Early Church History 44

Augustine's City of God: Applied Theology

"But we say that Christ is true God, born of God the Father ... and that the same Christ is true man, born of a woman, his mother ... and that his humanity, by which he is less than the Father, takes nothing away from his divinity, by which he is equal to the Father.  A dual nature, one single Christ." Quasten IV, p. 431

soteriology, spiritual anthropology, ecclesiology, sacramental theology, escatology.

It makes perfect sense that our Savior would be the God-man.  he has the power to redeem because he is God, and has the intimacy to redeem us because he is one of us.

"Each man is Adam, just as in those who believe each man is Christ." (In Ps 70,2.1)

"he has atoned for, abolished and redeemed all the faults of humanity, ransoming us from the power of the demon." (De Trin 4,13,16, 19)

Manichaeans, Father Pelegius

Saint Augustine: "Ah, then salvation is possible without a savior, without Christ, we are our own saviors."

"Augustine did not deny what the Pelegians affirmed - the goodness of created things, free will, the utility of the law, the merit of good works - but he affirmed what they denied - redemption, grace, Christian liberty and the free gift of salvation." Quasten IV, p. 436.

If we can follow Saint Augustine in understanding Original Sin and know that it is a constitutive part of our human nature, and realize that we are conceived with it, then we know we don't have the power or authority to overthrow it."

TWO IMPORTANT POINTS:

The remission of sins is total, absolute.  Man is restored to his innocence by Christ's sacrificial death on the cross.  BUT that does not mandate or force an interior conversion which each of us is call upon to make.  And that interior renewal is gradual, progressive, regressive and incomplete until our own perfection, our deification, full indwelling of the Holy Spirit, later called Beatific Vision, full entrace into the economy of the Godhead.

Grace, a free gift of God, a sign of favor which is signified by the Law, and a justification. "The divine aid for fulfilling what the law commands, for attaining justification and persevering in it." Quasten IV, p. 439.

"god does not command the impossible, but in commanding He admonishes you to do that which you can and to ask for that which you cannot..." And He helps you in order that you may be able, since "He does not abandon one if He is not abandoned."

freedom and grace work hand-in-hand.

without God's grace - no salvation

without our free petition for that grace - no salvation.

Council of Quiercy (DS 623) "The fact that some are saved is the gift of the one who saves. The fact that some perish is the merit of those who perish."

Purgatory? a teaching which "has been handed down by the Fathers and upheld by the custom of the universal Church." (Serm 172, 2 cf Confessions 9,12,32)

solacium dilationis

"for Thou madest us for Thyself and our heart is restless until it rests in Thee."