941, less than a year before her death. I remember that my dad, who is still alive, was in Europe in the trenches fighting the same foes which would kill this lovely saint.

In this meditation, St. Teresa Benedicta reminds her readers and her listeners of the three nails in the Cross representing the three vows taken by the nuns-poverty, chastity, and obedience, three ways Christ Himself chose to live in His life on earth.

She notes that Christ did not need to embrace poverty, celibacy and obedience, as He was completely detached from all worldly things, but she writes, "Whoever follows him must know that we have no lasting dwelling here. The more deeply we feel this, the more zealous we are in striving for the future, and we rejoice in the thought of our citizenship of heaven."

Teresa was aware and shared in this meditation that the nuns may have had to vacate their monastery because of the coming persecution against orders as revenge for the bishops' statement against the treatment of the Jews. She reminded her sisters in the Lord that God did not promise them when they made vows that they could stay behind the walls. And, her insight moves to something WE must ponder, as I have mentioned this many times on this blog--life without the sacraments.

"For us they are the prescribed means to grace, and we cannot receive them eagerly enough. But God is not bound to them. At the moment when some external force were to cut us off from receiving the sacraments, he would compensate us, superabundantly, in some other way, and he will do so all the more certainly and generously the more faithfully we have adhered to the sacraments previously."

As lay people, we should not hesitate to receive the sacraments as much as possible. Father Dan yesterday stressed this as well-synchronicity, indeed. Teresa reminds us that our lives are determined by God's will if we so desire his will. Then, she returns to the ideal of obedience, pointing out that Christ's life was reparation for the Original Sin of disobedience.

"The created will is not destined to be free to exalt itself. It is called to come into unison with the divine will. If it freely submits itself to this unison, then it is permitted in freedom to participate in the perfection of creation"

Go back and re-read the perfection posts....Here, St Teresa sounds like Garrigou-Lagrange and the other teachers of prayer quoted on this blog.

"If a free creature declines this unison, it lapses into bondage. The human will continues to retain the possibility of choice, but it is constrained by creatures that pull and pressure it in directions from straying from the directions straying from the development of the nature desired by God, and so away from the goal toward which it was directed by its original freedom. With the loss of original freedom, it also loses security in making decisions. It becomes unsteady and wavering, buffeted by doubt and scruples or obdurate in its error. There is no other remedy for this than the following of Christ, the Son of Man, who not only promptly obeyed his heavenly Father, but also subjected himself to people who imposed the Father's will on him. The obedience enjoined by God releases the enslaved will from the bonds of creatures  and leads it back to freedom. Thus, it is also the way to purity of heart."

I need to rush off, so I shall continue with this meditation of St. Teresa Benedicta's later in the day. Those of us who are about to experience persecution need her comforting words.

God is in the details

Some commentators have asked me what God's Will is for them.

God does not hide from us, nor does God withhold knowledge from us. If we really want to know His Will, He will show us.

The problem is this: too many people do not give themselves enough time to listen to God in prayer. Silence must precede knowledge. God gives parents knowledge of vocations for their children, if they are praying and listening. God lets us know His will is we turn away from distractions.

God's Will sometimes, as St. Thomas More stated, is what actually happens in our lives. It was God's Will that St. Thomas More became a martyr for the edification of us all, and for the building up of the Church.

An interior conversation with God allows one to ask God for guidance and to listen to His answers.

God's Will is actually the same as God's Love for each one of us. Love for us is in the will, This also is true in God as well. He loves us perfectly and wills our lives perfectly. As, God knows us perfectly and loves us perfectly, it makes sense to follow His Will for us.

When we will according to God's Will, we are joining in the love of God in a more perfect way. When we surrender to God's Will, we are entering into God's "good pleasure".

Here is my favorite mystical writer, Garrigou-Lagrange on love and will. from his book, Providence.

The beginning in us of a pure love for God will then be some participation in that love which God has for Himself, a spark from that Divine furnace of His own self-love. And as our love grows purer daily, it will increase in holiness, generosity, and strength. Indeed it will make us invincible, according to the phrase of St. Paul (Rom. 8:1), "If God be with us, who is against us?" And finally, our love thus gradually purified will enable us to triumph over death itself and will open the gates of paradise to us. When we enter into glory, we shall be established forever in a supernatural love for God that can nevermore be lost or lessened.  

In the same book, the author makes this point about knowing God's Will.

When the will of God is made known to a soul, and has made the soul realize His willingness to give Himself to it, provided that the soul, too, gives itself to God - then under all circumstances the soul experiences a great happiness in this coming of God, and enjoys it the more, the more it has learned to abandon itself at every moment to His most adorable will. 

