Any thinking Christian must have remarked that the past two centuries have been rough on the Protestant church. First, the 19th century featured the invasion of liberal and rationalistic ideas first championed by German scholars and quickly adopted by seminaries. Higher criticism had circular thinking as its process and tautology as its ultimate goal. Although mainline denominations seemed to welcome these innovations, there was nevertheless a minority who resisted them. Amongst Anglicans, many reverted to Roman liturgical practices if not actual doctrine, becoming the Oxford Movement. In the United States, a country always open to “progressive” ideas, the liberalizing trend that started in matters of hermeneutics spread to those of doctrine, discipline and worship. Starting in 1962, Bishop Pike was found to be heterodox in his theology, yet the House of Bishops refused to censure him on three separate occasions. In 1974, 11 women were ordained “priests” in violation of the canons of the Episcopal Church, effectively dismantling church discipline. Finally, in the early 21st century, The American and Canadian churches started ordaining practicing homosexuals to the ministry, culminating in the consecration of Gene Robinson Bishop of New Hampshire in 2004. Efforts to revise the BCP to include rites for the “marriage” of homosexuals and the “blessing” of transgender people continue unabated.
In contrast to these innovations in the Protestant church, the Roman Catholic Church has maintained traditional classical Christian views about doctrine and sexual mores. Perhaps this is due to institutional inertia; Stalin is quoted as saying, as he surveyed his deployments against the Germans in WWII, ” Quantity has a quality all of its own.” But then again, there may be something more profound afoot. Is it possible that the Reformation of the 16th century sufficiently altered the Christian Gospel in such a way as to leave the Protestant church more susceptible to invasion by the prevailing culture? How can Protestants, who pride themselves on having superior theology, end up having more internal schism and disagreements about theology, authority and behavior than the Catholic competition? For too long, Protestants have been content to content to criticize the Catholic Church without examining the very real problems they themselves are experiencing.
Any investigation into the differing fortunes of the two main branches of the Christian Church must go back to when the break occurred. What was held in common? What was the disagreement that caused the fracture? There were rumblings about medieval Roman practices from early on, first finding voice with John Wycliffe in England and John Huss on the Continent. By the time Martin Luther posted his 95 Theses on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, discontent about the political and economic practices of the Papacy was widespread. Luther’s innovation, though, was not to talk about retrograde practices alone, but rather to question the theology behind them. As a humanist, Erasmus mocked, but as a theologian, Luther engaged. The problem was not so much that the Roman church was preoccupied with worldly affairs, but that it was neglecting its spiritual mission. Rome didn’t know, or had forgotten, just how it is that a Holy God redeems a sinful humanity.
There was consensus between Roman and reformer about the problem that needed to be solved. As the de facto author of Roman Catholic theology in the form of his Summa Theologica, Thomas Aquinas wanted to solve the problem of sin. Augustine had elaborated upon the concept of original sin, an affliction common to all sons of Adam, and then there was the corollary of actual sins. The penalty of any sin, of course, was death. Luther also was concerned with sin. His own spiritual journey was characterized by frustration; the more he strove to become righteous, the more he was consumed with a sense of failure. Roman practices added to his moral burden, and did nothing to assuage it.[1] There was also consensus between the two regarding the solution to the problem of Sin, and that was a reliance upon the grace of God. Said Thomas, “I answer that, Man by himself can no wise rise from sin without the help of grace.”[2] So too Martin: “Nothing can take away sin except the grace of God.”[3] So what was the problem? They agreed that divine grace was necessary to combat Sin, but what did they mean by grace?
By the time of the Reformation, the Roman church had developed an elaborate system whereby humans could move from sin to happiness or beatitude; eternal life. It would be impossible to recount here the complete process of redemption as conceived by Aquinas and the Schoolmen, but a brief summary should nevertheless be offered. Since it is in our nature to live a life consisting of decisions and actions, God, in his providence, has ordained that we should attain salvation through the consequences of our decisions and actions.[4] Grace is an infused quality of the soul, an ontological transformation that imparts virtues to the believer. On the one hand there are cardinal virtues, which are part of our natural constitution and not dependent upon grace. Then there are theological virtues, which are completely dependent upon an infusion from the Holy Spirit.[5] Once in possession of a measure of theological virtues, there is a potential for performing good works.[6] Works may be viewed in two ways. The first is as the fruit of cooperation between God and man, and as such, have value. The second way is as meritorious of eternal life condignly, “whereby a man, being made a partaker of the Divine Nature, is adopted as a son of God, to whom the inheritance is due by right of adoption…”[7]
Works, in turn, deserve merit, which has the nature of a reward for actions undertaken by the proper use of free will.[8] We have a choice as to whether or not to cooperate with God, and when we do, it’s considered worthy of reward.
