Contrasting Augustine and the Council of Orange (529 AD) with The Council of Trent (1563)
Contrasting Augustine and the Council of Orange (529 AD) with The Council of Trent (1563) The purpose of this paper is to contrast the currently accepted
Roman Catholic dogma with some of the early well-established beliefs and confessions in the church. It will reveal that the Roman
Catholic Council of Trent of 1563 has affirmations and denials that are clearly at odds with their own church doctor, St. Augustine, as well as at least one important council of the early church (Orange).
Please note the text below for Roman Catholic Counter-Reformation doctrine which embraces a form of semi-pelagianism and rejects, as an anathema, the Augustinian view of grace and the bondage of the will (as codified in the Council of Orange) and the Reformation teaching of divine monergism in salvation. There are 1000 years difference between these councils but you can see the strength of human nature asserting itself, ever gravitating back to the covenant of works - a never-ending battle throughout the history of the church. But before exploring Trent lets set the trend by offering a few key quotes from Augustine and Orange:
"In some places God requires newness of heart [Ezek 18:31]. But elsewhere he testifies that it is given by him [Ezek. 11:19; 36:26].
But what God promises we ourselves do not do through choice or nature; but he himself does through grace."- Augustine
"To will is of nature, but to will aright is of grace." - Augustine "The nature of the Divine goodness is not only to open to those who knock. but also to cause them to knock and ask."- Augustine
"Without the Spirit man's will is not free, since it has been laid under by shackling and conquering desires." - Augustine
I would especially like to draw your attention to Canon 6 of the Council of Orange so you can compare it with declarations in Trent below CANON 6. If anyone says that God has mercy upon us when, apart from his grace, we believe, will, desire, strive, labor, pray, watch, study, seek, ask, or knock, but does not confess that it is by the infusion and inspiration of the Holy Spirit within us that we have the faith, the will, or the strength to do all these things as we ought; or if anyone makes the assistance of grace depend on the humility or obedience of man and does not agree that it is a gift of grace itself that we are obedient and humble, he contradicts the Apostle who says, "What have you that you did not receive?" (1 Cor. 4:7), and,
"But by the grace of God I am what I am" (1 Cor. 15:10).
In contrast, here is the currently accepted dogma of Rome:
The Council of Trent The Sixth Session: Justification Canons ....
CANON IV. If any one shall affirm, that man's freewill, moved and excited by God, does not, by consenting, cooperate with God, the mover and exciter, so as to prepare and dispose itself for the attainment of justification; if moreover, anyone shall say, that the human will cannot refuse complying, if it pleases, but that it is inactive, and merely passive; let such an one be accursed"! [Note:
Compare with Orange CANON 5 > If anyone says that not only the increase of faith but also its beginning and the very desire for faith, by which we believe in Him who justifies the ungodly ... belongs to us by nature and not by a gift of grace, that is, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit amending our will and turning it from unbelief to faith and from godlessness to godliness, it is proof that he is opposed to the teaching of the Apostles, for blessed Paul says, "And I am sure that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus
Christ" (Phil. 1:6). And again, "For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God"
(Eph. 2:8)....] CANON V.- If anyone shall affirm, that since the fall of Adam, man's freewill is lost and extinguished; or, that it is a thing titular, yea a name, without a thing, and a fiction introduced by Satan into the Church; let such an one be accursed"! [Note: Compare with Orange CANON 8 > If anyone maintains that some are able to come to the grace of baptism by mercy but others through free will, which has manifestly been corrupted in all those who have been born after the transgression of the first man, it is proof that he has no place in the true faith. For he denies that the free will of all men has been weakened through the sin of the first man, or at least holds that it has been affected in such a way that they have still the ability to seek the mystery of eternal salvation by themselves without the revelation of God. The Lord himself shows how contradictory this is by declaring that no one is able to come to him "unless the Father who sent me draws him" (John 6:44), as he also says to Peter, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jona! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven" (Matt. 16:17), and as the Apostle says, "No