The more we surrender ourselves to God, the more we sense God's Will for us. This truth has been reiterated by many theologians. 

Garrigou-Lagrange states this:

God is like the ocean, sustaining those who in all confidence surrender themselves to Him and do everything in their power to follow His inspirations as a ship will respond to a favorable breeze. This is what our Lord meant when He said: "The spirit breatheth where He will and thou hearest His voice: but thou knowest not whence He cometh and whither He goeth. So is everyone that is born of the Spirit" (John 3: 8). 

And this next section is key for understanding the cooperation of grace in the soul with God's plan.

Our Lord tells us (Luke 16: 10): "He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in that which is greater." Again, in the parable of the talents He says to each of the faithful servants: "Well done, good and faithful servant, because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy Lord" (Matt. 25: 21). We have here a most important lesson on the value of trivial things, one very often ignored by those who are naturally high-minded, who take the first step on the wrong path when their sense of dignity degenerates into pride. We cannot lay too much stress on this point in considering the fidelity we ought to show to the grace of the present moment. 

Trivial things must be followed faithfully. Many lay people get upset when priests do not follow the words and actions of the Mass, as they can see that the small things are not being followed faithfully.

Being faithful to the grace of the moment must be seen as part of following God's Will. But, the paragraph in italics below indicated how a critical moment separates those who want to be saints from those who do not. 

This "critical moment" of choosing God over one's personality, personal choices, even characteristics which may seem essential to a person's identity, or one's desires which may not be in God's Will, must be faced. This moment can be a compromise of one's conscience, or a falling into doubt from sure faith, or an act of uncharitableness.

Choosing real humility means choosing the narrow gate. Concentrating on God brings one to understand His Will.

As often noted, in many cases where souls have given themselves to God in all sincerity and have made generous, even heroic efforts to prove their love for Him, a critical moment comes when they must abandon a too personal way of judging and acting - though it may be of a high order - so as to enter upon the path of true humility, that "little humility" which loses sight of self and looks henceforward on God alone. 

One chooses to slide backwards when one does not accept God's Will, and we kid ourselves at this point in denying that it is known to us.

At that moment two widely different courses are possible: either the soul seeks for itself the course to take and pursues it, or it fails to do so, sometimes going so far astray in its upward path as to go back again without being altogether aware of it. 

God gives us opportunities to do little things daily-like share a book, or article, or video with a friend. Or listen to someone who is upset with God, or mourn with someone who has lost a loved, which are all moments of grace in God's Will, if one is loving in and with God. Sometimes one choses not to go to daily Mass when one can, or to not seek out local times of adoration....all these things may seem trivial at the time, but these add up to times of saying "no" to grace.

To see this path of true humility is to discover in our everyday life, from morning to night, opportunities of performing seemingly trivial acts for the love of God. But the frequent repetition of these acts is of immense value and leads to a delicacy of attitude to God and our neighbor which, if constant and truly sincere, is the mark of perfect charity. 

The acts then demanded of the soul are very simple and pass by unnoticed. There is nothing in them for self-love to take hold of. God alone sees them, and the soul thinks it is offering Him, so to speak, nothing at all. And yet these acts, St. Thomas says, 5 are like drops of water continually falling on the same spot: eventually they bore a hole in the rock. The same real effect is gradually produced by the assimilation of the graces we receive. They penetrate the soul and its faculties, at the same time sublimating them and gradually bringing everything to the required supernatural focus. Without this fidelity in little things actuated by the spirit of faith and love, humility, patience and gentleness, the contemplative life will never penetrate the active, the ordinary everyday life. Contemplation will be confined, as it were, to the summit of the intellect, where it is more speculative than contemplative; it will fail to permeate our whole existence and manner of life and will remain almost completely barren whereas it should become every day more fruitful. 

This is one reason why scheduling must be part of the growth in holiness. Without scheduling, one cannot be faithful, but merely act in spontaneous or knee-jerk reactions to events, things, and people. Scheduling allows reflection to enter into the day of trivial things. Quoting St. Thomas, Garrigou-Lagrange reminds us that no action is "morally indifferent".  Each action must be deliberate, not merely reactive. The trivial becomes important through reflection and the awareness of God's love active in each moment of the day.

Detachment has to be considered as an important attitude of the soul, mind, and body. The more one is detached from people, things, one's own desires, the more one "sees" God's Will in one's life.