Thus we see that the movement of an individual from being a sinner separated from God and hopeless in his powerlessness, to eternal life, involves discrete steps, all involving grace. Adjectives were attached to the term grace in order to show that at whatever point in this process a person is, their progress is dependent upon God’s aid. To get started, a person first needs enabling grace. There is also a medicinal aspect to grace, in that we require healing to be able to do things that will earn us divine favor. Once healed we manifest habitual or sanctifying grace, that cooperates with our nature to restore those qualities that were attenuated by the Fall. Thomas also speaks of actual grace, that enables us to do those things and operations that earn us merit and thus eternal life. This is not an exhaustive account of Roman doctrine on grace, nor is it necessarily accurate. Perhaps it is sufficient.
The theme of grace in Roman theology was enduring, remaining central in the Council of Trent’s formulation on justification centuries later:
“The Synod furthermore declares, that in adults, the beginning of the said Justification is to be derived from the prevenient grace of God, through Jesus Christ, that is to say, from His vocation, whereby, without any merits existing on their parts, they are called; that so they, who by sins were alienated from God, may be disposed through His quickening and assisting grace, to convert themselves to their own justification, by freely assenting to and co-operating with that said grace: in such sort that, while God touches the heart of man by the illumination of the Holy Ghost, neither is man himself utterly without doing anything while he receives that inspiration, forasmuch as he is also able to reject it; yet is he not able, by his own free will, without the grace of God, to move himself unto justice in His sight. Whence, when it is said in the sacred writings: Turn ye to me, and I will turn to you, we are admonished of our liberty; and when we answer; Convert us, O Lord, to thee, and we shall be converted, we confess that we are prevented by the grace of God.”
Because grace finds its source in the Cross of Christ, which occurred a long time ago, the question then became, how do we bring that grace to the present time and place? Thus, an emphasis on the sacraments that Aquinas felt to be the vehicle of transmission. “Wherefore it is manifest that the sacraments of the Church derive their power specially from Christ’s Passion, the virtue of which is in a manner united to us by our receiving the sacraments.”[9] He goes on, “And since ‘the sacraments of which the Church is built, flowed from the side of Christ while He lay asleep on the cross…the efficacy of the Passion abides in the sacraments of the Church.”[10] Through the sacraments God could be brought to us here and now.
Despite the inevitable simplification and abbreviation in this summary, there are a number of things worth noting. First of all, justification or the remission of sins is a step within a larger process and should not be equated with the end result of the process, which is salvation or the conferral of eternal life. Secondly, in addition to being sinful, man lies powerless to do anything about his situation. Man is completely dependent upon grace in some form to move back to the condition and abilities he enjoyed before the Fall. Although this scheme begins with God’s gracious aid, its goal is to improve a person, and as such is profoundly anthropocentric. Thirdly, grace is something that can be refused by the individual; one can cooperate with grace or refuse it. Grace does not dominate a person, but on the one hand embellishes their natural abilities and on the other confers supernatural abilities. Finally, this process is characterized by a complexity that reflects Aquinas’ dependence upon Aristotle and a Greek preference for analytical thinking.[11]
To Luther and other reformers, such fine parsing and differentiation was not only confusing, but wrong. They rejected this whole sequence of redemption for at least two reasons. First of all, they said that it was fruitless to try to improve man, to move him along this continuum of spiritual improvement; only Christ was righteous. Luther said that a man was justified only when he came to see that he could not have any virtue, could not possibly do anything right, and could not have any merit of his own, but could only ask that Christ’s merits be imparted to him. Secondly, they saw this scheme as limiting God’s sovereignty, putting him in a sort of fiduciary relationship with his creation. All the reformers rejected any system that put God in debt to man. Says Luther, “This is the wicked teaching of the papacy.”[12] Grace was not a fungible asset, one which could be granted, received, stored and cashed in when needed. Calvin went to so far as to say that man had no role whatsoever in his redemption, including the ability to avail himself to divine mercy or reject that same mercy.
