Quitting the Quintilemma: Eternal Security and Warnings of Falling Away: A Response to William Lane Craig

In a previous post (HERE), I presented an argument against the doctrine of eternal security in which I argued that, in order to avoid antinomianism while maintaining eternal security, a proponent of the doctrine of eternal security has four possible moves, none of which is ultimately acceptable: (i) Antinomianism; (ii) No true Christian (i.e., no person in the state of justification) has ever committed the sins listed in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, Galatians 5:19-21, and Revelation 21:8; (iii) Antinomianism minus apostacy; (iv) Sacred Scripture contains numerous completely pointless warnings. This set up a quintilemma in which it was concluded that the doctrine of eternal security is false. Focusing on (iv), if the doctrine of eternal security is true, then it would seem that Scripture contains pointless warnings. For if a Christian cannot lose his salvation, then warnings about Christians losing their salvation are pointless.

Thomism, Molinism, and God's Universal Salvific Will

One of the central disputes between Thomists and Molinists is over whether actual grace is intrinsically efficacious (Thomism) or extrinsically efficacious (Molinism). The late, great Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange explains this difference as follows:

According to Molinism, grace is efficacious only because God foresees that man will consent, whereas, for St. Thomas, “God indeed moves the will immutably, because of the efficacy of the moving power which cannot fail; but because of the nature of the will that is moved, which is indifferently disposed toward various things, it is not necessitated but remains free” (God, His Existence and His Nature, Vol. II pg. 516).

The Catholic Doctrine of Merit: Calvin's "No Contribution" Objection

Objection: Even if our good works are the products of God’s grace, what we could contribute to them would only detract from their goodness. Thus, any contribution we could make to our good works would be an evil contribution. Since merit can accrue to us only insofar as we make a good contribution to a praiseworthy action, it follows, therefore, that our good works cannot be meritorious. Everything deserving of praise in our good works is attributable solely to God’s grace. As John Calvin explains:

An Incarnational Problem with Molinism?

The dogma of the Incarnation holds that the Divine Logos “became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). To elaborate, the Second Person of the Trinity, the eternal Son of God, took on a complete human nature in such a way that He was truly God and truly man (Christ). This mysterious and sublime union is referred to in theology as the Hypostatic Union. To properly understand this great mystery, we must neither divide the person (which would be the heresy of Nestorianism) nor confuse the natures (which would be the heresy of Monophysitism). In other words, there is but one person in the incarnated Christ, the Divine Logos; and there are two complete and distinct natures in the incarnated Christ, Divine and human. Moreover, we must recognize that in the Incarnated Christ, due to the completeness of both natures, there are two wills (the Divine will and a human will), rather than just one will (which would be the heresy of Monothelitism).

In this reflection, I want to focus on the following doctrine pertaining to the incarnated Christ and how it creates a pressing puzzle for Molinism:

“Christ did not merely not sin in actuality, but He also could not sin. [Sent. fidei proxima.]” (Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, pg. 184)