This is a matter of supreme importance. St. Francis de Sales more than once speaks of it.  St. Thomas says the same thing in another way when he teaches, as we have already seen, that in the concrete reality of life no deliberate act is hic et nunc morally indifferent. In a rational being every deliberate act should be rational, should have an "honorable" end in view, and in the Christian every act should be directed at least virtually to God as to the supreme object of love. This truth brings out the importance of the multifarious actions we have to perform day by day. Perhaps they are trivial in themselves, nevertheless they are of great importance relative to God and the spirit of faith and love, of humility and patience that should actuate us in performing them and offering them to Him. 

We know when we are facing this "critical moment". God gives us many hints and signs of this time. For me, it was having cancer. That was my critical moment of following God more closely, or choosing my own will. But, willfulness can be a life-long struggle for some, as a way for God to humble one by letting one suffer one's faults over and over.

This critical moment of which we are speaking marks a difficult crisis in the spiritual life of many fairly advanced souls, who then run the risk of falling back again. If a soul that has shown itself generous or even heroic, after reaching this point is still far too personal in its manner of judging and acting and does not see the need of a change, it continues on its way with a merely acquired impetus, and its prayer and activities are no longer what they should be. There is a real danger here. The soul may become stunted and its development arrested like one dwarfed through some deformity. Or it may take a false direction. Instead of true humility, it may almost unawares develop a sort of refined pride, which scarcely appears at first except in the small details of daily life. For that reason this will remain unknown to a spiritual director living apart from those he directs. This pride will steadily take the form of an amused condescension, and subsequently develop into an acerbity of manner in our relations with our neighbor, permeating the whole life of the day and thus stultifying everything. This acerbity may lead to rancor and contempt for our neighbor, whom nevertheless we should love for God's sake. 

Arrested growth may be one of the most common problems of good people wanting to become perfect. This refined pride masks itself as humility. But, then, the mask falls, and the growing hatred for neighbor comes forth in all its ugliness. The fruit becomes judgemental attitudes, criticisms, self-centeredness, and all this is worse than when one was a newbie Christian, as one has been given grace to advance, and one has chosen to slide back into the self. Remember my posts on "boomeranging".

A soul that has come to this pass will not easily be led to make those holy considerations which are necessary for it to return to the point whence it went astray. Such a soul should be recommended to our Lady's care; in many cases she alone can lead it back into, the right path. 

The remedy for this evil is to make the soul very attentive to the grace of the moment and faithful in trivial things. 

What are trivial things? What are the things this soul needs to which this person must pay attention?

The list varies according to one's role in society, and in the family. The trivial duties of children involve obedience and docility to good parents. The trivial duties of parents revolve around creating a domestic church and passing the Faith on to the children daily. A trivial duty of a single person could be speaking the truth to friends, evangelizing one's peers, and supporting the Church and so on in small, almost unnoticed ways. Intercessory prayer, which no one notices may be the core of the trivial which pleases God. The saints tell us that it is the faithfulness in little things which make the saint. When I was in the convent, washing the kitchen floor to a point of excellence was just as important as decorum in prayer.

One had to be on time, dressed appropriately, following each detail of the schedule, and so on. Nothing was too trivial to be unimportant, as God is seen to be in the details in the Benedictine Rule.

Two huge problems of today's society must be the inappropriateness of so much behavior, which causes a laxity of thought and leads to a more undisciplined mind. The disobedience of so many leaders in the Church and in religious orders can be seen in trivial things, like the words of a banned breviary, or the lack of a habit or signs of being a contradiction in the world, and so on. 

Nothing is too small in God's eyes, as He stated:

Luke 16:10Douay-Rheims 

10 He that is faithful in that which is least, is faithful also in that which is greater: and he that is unjust in that which is little, is unjust also in that which is greater.

When I was in Tyburn, cleaning the kitchen floor in an excellence manner was deemed as important as proper decorum in chapel. Obedience in little things, like using the correct cloth for the floor, or turning out a light,  created a habit of mind of obedience in larger things, like kneeling upright for one's time before the Lord in the Monstrance, or reciting the lessons of the day given by the Novice Mistress. Nothing is trivial.

I have one short rule for knowing God's Will--follow the teachings of the Church to the last letter-not out of legalism, but out of a spirit of docility and humility. 

Here is a little prayer from the book:

 For love of Thee, O my God, and for the discharge of my debts, I will confine myself to the one essential business, that of the present moment, and thus enable Thee to act.

to be continued....

God to The World-- "I called, and you refused." Proverbs 1:24

Garrigou-Lagrange helps us understand a basic principle that sanctifying grace is not extrinsic to us but intrinsic. It is a permanent condition of the soul, which some of the synod fathers do not understand.

When one loses sanctifying grace, which is participation in the Divine, one cannot "make grace" or "make virtue" happen. God's gift of grace remains necessary.

A key paragraph from Reality helps us see the layers of meaning presented by this genius, Garrigou-Lagrange.