The reformers impugned works of merit whether performed before or after a person came to faith. Article 13 of the Articles of Religion in the English Book of Common Prayer reads as follows:
XIII. Of Works before Justification.
Works done before the grace of Christ, and the Inspiration of the Spirit, are not pleasant to God, forasmuch as they spring not of faith in Jesus Christ; neither do they make men meet to receive grace, or (as the School-authors say) deserve grace of congruity: yea rather, for that they are not done as God hath willed and commanded them to be done, we doubt not but they have the nature of sin.
Nor are works performed “after” a person comes to faith in Christ safe:
XII. Of Good Works.
Albeit that Good Works, which are the fruits of Faith, and follow after Justification, cannot put away our sins, and endure the severity of God’s judgment; yet are they pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ, and do spring out necessarily of a true and lively Faith;
insomuch that by them a lively Faith may be as evidently known as a tree discerned by the
fruit.
So if not works, what? And what is to keep Protestants from being universalists? How is the unlimited grace of the Cross limited so that all do not benefit? Luther said that the limiting factor is faith; those who have faith are justified, those who do not have faith are not. What the two Articles quoted above share is an assumption that we are justified at the time we come to faith in that sacrifice. There is no blanket justification of mankind outside of historical time, or even as of Good Friday, but rather an individual justification that is tied to a conversion event in the life of the individual believer. Article 12 speaks of good works that follow after justification, and Article 13 speaks of works done “before the grace of Christ.” This belief that justification is based on the Cross of Christ but nevertheless locked up or repressed until released by the “faith” of an individual can be found in Luther and has been faithfully maintained in evangelical doctrine to the present day. “Here let me say, that these three things, faith, Christ and imputation of righteousness, are to be joined together. Faith takes hold of Christ. God accounts this faith for righteousness.”[13] Thus, we are “saved” when we say the sinner’s prayer, go forward for an altar call, make a “decision” for Christ, or submit to adult baptism. Although Luther would say that God is sovereign in his redemption of humanity, nevertheless there has to be some sort of appropriation on the part of the individual believer. Thus, God is sovereign, but not completely so. What’s important, however, is that “faith” is understood to be a revelation that ancient events were of supreme relevance to a believer, though removed by time and distance. It was not just an intellectual assent to certain facts of history, but rather a transportation of the believer back to those events that produced the grace they were now experiencing.
So for Luther, the factor that limited grace was this notion of faith. John Calvin, whose critique of Roman doctrine was the most polemical, espoused a divine sovereignty that took no account of human involvement whatsoever. People were ordained to salvation or reprobation from time immemorial without any hope or possibility of change, for better or worse. The bad could not aspire to repentance and reform, the good could not fall to perdition. [14] God saved a minority to exhibit his mercy, God damned the majority to display his justice. Calvin’s influence was remarkable, both at that time and since. While the Articles in the English Prayer Book mentioned above seem to equate justification with the advent of personal faith, Article 17 reproduces Calvin’s view with amazing fidelity:
XVII. Of Predestination and Election.
Predestination to Life is the everlasting purpose of God, whereby (before the foundations of the world were laid) he hath constantly decreed by his counsel secret to us, to deliver from curse and damnation those whom he hath chosen in Christ out of mankind, and to bring them by Christ to everlasting salvation, as vessels made to honour. Wherefore, they which be endued with so excellent a benefit of God, be called according to God’s purpose by his Spirit working in due season: they through Grace obey the calling: they be justified freely: they be made sons of God by adoption: they be made like the image of his only-begotten Son Jesus Christ: they walk religiously in good works, and at length, by God’s mercy, they attain to everlasting felicity.
As the godly consideration of Predestination, and our Election in Christ, is full of sweet,
pleasant, and unspeakable comfort to godly persons, and such as feel in themselves the
working of the Spirit of Christ, mortifying the works of the flesh, and their earthly mem-
bers, and drawing up their mind to high and heavenly things, as well because it doth greatly establish and confirm their faith of eternal Salvation to be enjoyed through Christ, as because it doth fervently kindle their love towards God: So, for curious and carnal persons, lacking the Spirit of Christ, to have continually before their eyes the sentence of God’s Predestination, is a most dangerous downfall, whereby the Devil doth thrust them either into desperation, or into wrethchlessness of most unclean living, no less perilous than desperation.
