On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='rkwright' date='09 April 2010 - 02:12 PM' timestamp='1270836761' post='2090033']
Still this doesn't make much sense (at least to me). If you forgive a debt in the objective sense, the person is no longer a debter - whether they think they are or not (subjective). How can someone forgive a debt yet still call the other person a debtor when no debt exists.
[/quote]

You can't, but they can. If someone forgives my debt, I can still call myself a debtor because I cling to the burden of the debt.

[quote]My other thought on this (and just a thought I'm working through right now): sin only exists in the subjective, relational aspect. Sin does not exist in an objective since. When we say "action X is objectively sinful" we're not actually talking about a real sin, a real offense to God - we're speaking about hypotheticals. Sin only becomes manifest when an actor, subjectively, injures the relationship with God. Thus there can only be a "debt" with a "debtor". If the debtor refuses the forgiveness, then the debt still exists. But to say that objectively the debt is gone, but you're still a debtor is to call what is clean unclean - no?[/quote]

I disagree, but I suspect that this is more a matter of perspective. I'd like if more people would get involved.

[rkwright]

[quote name='Raphael' date='09 April 2010 - 01:36 PM' timestamp='1270838216' post='2090048']
You can't, but they can. If someone forgives my debt, I can still call myself a debtor because I cling to the burden of the debt.



I disagree, but I suspect that this is more a matter of perspective. I'd like if more people would get involved.
[/quote]

This is much better than my work right now

If God forgives your debt, How can God beaver dam one that is forgiven?

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='rkwright' date='09 April 2010 - 02:47 PM' timestamp='1270838840' post='2090058']
This is much better than my work right now

If God forgives your debt, How can God beaver dam one that is forgiven?
[/quote]

God doesn't really da[i][/i]mn anyone, does He? They da[i][/i]mn themselves by not allowing His forgiveness in.

[rkwright]

[quote name='Raphael' date='09 April 2010 - 01:52 PM' timestamp='1270839171' post='2090065']
God doesn't really da[i][/i]mn anyone, does He? They da[i][/i]mn themselves by not allowing His forgiveness in.
[/quote]

In one sense we say that; but in another it is God who passes judgment on our soul. I think we can say correctly that God damns sinners because of their own actions.

[Presbylicious]

[quote name='Nihil Obstat' date='09 April 2010 - 08:59 AM' timestamp='1270828769' post='2089964']
God offers grace freely, but He does not force us to accept it.
[/quote] Define 'force'. St. Paul uses rather active, forceful language when he speaks of God regenerating us.

Eph 2:4-7 (ESV)

[color="#0000ff"]But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, [sup]5[/sup]even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ— by grace you have been saved— [sup]6[/sup]and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, [sup]7[/sup]so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. [/color]

A good question to ask (and perhaps a topic for another thread?) would be, "what do Roman Catholics believe regarding God's calling of the elect".

As Charles Wesley so beautifully put it,
[center][i]Long my imprisoned spirit lay,
Fast bound in sin and nature's night,
Thine eye diffused a quickening ray,
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light!

My chains fell off, my heart was free!
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee
My chains fell off, my heart was free!
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.[/i]
[/center]

Edited April 9, 2010 by Presbylicious

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Nihil Obstat' date='09 April 2010 - 09:59 AM' timestamp='1270828769' post='2089964']
God offers grace freely, but He does not force us to accept it.
[/quote]
Yes . . . as St. Augustine said: "God made you without any cooperation on your part. For you did not lend your consent so that God could make you. How would you have consented, when you did not exist? But He who made you without your consent does not justify you without your consent. He made you without your knowledge, but He does not justify you without your willing it." [St. Augustine, Sermon 169:13]

[Nihil Obstat]

[quote name='Presbylicious' date='09 April 2010 - 02:32 PM' timestamp='1270841564' post='2090082']
Define 'force'. St. Paul uses rather active, forceful language when he speaks of God regenerating us.

Eph 2:4-7 (ESV)

[color="#0000ff"]But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, [sup]5[/sup]even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ— by grace you have been saved— [sup]6[/sup]and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, [sup]7[/sup]so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. [/color]

A good question to ask (and perhaps a topic for another thread?) would be, "what do Roman Catholics believe regarding God's calling of the elect".