Sanctifying grace, then, is a participation, not, like actual grace, virtual and transient, but formal and permanent. Still this participation is, not univocal, but analogical, because the divine nature is independent and infinite, whereas grace is essentially finite and dependent on God. Further, grace is an accident, not a substance, and the utmost knowledge it can give us of God is only intuitive, never absolutely comprehensive. Nevertheless this participation, though it is analogical, is still a participation in the deity as deity, since it is the source of the light of glory which enables us to see God as He is in Himself, the deity as deity. Now the deity as deity, though it pre-contains formally all perfections, being, life, intelligence, which it can communicate to creatures, still transcends infinitely all these perfections. [1113] The stone, by participating in being, has an analogical resemblance to God as being. The plant, participating in life, has an analogical resemblance to God as living. Our soul, participating in intelligence, has an analogical resemblance to God as intelligent. But sanctifying grace alone is a participation in the deity as deity, a participation which is naturally impossible and hence naturally unknowable. Only the obscure light of infused faith here below, and only the light of of glory there above, can let us see the deity as deity, God as He is in Himself.
We are here in a world of truth far beyond the reach of reason. Hence, first, the adversaries of the faith can never prove that sanctifying grace is impossible. But, secondly, neither can its possibility be rigorously demonstrated by reason. What, then, of the arguments we have just been proposing? They are arguments of appropriateness, profound indeed and inexhaustible, but since they move in an order beyond reason and philosophy, they can never be apodictically demonstrative. Both the intrinsic possibility of grace and its existence are affirmed with certitude, not by reason, but by faith alone. [1114].

In baptism. we are not merely adopted, but taken into God's Own Life. This participation is intrinsic to the soul, within, not without, as the Lutherans and some other Protestants believe.

I have posted these thoughts before under "grace", but I want to be more pointed in my examination of the lack of understanding of grace among some bishops and cardinals. They seem not to understand Christ, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. Garrigou-Lagrange clarifies this Scriptural based definition of the ability to turn against grace.

First, and again, a look at the different kinds of grace.

Efficacious grace, in contrast with sufficient grace which can remain sterile, is infallibly followed by a meritorious act. This efficacious grace, so Thomists maintain, is intrinsically efficacious because God wills it; not merely extrinsically efficacious, that is, by the consent of our will.
We shall consider first the texts of St. Thomas which express this doctrine, then the Scriptural texts on which it reposes. The main distinction here is that between God's antecedent will and God's consequent will, a distinction fully in harmony with that between potency and act.
Commenting on St. Paul, [1121] St. Thomas writes: "Christ is the propitiation for our sins, for some efficaciously, for all sufficiently, because the price, which is His blood, is sufficient for universal salvation, but, by reason of impediment, is efficacious only in the elect." God removes this impediment, but not always. There lies the mystery. God, he says again, [1122] withholds from no one his due. Again: [1123] the New Law gives of itself sufficient aid to shun sin. Then, commenting on the Ephesians, [1124] he becomes more precise: God's aid is twofold. One is the faculty of doing, the other is the act itself. God gives the faculty by infusing power and grace to make man able and apt for the act. God gives further the act by inner movement to good, working in us both to will and to do. [1125].

In other words, God is active in our participation in this grace. God makes us able to accept His grace, and leads the person in grace to a particular action, which is, therefore, good and a gift. Again, the idea that men and women do not have grace to pursue holiness is sheer heresy.


All men receive concurrence of grace which makes them able to fulfill the divine precepts, because God never commands the impossible. As regards efficacious grace, by which a man actually observes God's commands, if it is given to one, it is given by mercy, if it is refused to another, it is refused by justice. [1126] If man resists the grace which makes him able to do good, he merits deprival of that grace which gives him the actual doing of good. By His own judgment, says St. Thomas, [1127] God does not give the light of grace to those in whom he finds an obstacle.

We choose to live against God's Will for us, a life in grace.

This resistance of grace is entirely in our own wills. Because sanctifying grace is a permanent quality of life, one begins to think and act like God. One begins to rest in His Will. If one is not in sanctifying grace, without actual grace, or prevenient grace, one cannot come into this mode of being which is thinking and acting like God.

Many people in the Catholic Church are denying natural law. The reason for this is that natural law has been separated from sanctifying grace. Grace informs nature, sanctifies and makes holy what is natural to man. So, a natural virtue of prudence becomes "supernaturalized" by grace.

Natural law becomes clouded in both the will and the intellect by the lack of grace. Many of us have noted how many people are no longer baptized. Some low-church Protestant denominations do not believe in child-baptism and merely "consecrate" their babies to God.