Furthermore, we must receive God’s promises in such wise, as they be generally set forth to
us in Holy Scripture: and, in our doings, that Will of God is to be followed, which we
have expressly declared unto us in the word of God.
That these two approaches, those of Luther and Calvin, are fundamentally at odds and mutually exclusive didn’t seem to bother the English reformers, who tried to pick and choose what they considered the best from the Continental Reformation.
Always dismissed as a Pelagian, Jacobus Arminius was a Reformer on the opposite end of the theological spectrum from Calvin. He said that God’s choice of people for eternal felicity or reprobation is not arbitrary in the slightest, but rather based upon their behavior. God doesn’t create sinners for the purpose of damning them, he creates all people with free will, and some choose to engage in meretricious behavior that results first in hardening and ultimately in damnation. Grace is limited through the free moral choices that people make, including the decision to blaspheme the Holy Spirit. “Hence it is apparent that the question was not only about some being rejected, and some accepted, but about the rejected and the accepted being of such a kind, that is, distinguished by certain qualities.”[15] The Holy Spirit is the author and communicator of grace, and He can be grieved. “With respect to which, I believe, according to the scriptures, that many persons resist the Holy Spirit and reject the grace that is offered.”[16]
The followers of Arminius, the Remonstrants, were subpoenaed, tried without opportunity of defense, and variously executed, imprisoned or exiled. The forum was the Synod of Dort, 1618-19, and codified Calvin’s system under the acrostic TULIP. Thus, the high Dutch Calvinists were victors and wrote Protestant history to their liking. Representatives from many national Protestant churches were in attendance, and adopted Calvinism as the new standard of soteriological orthodoxy. Few in the 400 years since have had the temerity to question these Reformed tenets. A particularly eloquent exception is Will Durant who said of Calvin, “…we shall always find it hard to love the man who darkened the human soul with the most absurd and blasphemous conception of God in all the long and honored history of nonsense.”[17] The name Arminius has become associated with that of Pelagius, but wrongly. While Pelagius said we can respond to God and obey him without the aid of the Holy Spirit, grace, Arminius simply said that God does not bind people to commit sins, for if he did, he would himself be the author of sin.
In summary, Protestants cannot be considered a monolithic whole, for the only thing they agree on is that Rome is wrong; they certainly do not agree about what perspective is right. There are at least three streams of Protestant thought that must be considered individually. Calvin is right that God is sovereign; he cannot be put in debt to his creation. Luther’s contribution was that the righteousness we all seek is not a righteousness in and of ourselves, generated through our own efforts, but rather a righteousness from God; his righteousness, that is ascribed to us, not as a reward or a wage, but simply as a result of Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross. Arminius was helpful in that he pointed out that people are not judged as individuals as Calvin would assert, but rather as members of a class or type who are foreknown and chosen or elect to a spiritual destiny based upon their behavior. Collectively it can be said that they all militated for the principle that humanity is justified by God, that is, granted remission of sins, based not upon human effort but by the Cross of Christ which was “a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world.”[18] Where they are weak is that by equating justification with salvation, the conferral of eternal life, they have removed any motivation for talking about what faith really is or how it is manifested.[19] The result, as already noted, is a philosophical quandary wherein they cannot address the issues of authority or behavior, and have thereby suffered.[20] As the evangelist Lorenzo Dow said, when asked for a summary of Calvinism, “You can and you can’t, you will and you won’t, you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t.” Reformers have forgotten that the Gospel has two halves: what God has done that we cannot do, and what we do by way of response that God will not do. Mainline Protestants are half-Gospelers. Further, they have discouraged theological progress by warning we are not to inquire into the mind or methods of God.[21] This is a specious argument, and is probably merely an excuse for having an incomplete soteriology. It should be a given that a good father wants his children to understand the rules of the household.
