Sect. 225What Justification IsWhat Justification Is

Our treatise on the supernatural order and grace (Book III. Part II.) deals fully with the transforming, elevating, and deifying effect of grace on the justified soul. The sublime depth of the old doctrine of the Church stands in singular contrast to the shallow innovations of the pretended Reformers. The old excels the new as much as the adopted Son of God, the heir of the kingdom and partaker of the Divine nature, excels the prodigal who “is accounted righteous before God; God, overlooking man’s sins and crediting him with the merits of Christ.” We have not the heart, nor do we think it worth our while, to follow the maze of Protestant variations on the intrinsic character of justification. Osiander († 1552) enumerates twenty divergent systems current in his time. We give the Catholic dogma as formulated at Trent. The reader must turn to Book III. Part II. for the speculative theology bearing on the subject.

The seventh chapter of the Sixth Session of the Council of Trent is headed: “What the Justification of the Sinner [impii=lit. ‘a man not in due relation to God’] is, and what are its causes [viz. the several agents which influence its coming into existence].”

“Upon this disposition and preparation follows justification, which is not merely the remission of sin, but, moreover, the sanctification and renovation of the interior man by his voluntary acceptance of graces and gifts; whence the unjust is made just, the enemy a friend, that he may be heir according to hope of life everlasting (Tit. 3:7).

“The final cause of this justification is the glory of God and of Christ, and life everlasting.

“The efficient cause is the merciful God, Who gratuitously washes us and sanctifies us, signing and anointing us with the Holy Spirit of promise (1 Cor. 6:11; Tit. 3:5; Eph. 1:13), Who is the pledge of our inheritance.

“The meritorious cause is the Beloved Only-begotten Son of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, Who, when we were enemies, for the exceeding charity wherewith He loved us, by His most holy passion on the wood of the cross merited justification for us, and atoned for us to His Father (Rom. 5:10; Eph. 2:4).

“The instrumental cause is the sacrament of baptism, which is the sacrament of faith, without which (faith) no man was ever justified.

“Lastly, the only formal cause is the justice of God, not that by which He is Himself just, but that by which He maketh us just, by which, being enriched by Him, we are renewed in the spirit of our mind, and are not only reputed just, but are so in name and in fact, receiving in ourselves, every one according to his measure, the justice which the Holy Ghost divideth to every one according as He will (1 Cor. 12:11), and according to every one’s disposition and co-operation. For although no one can be just unless the merits of the passion of Christ be communicated to him, yet this (communication) takes place in the justification of the sinner when, by the merit of the said most holy passion, the charity of God is diffused by the Holy Ghost in the hearts of those who are justified, and is inherent (inhæret) in them. Whence in the act of justification, with the remission of his sins man receives all at once, through Christ, on Whom he is ingrafted, the infused gifts of faith, hope, and charity. For faith without hope and charity neither unites man perfectly with Christ, nor makes him a living member of His body.…”