Justification and meaning of increase of justification

from comment 108 here http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/12/justification-catholic-church-and-the-judaizers/

The righteousness that is infused into us at baptism was merited for us [by way of satisfaction] through Christ’s sacrifice, and yet is also, by infusion, truly ours. And the increases in righteousness through acts of love flowing from that infused agape are Christ’s because they are the dynamic expression of that infused agape, and are ours, because they are our cooperation in that agape. This is one implication of the ontology of participation.

from comment   5   here
http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/12/justification-catholic-church-and-the-judaizers/ :

The distinction between justification and its increase is not trivial. It makes the difference between Pelagianism and the orthodox Catholic faith. The notion that we can justify ourselves by our own works, is nothing less than Pelagianism. But the notion that when in a state of grace, none of our good deeds really matters for our eternal condition, is temporal nihilism. So the distinction between justification and its increase is essential for avoiding both of those alternatives.

The different between the soteriology of the Galatian agitators and that of Trent is like night and day. The former rejected the New Covenant, while the latter embraced it. That’s the difference between rejecting Christ and embracing Him. That’s not a trivial difference. That’s the difference that will ultimately separate all men into goats and sheep.

and from comment 11:

We work not for justification, but only for its increase. We can never merit justification. But once justified, we can, by the grace of God, merit eternal life, because in a state of grace (initiated by God), even one act done in agape for the God who is infinite Love merits an infinite reward, and this infinite reward is the eternal vision of God Himself.......................................................

and assurance of the future (Romans 5:9). The initial justification determines our present and future justification.

Only if we persevere. All the Scriptural warnings about persevering would be heretical if past justification guaranteed future justification

from comment 244 here: http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/09/does-the-bible-teach-sola-fide/

In addition to what Andrew said, it might be worthwhile to clarify the Catholic understanding of justification in light of your phrase “justification is a process.” In Catholic doctrine, the term ‘justification’ can refer both to an instant event, and a process. The instant event is the translation from a state of sin to a state of grace, which takes place at baptism or in the sacrament of penance in the case of mortal sins committed after baptism. The process of justification, on the other hand, is subsequent to that instantaneous event. For those persons already in a state of grace, the growth in grace that takes place through the sacraments, prayer, and good works done in grace, is the process of increasing in the justice already received, and this too is a kind of justification. But the process cannot take place without the instantaneous event taking place first.

also in comment  54    here http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2013/01/holy-church-finding-jesus-as-a-reverted-catholic-a-testimonial-response-to-chris-castaldo/#comment-47387

Catholic theology distinguishes between justification in the sense of translation from a state of enmity against God (i.e. being dead in sin) to the state of grace and adoption through Christ, and justification in the sense of growing in grace. Only those already justified in the first sense (which is instantaneous) can then be justified in the second sense (which is ongoing). We cooperate in both senses of justification, but our cooperation in justification-as-translation is non-meritorious, whereas once in a state of grace, our cooperation in justification-as-increase is meritorious. Our reward for acts done out of agape, is a greater participation in agape

and

God looks at the heart, and that is why there is a difference between dead works that conform externally to the law, and good works done out of agape. At justification-as-translation, there is not only a forgiveness of sins, but there is also an infusion of sanctifying grace faith, hope, and agape. At that moment, the justified person receives living faith in his heart. And because agape is righteousness, and living faith includes agape, the person having living faith is “counted [by God] for righteousness because he is righteous. The reason why in this verse is it “difficult to understand righteousness as something which is behavioral” is because righteousness is not fundamentally behavioral. It is not fundamentally process; it is who God is. Of course that is expressed in behavior and external conduct, but that’s not the essence of righteousness. That’s the difference between theagape paradigm, and the list paradigm, discussed in some detail in the “Imputation and Paradigms” post, and the comments following it. This is what St. Paul is talking about in Romans 2, in his distinction between circumcision of the flesh, and circumcision of the heart.

and

Why is it not that we cannot simply read this and walk away understanding Paul’s assertion that man is not justified by works because through faith man is cleansed by the forgiveness of sins, which is granted through the sacrament of baptism. Why must we add behavioral aspects here when Paul sees David really describing the very issue of justification in a description of sins being forgiven?>

First, as I just said, righteousness is not fundamentally behavioral. Secondly, righteousness is not fundamentally the absence of sin, or the absence of guilt. Rocks and trees have no sin and no guilt, but they aren’t righteous. No one who does not love God is righteous.

and

We do not make ourselves righteous by our works, or from a state of unrighteousness “earn” the status of being righteous. We are given righteousness as a gift, in baptism, received by faith. At that moment, we are made righteous. Subsequently, by walking in that righteousness we grow in righteousness, not from unrighteousness to righteousness, but from righteousness to greater participation in righteousness.

from comment 56 :

So, if “righteousness” is not fundamentally “behavioral”, how should we define it? Is it a quality? Is it a state ?

