Day: August 3, 2022

In short, we must be thoroughly persuaded that all our welfare depends on prayer: our change of life depends on prayer; our victory over temptations depends on prayer; on prayer depends our obtaining Divine love, together with perfection, perseverance, and eternal salvation.

So that, in the first place, the intention of St. Thomas is not to prove that some sinners are deprived of all actual grace, and therefore, being unable to avoid all sin, they fall, and are all the same worthy of punishment; but his intention is to prove against the Pelagians that a man who remains without sanctifying grace cannot abstain from sinning. And this is the teaching of the Thomists in their comments on this passage.

What cruel swords of anguish and remorse for the damned will the lights, the calls, and all the other graces be which they received from God in order to repent and be saved! They will say: “We might have become saints and happy for ever in Heaven, but now, alas, we must be forever miserable in hell!”