Moreover St. Paul , and after him the councils, regarded death and original sin as two distinct things transmitted by Adam. However, the occasion of a fault is not necessarily a fault, and whilst original sin is effaced by baptism concupiscence still remains in the person baptized ; therefore original sin and concupiscence cannot be one and the same thing, as was held by the early Protestants see Council of Trent, Sess.
If he has lost it for us we were to have received it from him at our birth with the other prerogatives of our race. Therefore the absence of sanctifying grace in a child is a real privation, it is the want of something that should have been in him according to the Divine plan.
If this favour is not merely something physical but is something in the moral order, if it is holiness , its privation may be called a sin. But sanctifying grace is holiness and is so called by the Council of Trent , because holiness consists in union with God , and grace unites us intimately with God.
Moral goodness consists in this, that our action is according to the moral law , but grace is a deification, as the Fathers say, a perfect conformity with God who is the first rule of all morality. Sanctifying grace therefore enters into the moral order, not as an act that passes but as a permanent tendency which exists even when the subject who possesses it does not act; it is a turning towards God , conversio ad Deum.
Consequently the privation of this grace, even without any other act, would be a stain, a moral deformity, a turning away from God , aversio a Deo , and this character is not found in any other effect of the fault of Adam. This privation, therefore, is the hereditary stain.
How voluntary "There can be no sin that is not voluntary , the learned and the ignorant admit this evident truth ", writes St. Augustine De vera relig. The Church has condemned the opposite solution given by Baius [prop. But how can original sin be even indirectly voluntary for a child that has never used its personal free will? Certain Protestants hold that a child on coming to the use of reason will consent to its original sin; but in reality no one ever thought of giving this consent.
Besides, even before the use of reason, sin is already in the soul , according to the data of Tradition regarding the baptism of children and the sin contracted by generation. Some theosophists and spiritists admit the pre-existence of souls that have sinned in a former life which they now forget; but apart from the absurdity of this metempsychosis , it contradicts the doctrine of original sin, it substitutes a number of particular sins for the one sin of a common father transmitting sin and death to all cf.
Romans sqq. The whole Christian religion , says St. Augustine , may be summed up in the intervention of two men, the one to ruin us, the other to save us Of Sin and Merit I. The right solution is to be sought in the free will of Adam in his sin , and this free will was ours: "we were all in Adam ", says St.
Ambrose , cited by St. Augustine Opus imperf. Basil attributes to us the act of the first man : "Because we did not fast when Adam ate the forbidden fruit we have been turned out of the garden of Paradise " Hom.
Earlier still is the testimony of St. Thomas thus explains this moral unity of our will with the will of Adam. Considered in the second way an act can be his although he has not done it himself, nor has it been done by his free will but by the rest of the society or by its head, the nation being considered as doing what the prince does. For a society is considered as a single man of whom the individuals are the different members St.
Paul, 1 Corinthians Thus the multitude of men who receive their human nature from Adam is to be considered as a single community or rather as a single body. If the man , whose privation of original justice is due to Adam , is considered as a private person , this privation is not his 'fault', for a fault is essentially voluntary.
If, however, we consider him as a member of the family of Adam , as if all men were only one man, then his privation partakes of the nature of sin on account of its voluntary origin, which is the actual sin of Adam " De Malo, iv, 1. It is this law of solidarity, admitted by common sentiment, which attributes to children a part of the shame resulting from the father's crime. It is not a personal crime, objected the Pelagians.
Augustine , " but it is paternal crime" Op. Being a distinct person I am not strictly responsible for the crime of another; the act is not mine. Yet, as a member of the human family , I am supposed to have acted with its head who represented it with regard to the conservation or the loss of grace. I am, therefore, responsible for my privation of grace, taking responsibility in the largest sense of the word.
This, however, is enough to make the state of privation of grace in a certain degree voluntary , and, therefore, "without absurdity it may be said to be voluntary " St. Augustine , "Retract. Thus the principal difficulties of non-believers against the transmission of sin are answered.
Our dogma does not attribute to the children of Adam any properly so-called responsibility for the act of their father, nor do we say that original sin is voluntary in the strict sense of the word. It is true that, considered as "a moral deformity", "a separation from God ", as "the death of the soul ", original sin is a real sin which deprives the soul of sanctifying grace. It has the same claim to be a sin as has habitual sin , which is the state in which an adult is placed by a grave and personal fault, the "stain" which St.
Thomas defines as "the privation of grace" I-II ; III, ad 3 , and it is from this point of view that baptism , putting an end to the privation of grace, "takes away all that is really and properly sin ", for concupiscence which remains "is not really and properly sin ", although its transmission was equally voluntary Council of Trent, Sess.
Considered precisely as voluntary , original sin is only the shadow of sin properly so-called. According to St. Thomas In II Sent. Several theologians of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, neglecting the importance of the privation of grace in the explanation of original sin, and explaining it only by the participation we are supposed to have in the act of Adam , exaggerate this participation.
I finally had it explained today in Bible study. Unlike her God must have known in advance that Adam and Eve will disobey him. Who wants someone to love you who was forced?!? Beware of what each brings into the table, least suffering tricks you into supporting it rather than you choosing to cultivate joy, happiness, love.
Indeed through one man, Adam, sin entered the world, and through one man, Jesus, humanity is restored: now God has given each the choice to know love and serve God or do something else.
What will each choose to do with the present opportunity? What will each soon to bring into this world? In actuality the choice is between accepting or rejecting love, truth, happiness, this, that and the other things and following through appropriately. God has given each the choice and infinite possibilities choose amongst the better ways now and onward.
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It is a deprivation, a loss of the original holiness and righteousness with which our first parents were created. When God made them, he filled Adam and Eve with all the grace and virtue they would ever need, and they experienced a close relationship with God beyond our ability to know. Because of the unity of the human race, everyone is affected by the sin of our first parents, just as, in turn, humanity is restored to a right relationship with God by Jesus Christ.
Do we commit Original Sin? Each of us inherits Original Sin, but it is not a personal fault of ours. It is a deprivation for each of us of original holiness and justice. This inheritance leaves us in a world that is subject to suffering and death, as well as in an environment in which the accumulated sins and failings of others disturb peace and order. What is the effect of Original Sin upon us? Original Sin underlies all other sins and causes our natural powers of knowing and loving to be wounded.
We are subject to ignorance, which makes it difficult for us to know the truth, and for some, even to believe that truth exists.
We also endure suffering and death and have a disorder in our appetites and an inclination to sin. Adam and Eve were created with immortal bodies. They knew no suffering, they knew no disease, they knew no death.
But ours are. Adam was tested by God not just as Adam but as the representative of the whole human race, since we are all the seed of Adam. Just as David and Goliath met on the battlefield as champions of their respective armies, Adam was our champion. In the battle against the evil one, Adam lost.
As a result, we also lost. They do not understand how the Church is using the term original sin. God no longer walked the earth with man. There was a fundamental change in the relationship of man to nature and a fundamental change in nature itself cf. A fundamental change in the relationship between man and woman.
A fundamental change in relationships among all men, since sin and death had entered the world. A fundamental change in the nature of man himself. This parallel is paramount. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.
How is that possible? Because Levi was in Abraham—in his loins, according to the Bible. This is the same concept we are talking about with original sin and being in Adam and with salvation and being in Christ.
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