In God, Righteousness is God Himself. When we are made righteous at the moment of justification, we receive by infusion a supernatural participation in God’s righteousness. In God, who has no parts, there is no difference between His very being and His powers. In us, however, our soul is not our will. Rather, our will is a power in and of our soul. We receive infused supernatural participation in God’s righteousness both in our soul, and in our will. As received into our soul, it is called sanctifying grace, and is a habitus entitativus because by participation in the divine nature the soul is given a new nature. As received into our will it is called agape (or charity), and is a habitus operativus, because by participation in the divine nature, the will is given a new operation, namely, loving God as He loves Himself.

and

St. Thomas explains here first that a virtue is a perfect disposition, and that perfection is according to the nature of a thing. For example, it is not a perfection of the bones of a hummingbird to be capable of withstanding the weight of an elephant; the bones of a hummingbird are perfect when they are sufficiently light for flight powered by wings of the size and strength of a hummingbird. But natural virtues dispose man to his natural end (which is to know and love God as First Cause), whereas infused [supernatural] virtues dispose man to know and love God as He knows and loves Himself [as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit]. (On the distinction between man’s natural end, and man’s supernatural end, see “Nature, Grace, and Man’s Supernatural End: Feingold, Kline, and Clark.”)

So supernatural virtues are perfect in relation to a nature higher than man’s own nature. And it is in receiving this new nature by participation (while retaining our human nature) that we are said to be born again as sons of God, having (by participation) God’s own nature and thus rightly and truly being called “sons of God” and members of His family, not by the human nature we received when we were conceived in our natural mother’s womb, but the divine nature we received when were conceived again in the womb of Holy Mother Church, i.e. in the laver of regeneration. Only by receiving this new nature are the infused (supernatural) virtues (i.e. faith, hope, and charity) perfections according to our [new] nature, because if our only nature were the human nature in which we were first conceived, these supernatural virtues would not be perfections in relation to our nature.

Another very good article here: http://www.saintaquinas.com/Justification_by_Grace.html

http://www.scripturecatholic.com/justification.html#justification-I

http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/12/justification-catholic-church-and-the-judaizers/

The above link goes into some detail on the RC view of Justification and what is meant by an increase of justification. Here are a few excerpts :

"Justification is defined by the Council of Trent as “translation from that state in which man is born a child of the first Adam, to the state of grace and of the adoption of the sons of God through the second Adam, Jesus Christ, our Savior.” (Trent VI.4)¹ Justification takes place through the sacrament of baptism, and then, if a person falls into mortal sin, through the sacrament of penance. At the instant of justification, the person receives sanctifying grace and the theological (supernatural) virtues of faith, hope and charity (agape). This does not mean that these cannot be received prior to the actual reception of the sacrament of baptism. Even then, however, they come through the sacrament, and anticipate its reception.

"An increase in justification is not the same thing as justification. An increase in justification is not the translation from a state in which one is deprived of sanctifying grace to a state in which one has sanctifying grace. An increase in justification is an increase in sanctifying grace from a condition in which one already has sanctifying grace. This is what St. Peter means in exhorting believers to grow in grace. (2 Pet 3:18) An increase in justification is not receiving sanctifying grace where there is none, but a movement of growth from grace to more grace, and thus a growth in conformity to the likeness of Christ, by an increase in the capacity of our participation in the divine nature. (2 Pet 1:4)....................................................

" My point here is to show that claiming that the Catholic Church teaches that we are justified by “faith and works” is false, because such a claim mistakenly conflates increases in justification with justification. A role for works in the increase of justification does not entail that there is a role for works in justification.³

"The distinction between justification and its increase is not trivial. It makes the difference between Pelagianism and the orthodox Catholic faith. The notion that we can justify ourselves by our own works, is nothing less than Pelagianism. But the notion that when in a state of grace, none of our good deeds really matters for our eternal condition, is temporal nihilism. So the distinction between justification and its increase is essential for avoiding both of those alternatives.

and

from comment 60 

The argument goes like this. Sin is an offense against God. An offense is remitted when the soul of the offender is at peace with the offended, and thus a sin is remitted when God is at peace with us. But in the case of the remission of sin, the change is not on God’s side, since God’s love is eternal and unchangeable. Rather, the change is on our side, because in a state of friendship with God we are participating in His love, while in a state of enmity against Him we are not participating in His love. Now our participation in God’s love is grace. Therefore, the infusion of grace is necessary for the remission of sin. And since regeneration is the infusion of sanctifying grace and agape, it follows that there is no remission of sin without regeneration [i.e. without being in a state of grace].

and from 69

If justification were merely forensic, and simul iustus et peccator were true, there would be no “necessity” that an interior sanctification accompany justification.

and from 76

There are four things which are accounted to be necessary for the justification of the ungodly, viz. the infusion of grace, the movement of the free-will towards God by faith, the movement of the free-will towards [i.e. away from] sin, and the remission of sins. The reason for this is that, as stated above (Article 1), the justification of the ungodly is a movement whereby the soul is moved by God from a state of sin to a state of justice. Now in the movement whereby one thing is moved by another, three things are required: first, the motion of the mover; secondly, the movement of the moved; thirdly, the consummation of the movement, or the attainment of the end. On the part of the Divine motion, there is the infusion of grace; on the part of the free-will which is moved, there are two movements–of departure from the term “whence,” and of approach to the term “whereto”; but the consummation of the movement or the attainment of the end of the movement is implied in the remission of sins; for in this is the justification of the ungodly completed.