As Charles Wesley so beautifully put it,
[center][i]Long my imprisoned spirit lay,
Fast bound in sin and nature's night,
Thine eye diffused a quickening ray,
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light!

My chains fell off, my heart was free!
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee
My chains fell off, my heart was free!
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.[/i]
[/center]
[/quote]


[quote name='Apotheoun' date='09 April 2010 - 03:03 PM' timestamp='1270843391' post='2090103']
Yes . . . as St. Augustine said: "God made you without any cooperation on your part. For you did not lend your consent so that God could make you. How would you have consented, when you did not exist? But He who made you without your consent does not justify you without your consent. He made you without your knowledge, but He does not justify you without your willing it." [St. Augustine, Sermon 169:13]
[/quote]
I agree with Apotheoun.

[Bennn]

Gods mercy is limitless. I suggest reading the writings of St. Faustina on the Divine Mercy. To say that God stops forgiving at a certain point in one's life is like saying that God stops being God. He IS Love and Mercy Itself, and until the last breath there is hope. I don't know what St. Alphonsus meant with it, though.

[Selah]

I agree, Bennn

[Innocent]

Today I found a similar concept in Cardinal Newman's Discourses To Mixed Congregations:

[quote]No; you cannot decide, my brethren, whether you are outrunning God's mercy, merely because the sin you now commit seems to be a small one; it is not always the greatest sin that is the last. Moreover you cannot calculate, which is to be your last sin, by the particular number of those which have gone before it, even if you could count them, for the number varies in different persons. This is another very serious circumstance. You may have committed but one or two sins, and yet find that you are ruined beyond redemption, though others who have done more are not. Why we know not, but God, who shows mercy and gives grace to all, shows greater mercy and gives more abundant grace to one man than another. To all He gives grace sufficient for their salvation; to all He gives far more than they have any right to {31} expect, and they can claim nothing; but to some He gives far more than to others. He tells us Himself, that, if the inhabitants of Tyre and Sidon had seen the miracles done in Chorazin, they would have done penance and turned to Him. That is, there was that which would have converted them, and it was not granted to them. Till we set this before ourselves, we have not a right view either of sin in itself, or of our own prospects if we live in it. As God determines for each the measure of his stature, and the complexion of his mind, and the number of his days, yet not the same for all; as one child of Adam is preordained to live one day, and another eighty years, so is it fixed that one should be reserved for his eightieth sin, another cut off after his first. Why this is, we know not; but it is parallel to what is done in human matters without exciting any surprise. Of two convicted offenders one is pardoned, one is left to suffer; and this might be done in a case where there was nothing to choose between the guilt of the one and of the other, and where the reasons which determine the difference of dealing towards the one and the other, whatever they are, are external to the individuals themselves. In like manner you have heard, I daresay, of decimating rebels, when they had been captured, that is, of executing every tenth and letting off the rest. So it is also with God's judgments, though we cannot sound the reasons of them. He is not bound to 1et off any; He has the power to condemn all: I only bring this to show how our rule of justice here below does not preclude a difference of dealing {32} with one man and with another. The Creator gives one man time for repentance, He carries off another by sudden death. He allows one man to die with the last Sacraments; another dies without a Priest to receive his imperfect contrition, and to absolve him; the one is pardoned, and will go to heaven; the other goes to the place of eternal punishment. No one can say how it will happen in his own case; no one can promise himself that he shall have time for repentance; or, if he have time, that he shall have any supernatural movement of the heart towards God; or, even then, that a Priest will be at hand to give him absolution. We may have sinned less than our next-door neighbour, yet that neighbour may be reserved for repentance and may reign with Christ, while we may be punished with the evil spirit.