Sorry, but consecration does not involve grace. The children grow up without the intellect, will, body, imagination, etc. being informed by infused knowledge and the theological virtues. One reason for the fast decaying of our Christian cultures must be this willing ignorance of grace as directly coming from baptism. One reason for the devolution of human intelligence, and teachers who are honest have noticed this, is that children are not allowed the grace which informs the intellect. Without grace, natural law can be set aside by those who choose not to be fully human. To be fully human, because we are made in the image and likeness of God, demands a participation in grace. 

Garrigou-Lagrange writes something startling. Even the demons have acquired faith, that is faith based on their experience of miracles. Faith in God in the demons is not infused faith, as in the person who has been baptized.

Here is G-L again on the basic grace of conversion:

Sufficient grace is not sterile, it produces a good thought, a good movement of will, some disposition to consent. It is called sufficient, says Alvarez, [1148] as counter-distinguished from "simply efficacious." But each sufficient grace is in a sense efficacious, i. e.: in its own order.
But each meritorious act, however small, requires a grace simply efficacious. It is good here and now realized, hence presupposes an eternal decree of God's consequent will. Nothing comes to pass hic et nunc, unless God has efficaciously willed it (if it is good) or permitted it (if it is evil). [1149] We cannot, says Bossuet, [1150] refuse to God the power of actualizing our free and salutary choice, without which no merit can exist.

3. Resistance to sufficient grace is an evil, arising from us, from our defectibility and our actual deficience, whereas our non-resistance is, on the contrary, a good, arising from ourselves as second causes, but from God as first cause.

What some of the synod fathers forget, or refuse to admit, is that resistance to sufficient grace, a great evil, comes from our own imperfections, which is why we must all pray daily for this grace of perfection. That a priest told me we can move beyond venial sin, and that insight from prayer that concupiscence can be destroyed, (http://supertradmum-etheldredasplace.blogspot.com/2015/04/to-destroy-concupiscence.html), both are truths which emphasize the call to holiness through grace.

I am moving towards a more in-depth discussion on the Indwelling of the Trinity, but one can follow the tags to previous posts until I get to these posts.

In the meantime, I hope readers are beginning to see the great dangers of those who are denying the very doctrines of grace and free will held to sacred in our Church.

Yes, more on gradualism....

Yes, more on gradualism

Garrigou-Lagrange reminds us in Reality, that sufficient grace is given to all men, otherwise sin would not be sin. The freedom of the will chooses either sufficient grace to avoid sin and do good. One may look up the many, many posts on this blog on grace and free will.

Grace to make come to pass the excellence of the Catholic life is called efficacious grace, again discussed here many times.

The choice is ours., whether to follow the urging of efficacious grace or not. If one refuses sufficient grace, one refuses efficacious grace as well.

Gradualism denies grace, as noted in earlier posts under the label synod. God gives us the movement of the will to do good actions, and also brings about the good action itself, as nothing good can be done without God's direct will.

However, one forgets, and Garrigou-Lagrange reminds us that impediments stop the flow of grace. We set up these impediments, and one is adultery, or the living in sin with another person rather than one's lawful, sacramental wife or husband. Justice, states Garrigou-Lagrange, demands that God will not give efficacious grace if sufficient grace is refused.

The great Dominican quotes Thomas Aquinas on this interaction of will and grace. “The will is related to things as they are in themselves with all their particular circumstances. Hence we will a thing simply (simpliciter) when we will it with all its concrete circumstances. This will we call the consequent will. Thus it is clear that every thing which God wills simpliciter comes to pass.”

Now, until one is in the illuminative state, that state described by the great saints who wrote about this, such as Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, and Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity, one does not know for sure if one is a child predestined by grace to be saved. One of the torments of the Dark Night is the doubt of one's own salvation. Again, see my many, many posts on the illuminative state. I refer to it here again because of the confusion in the synod on the nature of grace and free will.

Garrigou-Lagrange, thankfully, as backup for all of us who have written on the synod, writes, “God does not command the impossible.” God has His efficacious consequent will and His antecedent will, the source of sufficient grace.

Here is G-L: “All that God wills, He does. This principle has no exception. All that God wills (purely, simply, unconditionally) comes to pass without our our freedom being thereby in any way forced, because God moves that freedom sweetly and strongly, actualizing it, not destroying. He will efficaciously that we freely consent and we do freely consent. The supreme efficacy of divine casuality, says St. Thomas, extends to the free mode of our acts.”

We does not have to marry someone outside of sanctifying grace. We do not have to stay in an irregular marriage. We do not have to succumb to the pressures of work to compromise our Faith. We do not have to become bitter, unforgiving, angry with God or His Church, and so on.