All four of these occur simultaneously. And after that, there is nothing left for God to do, for the person to be justified (in the sense of justification-as-translation). So these four are all part of the one instantaneous movement in which God moves us by the infusion of grace, and our will cooperates in turning away from sin and toward God in love. The terminus of this movement is the forgiveness of sin. Taylor discussed this in “Is Justification Instantaneous?”

and

Likewise, the Council of Trent (Session 6) teaches the following:

This disposition or preparation is followed by justification itself, which is not only a remission of sins but also the sanctification and renewal of the inward man through the voluntary reception of the grace and gifts whereby an unjust man becomes just and from being an enemy becomes a friend, that he may be an heir according to hope of life everlasting.

Justification is not merely the forgiveness of sins, but also the [instant] sanctification and renewal of the inward man through the infusion of grace and the supernatural gifts of faith, hope, and charity, by which man is a friend of God.

and

Trent continues:

[T]he single formal cause is the justice of God, not that by which He Himself is just, but that by which He makes us just, that, namely, with which we being endowed by Him, are renewed in the spirit of our mind, and not only are we reputed but we are truly called and are just, receiving justice within us, each one according to his own measure, which the Holy Ghost distributes to everyone as He wills, and according to each one’s disposition and cooperation.

We either have this justice, or we do not. And the moment we have it, we are justified. There is nothing left for God to do, to make us justified (in the justification-as-translation sense), as soon as we have received this “justice of God.” The reception of the “justice of God” and the forgiveness of sins are not two separate divine acts joined only by divine stipulation.

According to Trent, the justification of the sinner takes place in this way:

For though no one can be just except he to whom the merits of the passion of our Lord Jesus Christ are communicated, yet this takes place in that justification of the sinner, when by the merit of the most holy passion, the charity of God is poured forth by the Holy Ghost in the hearts of those who are justified and inheres in them; whence man through Jesus Christ, in whom he is ingrafted, receives in that justification, together with the remission of sins, all these infused at the same time, namely, faith, hope and charity.

In that moment of justification, man receives the forgiveness of sins and the infusion of the supernatural virtues of faith, hope, and charity. At that point, there is nothing else to be done for accomplishing justification (as translation).

As I said above, a detailed analysis of and debate about justification is off-topic for this thread. If you wish to continue the discussion please continue on a post about justification, such as “Justification: The Catholic Church and the Judaizers in St. Paul’s Letter to the Galatians,” or “Does the Bible Teach Sola Fide?.”

From the link below--more quotes

http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/01/the-catholic-protestant-divide-a-path-to-unity/

" Joint Declaration on the Doctrine ofJustification, Catholics and Lutherans not only agree on the assurance of salvation, but also formally and publicly declare it as permanent evidence of a pre-existing unification point. Paragraph 38 of the Joint Declaration exposes this with such alarming clarity, any Christian apologist should question the very need to defend his Faith to another Christian altogether:

“According to Catholic understanding, good works, made possible by grace and the working of the Holy Spirit, contribute to growth in grace, so that the righteousness that comes from God is preserved and communion with Christ is deepened. When Catholics affirm the “meritorious” character of good works, they wish to say that, according to the biblical witness, a reward in heaven is promised to these works. Their intention is to emphasize the responsibility of persons for their actions, not to contest the character of those works as gifts, or far less to deny that justificationalways remains the unmerited gift of grace.¹

From comment 5 here: http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2012/08/imputation-and-paradigms-a-reply-to-nicholas-batzig/  ---
" you stated

Subsequently, by growing in grace and agape, we grow in righteousness and thus in justification, not by moving from a state of imperfect justification, but from perfect justification to more perfect justification, through a greater measure of sanctifying grace and agape.

I do not understand the idea of moving from perfect justification to more perfect justification. If something is perfect it almost seems contradictory to say “more perfect”. Could explain?

As I explained in comment #11 of the “Nature, Grace, and Man’s Supernatural End” thread, there are two ways in which something can be perfected. One is by repairing a defect. That is a movement from imperfection to perfection. That’s the kind of perfection with which we are most familiar.