Nay, some have been cut off and sent to hell for their first sin. This was the case, as divines teach, as regards the rebel Angels. For their first sin, and that a sin of thought, a single perfected act of pride, they lost their first estate, and became devils. And Saints and holy people record instances of men, and even children, who in like manner have uttered a first blasphemy or other deliberate sin, and were cut off without remedy. And a number of similar instances occur in Scripture; I mean of the awful punishment of a single sin, without respect to the virtue and general excellence of the sinner. Adam, for a single sin, small in appearance, the eating of the forbidden fruit, lost Paradise, and implicated all his posterity in his own ruin. The Bethsamites were {33} irreverent towards the ark of the Lord, and more than fifty thousand of them in consequence were smitten. Oza touched it with his hand, as if to save it from falling, and he was struck dead on the spot for his rashness. The man of God from Juda ate bread and drank water at Bethel, against the command of God, and he was forthwith killed by a lion on his return. Ananias and Sapphira told one lie, and fell down dead almost as the words left their mouth. Who are we, that God should wait for our repentance any longer, when He has not waited at all, before He cut off those who sinned less than we?

O my dear brethren, these presumptuous thoughts of ours arise from a defective notion of the malignity of sin viewed in itself. We are criminals, and we are no judges in our own case. We are fond of ourselves, and we take our own part, and we are familiar with sin, and, from pride, we do not like to confess ourselves lost. For all these reasons, we have no real idea what sin is, what its punishment is, and what grace is. We do not know what sin is, because we do not know what God is; we have no standard with which to compare it, till we know what God is. Only God's glories, His perfections, His holiness, His Majesty, His beauty, can teach us by the contrast how to think of sin; and since we do not see God here, till we see Him, we cannot form a just judgment what sin is; till we enter heaven, we must take what God tells us of sin, mainly on faith. Nay, even then, we shall be able to condemn sin, only so far as we are able to see and praise and glorify God; He alone can {34} duly judge of sin who can comprehend God; He only judged of sin according to the fulness of its evil, who, knowing the Father from eternity with a perfect knowledge, showed what He thought of sin by dying for it; He only, who was willing, though He was God, to suffer inconceivable pains of soul and body in order to make a satisfaction for it. Take His word, or rather, His deed, for the truth of this awful doctrine,—that a single mortal sin is enough to cut you off from God for ever. Go down to the grave with a single unrepented, unforgiven sin upon you, and you have enough to sink you down to hell; you have that, which to a certainty will be your ruin. It may be the hundredth sin, or it may be the first sin, no matter: one is enough to sink you; though the more you have, the deeper you will sink. You need not have your fill of sin in order to perish without remedy; there are those who lose both this world and the next; they choose rebellion, and receive, not its gains, but death. [/quote][url="http://www.newmanreader.org/works/discourses/discourse2.html"]SOURCE: DMC, Discourse 2. [/url]


[quote name='Bennn' date='10 April 2010 - 04:40 AM' timestamp='1270851054' post='2090188']
Gods mercy is limitless. I suggest reading the writings of St. Faustina on the Divine Mercy. To say that God stops forgiving at a certain point in one's life is like saying that God stops being God. He IS Love and Mercy Itself, and until the last breath there is hope. I don't know what St. Alphonsus meant with it, though.
[/quote]

I have a copy of [i]Divine Mercy In My Soul[/i] and read it occasionally. I wish someone would explain this sermon by St. Alphonsus more clearly, since it frightens me quite a bit.

[kafka]

The only sin God cannot forgive is final unrepentance which is what Jesus called the sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit:

{12:31} For this reason, I say to you: Every sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven men, but blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven.

the sin of final unrepentance of any mortal sins on one's conscience at the moment of one's death is the sin of blasphemy against the Spirit. All sins will be forgiven if one truly repents, up to the moment of one's death since the Spirit offers grace even to the hardest sinners up until the state of his soul is finalized in death.

{12:32} And anyone who will have spoken a word against the Son of man shall be forgiven. But whoever will have spoken against the Holy Spirit shall not be forgiven, neither in this age, nor in the future age.

one cannot be forgiven the sin against the Spirit in this age since once one dies with unrepentant mortals sins on his conscience; his state of soul is finalized and He is immediately judged by God and sent to Hell.