God's will allows us to respond to grace. Here is Garrigou-Lagrange again on the decisive statement from the Council of Thuzey (860): “Whatever He has willed in heaven or on earth, God has done. For nothing comes to pass in heaven or on earth that He does not in mercy bring to pass or permits to come to pass in justice.

The teaching of the Church tells us God's Will. What God gives us for salvation and beyond, for perfection comes in and through the Catholic Church. Grace is necessary, and gradualism denies this, relying on false ideals of modern psychology and false ideas of cheap grace, that one can flaunt the laws of God in the Church and still be saved.

Does this mean that everyone caught up in irregular marriages cannot be saved? Of course not. Some people choose to live and brother and sister for the sake of the children, not taking part in receiving Holy Communion. Some do make the brave decision to separate, to take themselves out of the way of further temptation to sin.

What is missing from the synodal discussion, besides this necessary teaching of the ages on grace is the nature of real love. The previous posts on St. John Paul II's encyclical reveal what true love is-sacrificial, hard, leading to perfection.

By the way, we do not merit our predestination, it is given. It is grace. Holiness is gratuitous, not earned.

Some people never commit mortal sin in their lives, and this is a mercy, a gift from God.

And, an extremely important note from G-L on disorder. As there is much disorder, or chaos, in the world regarding marriage and so-called ssm, one must know that God does not cause disorder or chaos. The disorder of sin is caused by man himself. God permits human beings to use their free will daily. We choose daily His way or not.

I repeat a bit here, but the gradualists forget four important things about grace and free will.

One, a person wills to be in an irregular marriage, or to leave such.

Free will may be clouded by the passions, but God gives to all sufficient grace to control the passions.

Two, grace trumps nature. If one cooperates with grace, with the mercy of God, one will have clarity of mind and discernment as to what to do in a disordered situation, and the first things would be to repent.

Three, no one in mortal sin can receive any merit or any subsequent or sanctifying grace. One's soul is dead and incapable of receiving grace except for the completely gratuitous prevenient actual grace, which moves one to metanoia. A person must decide to leave the path of mortal sin when offered the grace of conversion.

Four, God is not passive. He gives us opportunities for conversion over and over again.

More later...

Being in Eastertide Is Down and Dirty

From today's First Reading:

Acts 14:19-28New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition 

19 But Jews came there from Antioch and Iconium and won over the crowds. Then they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, supposing that he was dead. 20 But when the disciples surrounded him, he got up and went into the city. The next day he went on with Barnabas to Derbe.

The Return to Antioch in Syria

21 After they had proclaimed the good news to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra, then on to Iconium and Antioch. 22 There they strengthened the souls of the disciples and encouraged them to continue in the faith, saying, “It is through many persecutions that we must enter the kingdom of God.” 23 And after they had appointed elders for them in each church, with prayer and fasting they entrusted them to the Lord in whom they had come to believe.

24 Then they passed through Pisidia and came to Pamphylia. 25 When they had spoken the word in Perga, they went down to Attalia. 26 From there they sailed back to Antioch, where they had been commended to the grace of God for the work[a] that they had completed. 27 When they arrived, they called the church together and related all that God had done with them, and how he had opened a door of faith for the Gentiles. 28 And they stayed there with the disciples for some time.

Note that the great Apostle of the Gentiles just got up out of the dirt and carried on. He kept going despite horrible ordeals. Again and again, he and his fellow workers got up and kept preaching, teaching, setting up liturgies, moving on.  He opened the door of faith for the Gentiles.

We are to open the door of Faith. 


We are an Easter People, a community of the Resurrected Christ, Who "trampled death by death" and "led the captives out of prison"

However, many of us do not feel release from the pains of many prisons. With the increasing evil revealed in even the msm, one may feel overwhelmed with negativity and the proliferation of sin.

But, Christ has overcome evil and He has overcome death. However, some of us wear death in our souls from sin, from sins against us, from daily, almost constant persecution and the various consequences of sin in the larger society.

McDonald's, were I sit daily, and write to my Dear Readers, has a motto here in this state, "Your lovin'--Their healing." I assume the advertisers mean to state that a mom and dad who takes their kid or kids to Macs will be feeding them good food and helping charities at the same time.

Some of the billions of the money earned through places like this little outlet, goes to houses for medical treatment for children. A drop in the bucket... And, I am sure the vast majority of people who come here for coffee and a muffin, or the dollar menu actually care if any of the money goes to charity.

This type of charity, which is another word for love, is not the type of charity God, the Resurrected One, demands of us daily. Love cannot be compartmentalized. It cannot be pushed off to be done by others. We need, absolutely, to be involved with others who have needs.