Another kind of perfection is not from imperfection, but from perfection to still greater perfection. The saints in heaven do not all have the same glory. Those who by grace lived lives of heroic virtue have great glory. Those who by grace made it in by ‘the skin of their teeth,’ as it were, have less glory. But none of the saints in heaven is in a condition of imperfection. Even the ones who have the least glory are still perfect in the sense that there is no defect in them. At the same time, the greater the glory, the greater the perfection, because a thing is more perfect the more it partakes of and shares in God who is all Perfection. A person who has just been baptized a moment ago is not, say, 30% righteous. He is 100% righteous, because of the infused agape he has received. But as he grows in agape, through the sacraments, prayer, and works of charity, he grows in righteousness; this is the meaning of increasing in justification (or growing in justification). In this process his ‘cup’ is enlarged, as it were, such that his 100% full small cup is now a 100% full larger cup. The growth in righteousness was not from 30% righteousness to some higher percentage of righteousness; it was from 100% to a larger 100%, from glory to still greater glory, from righteousness to still greater righteousness, from perfection to still greater perfection. The increase is in the capacity, not in the percentage of capacity. So different believers can have different shares of agape, and thus different shares in happiness, and yet each is fully righteous, and fully happy. This is how the saints in heaven are all perfectly happy, and yet some are happier than others, as Saint Thérèse of Lisieux explains in The Story of a Soul:

One day I expressed surprise that God does not give an equal amount of glory to all the elect in Heaven–I was afraid that they would not all be quite happy. She [Thérèse's sister Pauline] sent me to fetch Papa’s big tumbler, and put it beside my tiny thimble, then, filling both with water, she asked me which seemed the fuller. I replied that one was as full as the other–it was impossible to pour more water into either of them, for they could not hold it. In this way Pauline made it clear to me that in Heaven the least of the Blessed does not envy the happiness of the greatest; and so, by bringing the highest mysteries down to the level of my understanding, she gave my soul the food it needed.

quote below from comment  12 here: http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/03/st-thomas-aquinas-on-penance/

But if we have love for God (i.e. agape), then all that we do in that love is ordered toward heaven, and merits a supernatural reward, namely, a greater participation in the life of God. And that’s what Trent 6 is talking about when speaking about an increase in justification.

"from comment 108 here http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/12/justification-catholic-church-and-the-judaizers/#comment-40647

The paradigm you are bringing to these texts is not the same as the Catholic paradigm, according to which there is no either/or with regard to our righteousness in Christ, as though this righteousness is either entirely and only Christ’s, or entirely and only ours. The righteousness that is infused into us at baptism was merited for us [by way of satisfaction] through Christ’s sacrifice, and yet is also, by infusion, truly ours. And the increases in righteousness through acts of love flowing from that infusedagape are Christ’s because they are the dynamic expression of that infused agape, and are ours, because they are our cooperation in that agape. This is one implication of the ontology of participation.

from another comment 114 on this post someone argued against Aquinas's being in agreement with Trent: 

...............from Aquinas which I consider contradictory to Trent here it is:“On the contrary, The justification of the ungodly is caused by the justifying grace of the Holy Spirit. Now the Holy Spirit comes to men’s minds suddenly, according to Acts 2:2: “And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a mighty wind coming,” upon which the gloss says that “the grace of the Holy Ghost knows no tardy efforts.” Hence the justification of the ungodly is not successive, but instantaneous.”For me this is very problematic because Aquinas is here using justification in a very narrow sense which excludes it from possibly being a process. You actually admitted that Aquinas did not use the term justification for what Trent speaks about an increase in justice. This leads me to conclude that he distinguished the event of justification from the lifelong process of being conformed to the image of Christ. That’s the whole point Theophilogue tried to make with me in our debates when he said that Aquinas used the term much more narrowly than Trent. So either Aquinas is wrong or Trent is wrong.

The answer to this was given in comment 115

 When St. Thomas says “hence the justification of the ungodly is not successive, but instantaneous,” he is referring to the justification of the “ungodly.” He is not referring to the increase in justice by those already in a state of grace. Using the term ‘justification’ to refer to initial justification (or justification-as-translation) does not exclude the term from being used to refer to the process of growing in the justice received, for the reason I explained in #113. So there is no conflict here between St. Thomas and Trent.

from 113

 In Protestant theology justification is by extra nos imputation, and sanctification is by a progressive inward work of the Holy Spirit making us more and more conformed to the image of Christ. In St. Thomas, by contrast, there is no essential difference between the movement by which we come into a state of grace, and the movement by which we grow in grace, because both are by the infusion of sanctifying grace and agape. For this reason, what Trent Sess. 6 Chap. 10, and Canons 24 and 32 say concerning the increase in justice/grace, is fully in keeping with St. Thomas’s theology.

and from a comment on another blog here http://www.creedcodecult.com/oddly-enough-paul-echoed-jesus/