One cannot be forgiven in the future age which is after the general resurrection and general judgment known as the New Heaven and the New Earth since once one is sent to Hell he will only be reunited with his body in the general resurrection to be judged and further punished by being given the second death and cast into the New Hell (pool of fire below):

{20:13} And the sea gave up the dead who were in it. And death and Hell gave up their dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one according to his works.
{20:14} And Hell and death were cast into the pool of fire. This is the second death.
{20:15} And whoever was not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the [b]pool of fire[/b].

The pool of fire is the New Hell created and designed by God to contain both soul and body of the unjust, after the general resurrection and judgment.

Now one has to apply this to Saint Alphonsus' teaching:

According to Scripture and many of the saints, [b]God has fixed for each of us the number of our days[/b], the degrees of health and talent which will be given to us, and so has He determined the number of sins He will pardon; when this number is completed, He will pardon no more.

God has fixed the number of our days meaning He knows and has decided when we will die. The number of sins can only be reached in death, since once one dies his state of soul is finalized, and also God does not permit the just as well as the unjust to sin anymore, thus He cannot pardon anymore once one is consumed in death. The number is determined, since God knows when the sinner will die and be able to sin no more.

God will forgive any and all mortal sins which we have truly repented of before God subsumes us in death.

Edited April 25, 2010 by kafka

[kafka]

and I dont know the answer to your question, Innocent. I think Saint Alphonsus was teaching his own understanding based on Scripture and the Saints, but one needs to read it with a critical eye based on the all the Teachings of Sacred Tradition, Scripture and Magisterium in order try to understand what he is trying to express, like I attempted above.

Edited April 25, 2010 by kafka

[Bennn]

Excellent post, Kafka. In the Gospel of Saint John it is explained to us how condemnation works. The true Light which enlightens every man, came into the world, but the world did not accept It. Those who do accept It, however, have been given the ability to become sons of God. It is only our own lack of repentance that can block us from salvation. Gods mercy is endless, because it is divine. We can only be condemned if we choose to be.

[kafka]

[quote name='Bennn' date='25 April 2010 - 03:48 PM' timestamp='1272224903' post='2099834']
Excellent post, Kafka. In the Gospel of Saint John it is explained to us how condemnation works. The true Light which enlightens every man, came into the world, but the world did not accept It. Those who do accept It, however, have been given the ability to become sons of God. It is only our own lack of repentance that can block us from salvation. Gods mercy is endless, because it is divine. We can only be condemned if we choose to be.
[/quote]
thanks, hope it helps Innocent. And good insight on your part.

In John's prologue "the true Light" is the Holy Spirit. The passage is Trinitarian. God is the Father, the Word is the Son, the Light is the Spirit. In the Latin: Deus, Verbum, Vitam. Father, Son, Spirit.

God is Awesome. Praise be God.

Edited April 25, 2010 by kafka

[kafka]

On a more positive note, I think another point Saint Alphonsus is making here is that God tends to take us when we have reached our limit for doing good in this our first temporal life. I've seen this teaching in St. Hildegard's Scivias, and I am sure it is expressed in Sacred Scripture.

In general we are suppose to do as much good in this our first temporal life as possible as JPII taught in Veritatis Splendor, however we are weak and finite human creatures, with a fallen nature, so there is a limit to how much good we may accomplish in our unique vocations and circumstances of this our first life. So God in his wisdom, has this way of ordering life so that he takes those who cooperate with his grace when they have reached their full capacity and limit for goodness.

For example Cardinal Avery Dulles taught and wrote theology for many decades. Toward the end of his life he caught a debilitating sickness, which rendered him unable to speak, then eventually he had a hard time writing, yet he said that his mind remained lucid to the end. He could no longer write or teach, so God took him (shortly after Pope Benedict visited him!). Same with other Saints, like Aquinas, it seems God took him at the height of his powers after he had written so brilliantly and profusely on a broad range of theological topics. Saint Therese was taken when she was young and in full bloom, like a beautiful daisy consumed by winter. Saint Faustina died at the age of 33, the same age as Our Lord. Saint Dominic Savio died young, since his vocation was different, etc.

Edited April 26, 2010 by kafka