Katesismo

Blessing and Grace

By Bro. Romy D. Delima

In the catechism of the Catholic Church, grace is defined as an interior, supernatural gift bestowed on us by God through the merit of Jesus Christ for our salvation. It simply means that the divine life of God is share to our souls. We can’t live in a Christ-like manner if we don’t possess grace, we can not enter heaven without grace. That grace essential to our soul every moment of our lives is called sanctifying grace (a.k.a. habitual or perpetual grace), for without it our soul has no divine life, and it is dead. One’s sanctity in heaven is based on the degree of immersion with sanctifying grace on one’s soul at the very moment of death.

Sanctifying grace is first infused on our soul at our baptism. We have three duties regarding that grace.

1. We have to protect and guard that grace, a single mortal sin committed is enough to lose it.
2. When we lost it, re-acquire it quickly. The sacrament of penance brings back that grace in our soul again.
3. We have to nourish it, for God admonishes us to perfect our lives by doing virtuous deeds when we are in the state of sanctifying grace.

Maintaining that grace in our souls is no easy thing for mortals like us. And God knows that, so he sends us another grace to help us towards our duties on it by enlightening our minds to know right from wrong, and strengthening our will to do God’s will. Actual grace is sent also not only to good people with grace in their soul but to souls who are lost to help them find their way back to Him, to earn Sanctifying grace for his soul.

Doing virtuous deeds not in the state of grace is inutile because we are not in communion with God.

Graces are blessings to our souls but not all blessings (natural graces) are necessarily graces to our souls, in the strict sense. God gives us blessings in many different ways and forms. He blesses us with beautiful faces, good jobs, nice houses, happy relationship, health, wealth, so on and so forth. These blessings can merit us heaven or damnation to our soul, depends on how we use those or how our attitude towards life for not having those.

“There may be those on earth who dress better or eat better, but those who enjoy the peace of God sleep better.”