I already cited the Catechism on this point (justification is merited by the work of Christ on the cross). But your paradigm is keeping you from understanding my point because you refuse to see that justification has a past, ongoing, and future dynamic. This is why you have such a hard time with Paul’s statement that “the doers of the law will be justified,” but you have no problem with Jesus’ words that “he who hears these sayings of mine and does them…” or James’s statement that we should “be doers of the word, not hearers only.” It should be obvious that these three statements mirror each other, that they’re all normative, and that they’re all keepable. But for you, Rom. 2 is a sticking point because your paradigm doesn’t let you define justification broadly enough to reflect the NT usages of the term and concept.

from here: http://principiumunitatis.blogspot.com/2009/02/aquinas-on-instant-and-progressive.html

Instant justification is the restoration of rectitude of order between the highest power of our soul and God, by the infusion of grace, and thus by the gifts of faith, hope, and charity in which our will turns to God in love, and turns away from loving other things more than God. It is a fundamental reorientation of the will, and that is why it cannot be gradual, for either our will is oriented to God in love, or not. Jesus said, "No one can serve two masters." (St. Matthew 6:24) And "He who is not with me is against me". (St. Matthew 12:30) This fundamental orientation of the will at the moment of death determines whether a person spends eternity with God as friend, or eternally separated from God.

Progressive justification, by contrast, is the gradual restoration of rectitude of order between reason and the lower powers of the soul (i.e. the gradual reduction of concupiscence), and the gradual increase of rectitude of order in the habit of the will with respect to action, namely, giving to God and man what each is due, out of love for God as Father, through an increase in sanctifying grace (i.e. an increase in our participation in the divine life of the Trinity). This is how we gradually grow in justice, and thus gradually grow in sanctification. This can be seen in Chapter X of Session VI of the Council of Trent, which reads:

Having, therefore, been thus justified and made the friends and domestics of God, [Eph 2:19] advancing from virtue to virtue, [Ps. 83:7 / 84:7] they are renewed, as the Apostle says, day by day, [2 Cor. 4:16] that is, mortifying the members [Col. 3:5] of their flesh, and presenting them as instruments of justice unto sanctification, [Rom. 6:13, 19] they, through the observance of the commandments of God and of the Church, faith cooperating with good works, increase in that justice received through the grace of Christ and are further justified, as it is written: He that is just, let him be justified still; [Apoc. 22:11] and, Be not afraid to be justified even to death;[Ecclus. 18:22] and again, Do you see that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only? [James 2:24] This increase of justice holy Church asks for when she prays: "Give unto us, O Lord, an increase of faith, hope and charity." [Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost]


When the Council of Trent refers to our "having been justified", it is referring to the instant justification by which through grace we are made friends with God, by the reorientation of our will toward God in charity. When the Council of Trent then says that we "increase in that justice received through the grace of Christ", it is referring both to the progressive increase in the virtue of justice by the doing of virtuous acts (made possible by grace), and to the progressive mortification of the members of our flesh (i.e. the subjugation of our lower passions to reason) through our putting to death the "deeds of the body" by the Spirit (Rom 8:18). Notice also that it is in this way that the Council of Trent understands James 2:24. The justification that takes place through our works is not the instant justification that takes place in baptism by which we are made friends with God, but is rather the increase in justification that takes place as we grow in the virtue of justice and in the continual subjugation of concupiscence, and in the growing perfection of our love for God.

This explains, I hope, why it is misleading to claim that the Catholic Church makes sanctification depend on justification, without distinguishing between these two different ways in which through Christ we are justified. To have rectitude of order in all these ways is to be pure, for any impurity is an absence of rectitude of order. In this way, justification is sanctification, for sanctification is the purity necessary for us to see God. (Matthew 5:8; Hebrews 12:14) So these two ways in which we are justified are the two ways in which we are sanctified. Moreover, this also shows, I think, why philosophical anthropology is crucial for understanding soteriology. We cannot understand salvation until we understand the sickness from which we are saved. And we cannot understand this sickness until we understand the philosophical 'structure' of the human person.

and from 420 http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2012/08/imputation-and-paradigms-a-reply-to-nicholas-batzig/ :

 In one sense of the term, we are completely sanctified at our baptism, because through that sacrament we receive sanctifying grace and agape in the will, and there is no middle position between having these and not having these. That is, one’s will is either directed toward God as one’s supernatural end, or not directed toward God as one’s supernatural end. In that sense, one is either completely sanctified, or not sanctified at all. Another sense of the term ‘completely sanctified’ refers not only to the condition of the will, but includes also that of the lower appetite [i.e. the sense appetite], according to whether or not it is perfected in relation to reason-directed-by-agape. Growth in sanctification brings this lower appetite more and more into conformity with reason-as-directed-by-agape. Trent refers to this as “mortifying the members of their flesh,” and it is also described as a weakening of concupiscence. In order to be ‘completely sanctified’ in this sense, the lower appetite must perfectly possess the rectitude of order by which it is docile to reason-directed-by-agape, and concupiscence is thus vanquished entirely.

and from comment 422 :

Agape is righteousness. To grow in agape is to grow in righteousness. But growth in agape requires growth in sanctifying grace, by which we are made participants in the divine nature (i.e. theosis, divinization), and corresponds with a greater indwelling of the Most Holy Trinity. So it is impossible to grow in righteousness and not become more holy. God is agape, as the Apostle John testifies, so growing in agape is growing in our union with God who is holiness. And in that way, growth in justification is necessarily growth in holiness......

