Wednesday, February 6, 2013
427. What are the goods that we can merit?
(Comp 427) Moved by the Holy Spirit, we
can merit for ourselves and for others the graces needed for our sanctification
and for the attainment of eternal life. Even temporal goods, suitable for us,
can be merited in accordance with the plan of God. No one, however, can merit
the initial grace which is at the origin of conversion and justification.
“In brief”
(CCC 2027) No one can merit the initial grace which is at
the origin of conversion. Moved by the Holy Spirit, we can merit for ourselves
and for others all the graces needed to attain eternal life, as well as
necessary temporal goods.
To deepen and
explain
(CCC 2010) Since the initiative belongs to God in the order
of grace, no one can merit the initial
grace of forgiveness and justification, at the beginning of conversion.
Moved by the Holy Spirit and by charity, we
can then merit for ourselves and for others the graces needed for our
sanctification, for the increase of grace and charity, and for the attainment
of eternal life. Even temporal goods like health and friendship can be merited
in accordance with God's wisdom. These graces and goods are the object of
Christian prayer. Prayer attends to the grace we need for meritorious actions.
Reflection
(CCC 2011) The charity
of Christ is the source in us of all our merits before God. Grace, by
uniting us to Christ in active love, ensures the supernatural quality of our
acts and consequently their merit before God and before men. The saints have
always had a lively awareness that their merits were pure grace. After earth's
exile, I hope to go and enjoy you in the fatherland, but I do not want to lay
up merits for heaven. I want to work for your love alone.... In the evening of this life, I shall appear before
you with empty hands, for I do not ask you, Lord, to count my works. All our
justice is blemished in your eyes. I wish, then, to be clothed in your own justice and to receive from your love the eternal possession of yourself [St. Therese of Lisieux,
"Act of Offering" in Story of a
Soul, tr. John Clarke (Washington Dc: ICS, 1981), 277].
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