The Roman Catholic, by contrast, says that we can, indeed must, make a positive contribution to our spiritual ledger. On the one hand, they say this is simply grace working in and through us, which is commendable. On the other, they are saying that though this grace emanates from God, its goal is to improve us, to make us fulfill our potential that has been vitiated by sin. This infuriates Protestants, particularly Martin Luther, who says: “We herewith pass judgment on the papists, monks, nuns, priests, Mohammedans, Anabaptists, and all who trust in their own merits, as wicked and destructive sects that rob God and Christ of the honor that belongs to them alone.”[22] Nevertheless, by identifying a discrete process whereby the Christian appropriates grace and responds to God’s monergistic actions, they have made a distinction, perhaps inadvertently, between justification and salvation, or eternal life. They have developed their own ordo salutis,[23] and have maintained the ability to value human decision, for grace can be resisted. Discussions of authority and behavior have therefore been possible, and profitable. They have left themselves open to Protestant critique, however, by adopting an overly elaborate and mechanistic view of the sacraments. Rather than take the believer to God, Roman sacramental practice tries to bring God to the believer. God is not mobile. Further, grace has been depersonalized and rendered a commodity that invites efforts to quantify and qualify it. God is not manipulated. I’m reminded of Thomas Aquinas’ experience toward the end of his career, wherein he found that God could not be placed within an Aristotelian framework.”[24] As Will Durant said of Thomas’ work, it resulted in “subtlety, but not wisdom.”[25]
By drawing upon the best insights of both Rome and Reformer, a synthetic, Biblical, and rational soteriology can be assembled. It can be presented in graphic form:
| Actor | Man’s Problem | Attitude as of the Fall | Solution | Historic Event | Extent | Our Position Relative to Christ | Associated Sacrament | Judgment | Role of Christ | Event in Theological Terms |
| God | Guilt | Enmity with Man | Blood of Christ | Good Friday | Universal | Us in Christ legally | Baptism | On Sin | Savior | Justification |
| Man | Power-
lessness |
Enmity with God | Life of Christ | Pentecost | Particular | Christ in us effectually | Eucharist | On Fruitless- ness | Lord | Salvation |
First, those things upon which Rome and Reformer agree. There are two actors, God and Man. As of the Fall, we have moral guilt. Since the Fall we’ve been running from God, we can no longer eat from the Tree of Life, another way of saying our spirit is somehow attenuated. Both agree the solution involves the blood of Christ that we might be forgiven, but then comes a divergence. Whereas the Protestant stops here, and says that Christ’s sacrifice has purchased forgiveness of sins and therefore eternal life, the Roman says more is required. In addition to the blood of Christ, the Roman would say we also need God’s continued grace to merit eternal life. This brings us to what Paul calls salvation, while Romans call it beatitude or eternal life. Same thing.[26] What is important to note is that Protestants believe that salvation is either decided by God without reference to our faith or behavior, or conferred at the time faith is registered. In either case, end of conversation. It’s good to lead a righteous life, but going to heaven is not an issue. In fact, for those in the Reformed tradition, talk about the importance of behavior cannot progress beyond this point. As Oswald Chambers sarcastically describes it, “Christ died for me, I go Scot free.”
A genuine synthesis between Roman and Reformed has to return to the Bible, and be eclectic about what is retained by each. The Protestant contribution is that we are justified without any role for human agency. When Abraham witnessed the establishment of the first covenant in Genesis 15, he was asleep, a mere bystander, while the covenant was executed by the Father and Son themselves, the smoking pot and flaming torch. The Roman contribution is that justification is not salvation; they are separate and cannot be confused or conflated without doing damage to God’s reputation. Paul makes a distinction between the two in Romans chapters 5 and 10, and in 1Timothy 4:10. So does the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews at the end of chapter 9,[27] as does Jesus in the parable of the wedding feast, among others.[28] There is a role for man in our salvation, for grace can be resisted. This synthesis would suggest that this role is not positive, as medieval Catholic practice posited, but negative, the cessation of something. Thus, sin since the Cross is not wrong doing so much as failing to take advantage of our rehabilitated state and use it to do right.[29] Sin still plays a role, but from Good Friday on, it is secondary, not primary. Where sin can still prove a snare, however, is that sin clung to and repeated will eventually grieve the Holy Spirit, who will be unable to animate us to love and good works, and we will in the end prove fruitless, a dried branch.[30] Note that in John 15 where Jesus speaks of these branches, he says that they were originally “in me,” that is, justified.