Growth in vanquishing concupiscence is not identical to growth in agape, because agape is in the will (i.e. the rational appetite), and concupiscence is in the lower appetite. But they correspond. The more one grows in agape, the more concupiscence is mastered and diminished.

and in comment    13     here http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/12/justification-catholic-church-and-the-judaizers/ :

The person who by acts of love (agape) increases his justification is subsequently “different” only in that it is a greater participation in the divine nature. But, there is no part of our justification that is from us, as though justification could be divided into parts. The conjunction of divine and human causality in the increase in justification is not part/part, as though God does part and we do part. God justifies us, but not without our free consent. Likewise, our actions in a state of grace are gratuitously meritorious, because it is God who freely and graciously granted us this grace, and every subsequent good act, done by us in agape, is a divinely-granted gift of participation in that divine movement of justification we received through our baptism.

and

  If justification absolutely depended on works, then even baptized babies who die in infancy could not be saved. But we know that baptized babies who die in infancy are saved. Hence, we know that justification does not absolutely require that the living faith possessed be expressed in works, or that justification be increased.

and

 The Church Fathers believed and taught that justification is sanctification. According to the Fathers, we come up from the font holy, and without sin.

and

a comment said

" Like the baptism of John the Baptist, Christian baptism doesn’t remove the filth of sin (1 Peter 3:21)."

the reply:

 That would make Christ no better than John the Baptist. It would also contradict what John the Baptist himself says in the Matt 3:11. It would also contradict the Nicene Creed and all the Church Fathers. You can accuse the Church of teaching a false gospel, but if in fact it were you who is teaching a false gospel and the Church and the Creed were orthodox, how would you know?

and

  In Catholic doctrine the sanctifying grace by which we receive the gift of living faith comes to us (in the New Covenant) through the sacrament of baptism.

and

In Catholic theology, you do the work of baptism to attain justification, and you won’t keep it unless you do a lifetime of other works thereafter.

That’s not true. In Catholic doctrine one loses justification only by committing a mortal sin. Justification doesn’t just fade away. 

 If you maintain and increase justification through works, what are you maintaining and increasing? Justification. Thus, the justification you possess thereafter is different. And it was attained partly through works.

The person who by acts of love (agape) increases his justification is subsequently “different” only in that it is a greater participation in the divine nature. But, there is no part of our justification that is from us, as though justification could be divided into parts. The conjunction of divine and human causality in the increase in justification is not part/part, as though God does part and we do part. God justifies us, but not without our free consent. Likewise, our actions in a state of grace are gratuitously meritorious, because it is God who freely and graciously granted us this grace, and every subsequent good act, done by us in agape, is a divinely-granted gift of participation in that divine movement of justification we received through our baptism.

I wrote, “Only if we persevere. All the Scriptural warnings about persevering would be heretical if past justification guaranteed future justification.”

[quoting the guy] I agree that Romans 5:1 and 5:9 can be reconciled to Catholicism if qualifications are added. But adding such qualifications is a less natural way to take the passages. Romans 5:1 attributes present peace to a past justification through faith. Catholicism, on the other hand, would attribute present peace to a combination between past justification and the ongoing maintaining and increasing of justification through a combination of faith and works.

Again, you’re reading Scripture without the aid of the Apostolic Tradition. First, as I explained above, there is no “maintaining” of justification. Second, as I explained just above, growth in justification is a graciously granted participation in God’s work of justifying us, an act by which He graciously grants us to be participants in the life and death of Christ. By trying to derive the Apostolic deposit from Scripture alone, when Scripture wasn’t intended to be an exhaustive theological manual, you end up taking as “the natural reading” an artificial interpretation imposed on a subset of the available data. The ‘natural’ way of interpreting a subset of data is not necessarily the right understanding of that subset, which right understanding can be seen only when the whole set of data is included.

and

As I said before, all the Scriptural warnings about persevering would be heretical if past justification guaranteed future justification. Nothing in your immediate paragraph above resolves that problem. If “initial justification” determined our “future justification”, all the Scriptural warnings about perseverance and apostasy would not only be misguided; they would be heretical, i.e. contradicting the doctrine that initial justification guarantees future justification.