Lately, I have noticed that most people do not want to get involved with the needy, or, only at a great distance. I see this in my own life, but then, I understand that people are limited in love, just as I am, and that we have to be pulled, even pushed out of our comfort zones.

Our charity must be direct, involved, "down and dirty" as Christ got down and dirty walking this earth created for happiness and perfection and not for sin.

Sin was mankind's idea, not God's.

When Christ appeared in His Resurrected Body, He wore and still wears for all time, the wounds from His Crucifixion.

Have you meditated on this fact? The Glorified Body of Christ bears all the major wounds-the marks on the Hands, the spear-thrust wound in the Side, the holes in the Feet.

Recently, a priest reminded me that the wounds I wear from trials, poverty, illness, especially is done for mortification and for the glory of God, will be part of my resurrected, glorified body.

Amazing--the wounds we carry will be part of our glory, and how these wounds will be manifested is a mystery.

But, one can guess. If one has been hated, perhaps one will emanate great love. If one has been poor, perhaps one will be adorned like a princess. If one has been calumniated, a great humility will be obvious.

Mary, Our Mother, shares in all the greatest of virtues, from her Immaculate Conception to her days with John in Ephesus.

What were those long days like as she waited for God to call her home?

She was in constant union with the Trinity.

Again and again, I return to this mystery of the Indwelling of the Trinity. The Trinity dwells within all who are in sanctifying grace.

St. Teresa of Avila's birthday is being celebrated by Carmelites and those of us who love her this year. She was born in 1515. More than many saints, she shared what it means to experience the Indwelling of the Trinity.

Here is one of her notes on this fact, also referred to by St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine.

The spirit becomes enkindled and is illumined as it were, by a cloud of the greatest brightness. It sees these Three Persons, individually, and yet, by a wonderful kind of knowledge which is given to it, the soul realizes that most certainly and truly all these three Persons are one Substance and one Power and one Knowledge and one God alone; so that what we hold by faith the soul may be aid here to grasp by sight, although nothing is seen by the eyes, either of the body or of the soul, for it is no ordinary vision.

As Garrigou-Lagrange, who refers to this teaching of St. Teresa notes, this awareness comes after the Dark Night and when one is entering the Illumination State.

Even some great saints, such as Mother Teresa of Calcutta, did not experience the awareness of the Indwelling of the Trinity until the very end of her life.

That some saints live in this awareness has been made clear by their writings-I think of Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity. I shall share more of her insights later this week.

While one is walking with God, one must keep in mind that although the lives of the saints are useful guides, God calls each one of us in a unique manner.

There is only one Thomas Aquinas, only one Teresa of Avila, only one Joseph of Cupertino, only one Mary of Egypt.

However, the universal truth of the Indwelling of the Trinity may be shared by all the baptized who are in sanctifying grace.

An exploration of the Indwelling of the Trinity will be my theme this week on this blog.

On Gifts Two

So, how to we come to know what our gifts are without paying for weeks of intense self-centeredness?

1. The first route to knowing one's gifts in a Catholic context would be the discernment God gives every parent. Parents know from the moment of a child's birth something of the character and natural gifts of that child. God gives much information about children to praying and reflective parents. Parents who seem estranged from their children or who claim they do not understand a child's gifts are not listening to God in the daily event of domestic life.  The character and gifts of a child blossom early in good, nurturing homes. The sacraments inform the natural gifts and give additional supernatural ones, the next point.

2.Gifts of the theological virtues are given at baptism as well as helps to develop the cardinal virtues. Gifts of the Holy Spirit are given at confirmation and a good parent helps form these gifts into lasting character traits, as well as even strong charisms for a certain vocation.

3.Simplicity teaches us what our gifts actually are. Here is Garrigou-Lagrange, again, as I have posted this before, on simplicity.

The souls of such men as St. Joseph, St. John, St. Francis, St. Dominic, the Cure of Ars give us some idea of this simplicity of God; but still more the soul of Mary, and especially the holy soul of Jesus, who said: "If thy eye be single, thy whole body shall be lightsome." That is, if your soul is simple in its outlook, it will be in all things enlightened, steadfast, loyal, sincere, and free from all duplicity." Be ye wise as serpents [so as not to be seduced by the world], and simple as doves, " so as to remain always in God's truth." I confess to Thee, O Father,... because Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them to little ones." "Let your speech be yea, yea: no, no" (Matt. 10: 16; 11: 25; 5: 37)

It is a great gift not ever to fall into mortal sin, as simplicity comes to the pure in heart.