If this somewhat binary understanding of God’s plan of redemption is accurate, then it explains all of the problems the Protestant church has been experiencing. Further, it explains how the Roman church can continue to do what the Protestants cannot: talk about authority and behavior. In doing so, Catholics are helping their people play host to the Holy Spirit and be saved. With the exception of ardent evangelicals, Catholics are alone in talking about the evils of divorce, abortion, sex apart from the prospect of conception, same-sex adventurism, euthanasia, and abandoning the Church. Mainline Protestants, by contrast, who pride themselves on their theological acuity, have no response for those who would turn the Church into either a progressive political institution or a laboratory for exploring the latest moral depravity.
A complementary synthesis of this sort is acutely needed in the Church, for only by it can there be progress in both ecumenism and evangelism. Ecumenism because it allows for a new definition of a Christian. A Christian is anybody who is willing to accept both forgiveness of sin and power to live, vicariously from Jesus Christ. Both Roman and Protestant need to realize that the Reformation of the 16th century was both warranted and imperfect. It was warranted because the Papacy had vitiated the Gospel through political and economic adventures. Further, non-Scriptural constructs such as Original Sin, merits, and extra sacraments obscured the simplicity and efficacy of the Gospel. The Reformation was imperfect in that the belligerents on both sides overstated their case and accepted schism instead of synthesis. God hates both things, error and schism, and it’s time that we in the Church repent of both. Evangelism too, waits for a revised soteriology, because until the watching world sees Christians of whatever stripe engage in objective self-examination, it will not listen to what we have to say. My Bishop once observed after watching the movie, Titanic, that when the ship broke up, both halves sank.
[1] Luther wrote his mentor, Johann von Staupitz, vicar general for the Augustinian order in Germany, “For I hoped I might find peace of conscience with fasts, prayer, and the vigils with which I miserably afflicted my body, but the more I sweated it out like this, the less peace and tranquility I knew.” From The Works of Martin Luther, cited by James Kittelson, Luther The Reformer (Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Publishing House, 1986), p. 84.
[2] Summa Theologica, 1st part of 2nd part, Question 109, Article 7.
[3] Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1949), p. 15.
[4] Summa, 1st part of the 2nd part, Question 5, Article 7.
[5] Summa, 1st part of the 2nd part, Question62, Article 2.
[6] Summa, 1st part of the 2nd part, Question 5, Article 7.
[7] Summa, 1st part of the 2nd part, Question 114, Article 3.
[8] Summa, 1st part of the 2nd part, Question 114, Article 1.
[9] Summa Theologica Third Part, Question 62, Article 5.
[10] Ibid, Supplement, Question 17, Article 1.
[11] Aquinas produced “subtlety, but not wisdom” according to Will Durant. The Story of Philosophy (New York: Washington Square Press, 1969), p. 104.
[12] Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians, p. 64.
[13] Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians, p. 66.
[14] “…we say that God once established by his eternal and unchangeable plan those whom he long before determined once for all to receive into salvation, and those whom, on the other hand, he would devote to destruction.” Institutes of the Christian Religion (Philadelphia, PA: The Westminster Press, 1960), p. 931.
[15] The Works of James Arminius, Volume III (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1986), p. 496.
[16] Ibid, Volume I, p. 664.
[17] The Reformation, The Story of Civilization VI (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1957), p. 490.
[18] The Book of Common Prayer, The Holy Eucharist.
[19] James 2:14-26.
[20] Luther writes: “Under the papacy people were charitable and gave willingly; however, now under the gospel no one gives any more, but everyone simply extorts from the next person, and each wants to have it all to himself.” Sermons of Martin Luther, Volume 2, (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1996.) p. 233.
[21] For Luther, see his Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians, p. 16; for Calvin, see the Institutes, p. 922.
[22] Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians, p. 19.
[23] The ordo salutis is based upon Romans l8:28-30, and refers to the “order of salvation.” Read as a logical sequence, the verses make no sense. Read as a Hebraic chiasmus, they refer to savings acts of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, respectively.
[24] On December 6th, 1273, Aquinas experienced a long ecstasy during mass, and refused to write more. To Fr. Reginald he said, “I can do no more. Such secrets have been revealed to me that all I have written now appears to be of little value.” The Catholic Encyclopedia (Online Edition: Kevin Knight, 2003), biography of Thomas Aquinas.
[25] The Reformation, p. 104.
[26] Romans 5:9,10 and 10:9,10.
[27] Romans 5:9,10 and 10:9,10, Hebrews 9:28.
[28] Matthew 22:1-14.
[29] James 4:17.
[30] Matthew 3:29, Matthew 12:31.