For fifteen hundred years (and to this day) the Church believed that justification can be lost. The Orthodox also have always believed that justification can be lost. There are many places in the Fathers where we see that justification can be lost. Here’s one example from St. Augustine:

If, however, being already regenerate and justified, he relapses of his own will into an evil life, assuredly he cannot say, ‘I have not received [grace],’ because of his own free choice he has lost the grace of God, that he had received.” (On Rebuke and Grace, chpt. 6:9)

But we can find the same teaching clearly in the New Testament. Jesus tells us:

“Anyone who does not remain in Me will be thrown out like a branch and wither; people will gather them and throw them into a fire and they will be burned.” (John 15:6)

Why is Jesus wasting our time talking about impossible hypotheticals?

and

St. Paul says:

“On the contrary, you yourselves wrong and defraud, and that your brethren. Or do you not know that the unjust shall not possess the kingdom of God? Do not err: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, Nor the effeminate, nor liers with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor railers, nor extortioners, shall possess the kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:9-10)

In this context, he is talking to believers about their wronging each other, even to the point of taking each other to court. His statement would make no sense if it had no applicability to the Corinthian believers’ wrongdoing to each other. His exhortation to them to stop wronging each other, by reminding them of the destiny of those who commit [mortal] sin, presupposes that they too could, by their wrongdoing, lose their possession of the kingdom of God. That is, they shall not enter into heaven.

A few chapters later he says:

“But I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that, after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified.” (1 Cor 9:27)

What would he be disqualified from receiving? The “imperishable” prize of eternal life, i.e. salvation. (verse 25) He then goes on in chapter 10 to talk about the Israelites who were ‘baptized’ in the cloud, but then disobeyed God in the desert, and perished under God’s displeasure. They were idolaters (recall, idolaters cannot inherit the kingdom of God). Idolatry is a mortal sin. They were immoral and God killed 23,000 of them in one day. Others for their disobedience were destroyed by serpents. Then he says:

“Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages have come. Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.” (1 Cor 10:12)

The fall that he is talking about is falling from grace. The very warning would make no sense unless St. Paul believed it is truly possible to fall, just as did those Israelites. If we couldn’t lose our salvation, then instead of warning them about taking heed lest they fall, he would be enjoining them not to worry, since they could not possibly fall.

And in his letter to the Galatians he says:

“You have been severed from Christ, you who are seeking to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace.” (Gal 5:4)

That verse makes no sense if it is impossible to be severed from Christ and to fall from grace. Again in Galatians St. Paul tells us:

Now the works of the flesh are plain: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension, party spirit, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and the like. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God (Gal 5:18-21).

Notice the warning. He is speaking to Christians. If Christians cannot lose their salvation, then there could be no warning about not inheriting the kingdom of God. It would make no sense. The warning is an actual warning, because it is truly possible (through committing the mortal sins he lists there) to lose one’s salvation, be cut off from Christ, and not inherit the kingdom of God. He gives these lists of mortal sins frequently: (Rom 1:28-32; 1 Cor 6:9-10; Eph 5:3-5; Col 3:5-8; 1 Tim 1:9-10; 2 Tim 3:2-5).

And in the book of Hebrews we find the same doctrine about the real possibility of losing one’s salvation.

“For it is impossible to restore again to repentance those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, if they then commit apostasy, since they crucify the Son of God on their own account and hold him up to contempt (Heb 6:4-6).

These enlightened persons have tasted the heavenly gift and become partakers of the Holy Spirit (through baptism, which was early in the Fathers called the sacrament of illumination/enlightenment), and then rejected Christ. But it would be impossible for them to fall away if they were never regenerated (and hence justified) in the first place. And yet they do fall away — the warning is not merely hypothetical. Such persons cannot be restored to repentance by baptism, because in baptism we are crucified with Christ (Rom 6), and Christ died only once. (But they can be restored by the sacrament of penance.)

Later in Hebrews the author writes about the apostasy of Christians in chapter 10:

For if we sin deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful prospect of judgment, and a fury of fire which will consume the adversaries. A man who has violated the law of Moses dies without mercy at the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment do you think will be deserved by the man who has spurned the Son of God, and profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and outraged the Spirit of grace? For we know him who said, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay.” And again, “The Lord will judge his people.” It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God (Heb 10:26-31).

The writer speaking as a Christian to Christians, says that if “we” sin deliberately [he's speaking of mortal sin] after receiving the knowledge of the truth, we face the fearful prospect of judgment and a fury of fire. How do we know he is talking about justified people? Because he explicitly says that a man who “was sanctified” by “the blood of the covenant,” who then profanes this blood and outrages the Spirit of grace, will deserve much worse punishment than those (Israelites) who violated the law of Moses and died without mercy at the testimony of two or three witnesses. Then he says that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Under what condition is it fearful? Under this condition: when we who are sanctified by the blood of Christ, then sin deliberately [i.e. commit mortal sin]. Such a person forfeits all the benefits of the grace of the New Covenant, and, if he dies in that condition, is punished in the eternal fires of Hell. Yes, that’s something to fear. The Christian is not told not to fear this possibility because he can never lose his salvation. Rather, the warning (about falling into the “fury of fire” [i.e. Hell]) is precisely to Christians. The warning implies the real possibility of Christians losing their salvation.