In the Old Testament we read: "Seek the Lord in simplicity of heart" (Wis. 1: 1) ; "Better is the poor man that walketh in his simplicity, than a rich man that is perverse in his lips and unwise" (Prov. 19:1). "Let us all die in our innocency," cried the Maccabees amid the injustices that oppressed them (I Mach. 2:37). "Obey... in simplicity of heart," said St. Paul (Col. 3: 22) ; and he admonishes the Corinthians not to lose "the simplicity that is in Christ" (II Cor. 11: 3).

This simplicity, says Bossuet, enables an introverted soul to comprehend even the heights of God, the ways of Providence, the unfathomable mysteries which to a complex soul are a scandal, the mysteries of infinite justice and mercy, and the supreme liberty of the divine good pleasure. All these mysteries, in spite of their transcendence and obscurity, are simple for those of simple vision.

The reason is that, in divine matters, the simplest things, such as the Our Father, are also the most profound. On the other hand, in the things of this world, containing both good and evil closely intermingled and thereby exceedingly complex, anybody who is simple is lacking in penetration and will remain naive, unsuspecting, and shallow. In the things of God simplicity is combined with depth and loftiness; for the sublimest of divine things as also the deepest things of our heart, are simplicity itself.

4. Teachers, working with parents, have a duty to find out the external and even the internal gifts of a child. How many times have I sensed as a Catholic teacher, a vocation, and encouraged the young person to follow this to conclusion?

5. Leadership training is not the same as knowing or acknowledging gifts, as leadership qualities are encouraged after a person is seen as having such gifts. But, natural gifts should impinge on supernatural gifts.

6. Most people who are praying and reflective have a sense of their gifts. The most obvious way is to see what interests a person. Does someone love pencils, papers, computers, words, reading, researching? Most likely that person has a gift of writing and perhaps, teaching. Does someone love baking, being in the kitchen, reading about recipes, sharing baked goods? Most likely that person has the gift of baking and hospitality, even motherhood. Does a little boy want to read about martyrs, and dress up like them on All Saints, and follow the Church calendar of saints? Most likely that child will be a martyr or be involved in a servant-type of vocation.  Does a little girl love her baby brothers and sisters to the point of loving to care for them, even in the hard work? She may be called to motherhood. Or she may have a vocation to be a sister, as she loves to serve.

7. Not everyone has charismatic gifts as some charismatics believe. There are few prophets and fewer interpreters of tongues. The list of gifts in St. Paul mix both charisms and more ordinary, natural gifts which can be supernaturalized by God. Sometimes a person obviously has a charism, such as a woman who has a stutter can sing in the choir without halting, clearly an intervention from God.

1 Corinthians 12:4-11

4 Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; 5 and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; 6 and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. 7 To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. 8 To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, 9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, 10 to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. 11 All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses.
8. Notice that St. Paul refers to services as well as gifts. To pretend that a service is a charismatic gift confuses the levels of gifts. Remember, the Church is not a democracy, and people do not have to "feel equal" about gifts or services. One of the greatest deceits of the gifting courses is to level out gifts, instead of teaching humility.



9. The gifts received in confirmation are for all the confirmed, not merely for some. These gifts PERFECT the virtues given at baptism. They are: wisdom, understanding, knowledge, counsel, fortitude, piety and fear of the Lord. We all have these, all who are confirmed in the Catholic Church.

10. Some gifts are for the Church and some are for growing in personal holiness, but there can be overlaps, which I can cover later today. Not all have the same gifts, and some gifts are less obvious than others.

The Fourth Principle of Providence

In view of Quietism, however, this last sentence obliges us to lay down a fourth principle no less certain than the principles that have preceded. The principle is, that obviously self-abandonment does not dispense us from doing everything in our power to fulfil God's will as made known in the commandments and counsels, and in the events of life; but so long as we have the sincere desire to carry out His will thus made known from day to day, we can and indeed we must abandon ourselves for the rest to the divine will of good pleasure, no matter how mysterious it may be, and thus avoid a useless disquiet and mere agitation. [55]

This fourth principle is expressed in equivalent terms by the Council of Trent (Sess. VI, cap. 13), when it declares that we must all have firm hope in God's assistance and put our trust in Him, being careful at the same time to keep His commandments. As the well-known proverb has it: "Do what you ought, come what may." Garrigou-Lagrange

It is interesting that St. Padre Pio reminds us that agitation comes from satan, not God and is a sign that one is giving into temptation. Garrigou-Lagrange understands the same truth.

With the stress of our daily lives, it seems impossible to not fall into agitation (getting upset at the speed of the Net-a first world problem, for example).

Yes, one desires to live in the Will of God. Desire and pray for this daily, and God will guide you.