That is part of the gospel taught in Scripture, and it is the same true gospel handed down by the Apostles and laid out in the dogmas of the Catholic Church.

from a comment here http://www.creedcodecult.com/what-counted-as-abrahams-righteousness/

You keep forgetting about Rom. 2 and the argument I made that has not been refuted by anyone here. Paul is showing there that the Jews are ironically confounded by Gentiles who, through the indwelling Spirit, “keep the precepts of the law.” Paul says much the same in ch. 10 when he says that the Jews failed to attain God’s righteousness because they sought it by means of Moses, while the Gentiles did in fact receive it though faith.

So when it comes to our initial justification (usually given in baptism, but not always), we are passive and our works play no role. But we can increase and grow in the grace of justification by the Spirit, and we will be finally justified on the last day.

from 140 http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2012/08/imputation-and-paradigms-a-reply-to-nicholas-batzig/#comment-36209

The purpose of my post was not about demonstrating how many times Abraham was justified or when he was justified. So this is a bit of a rabbit trail. But it is worth considering. In Reformed theology, the unjustified person is said to be dead in sin, bereft of faith, hope, agape, living only in sin, having “wholly lost all ability of will to any spiritual good accompanying salvation,” and “being altogether averse from that good.” (WCF IX.3) In Reformed theology, unregenerate man is “utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil.” (WCF VI.4)

However, that’s not the picture we get of the man Scripture calls ‘Abram’ in Genesis chapters 12-14. Scripture says in Gen. 12:1-4 that God spoke to Abram and that Abram obeyed the Lord’s call to leave Ur. Then the Lord appeared to him at the oak of Moreh, and said, “To your descendants I will give this land.” How did Abram respond? “So he built an altar there to the LORD who had appeared to him.” (Gen 12:7) The verse doesn’t say that he worshipped the Lord there, but in the context (as shown below) we can presume that he did. (Why else does one build an altar to the LORD?) Abram’s worshipful response to God’s promise is one of trust in the Lord’s promise, just as he responded to God’s promise in Gen 15:6.

Then in Gen 12:8, on the mountain east of Bethel, Abram “built an altar to the LORD and called upon the name of the LORD.” Is this really the picture of a man dead in trespasses and sins, “utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good”? How is a man who is completely dead in trespasses and sins responding to the Lord’s promises by building altars to Him, and calling upon His Name? Was Abram faking it, merely pretending to worship God, while actually hating God in his heart? There is no sign at all in the text of such a thing.

Then in Gen 13:4 Abram returns to the altar on the mountain east of Bethel, and there again he calls on the name of the LORD. That’s not the behavior of one dead in sins. Ten verses later God speaks to Abram again in Gen 13:14-17, promising him and his descendants the land. Abram accepts God’s promise, and moves to Hebron, letting Lot have the seemingly better land. Does a man dead in trespasses and sins trust God’s word in this way?

Then in Gen 14, Melchizedek says, “Blessed be Abram of God Most High.” Melchizedek was not merely saying that Abram was one more piece of God’s property, as are trees and flowers and birds. Abram was “of God” in the sense that he was a man of faith, a friend of God. Abram then participates in a proto-typical Eucharist, receiving the bread and wine from the priest Melchizedek. Should we think that the proto-typical Eucharistic event involves the reception of this prefigurement of the sacrament by an unregenerate man dead in sins? Then Abram, this man allegedly dead in sin, with no faith and noagape, pays a tithe to Melchizedek, “the priest of God Most High.” Abram then reveals that he has made an oath to God, and keeps his oath. (Gen 14:22) Should paying his tithe to the Lord, and keeping his oath to God be construed as the activity of one dead in sins and at enmity with God, “utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good”? Which is more difficult to believe, that Abram is only faking love for God in all this, or that he is in fact a man of faith? On top of that, Hebrews 11:8 tells us that “By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed by going out to a place which he was to receive for an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he was going.” So Scripture itself explicitly states that Abraham left Ur by faith. If justification is a once-in-a-lifetime event, and faith is sufficient for justification, then Abraham was already justified when he left Ur, and thus couldn’t have been justified by the act of faith described in Gen 15.

How does Lane respond to all this biblical data that points to Abram already having faith in Gen 12-14? He writes:

I am not sure what Abraham’s doings in Genesis 12-14 have to do with the discussion, either. Chronology is tricky in those chapters.

Lane believes firmly in the Reformed system of doctrine, because he believes that it is the biblical system of doctrine. He is so committed to this system, according to which justification can happen only once within a given person’s lifetime, and that faith is the sole instrument of justification, that in the face of all the data in Genesis chapters 12-14 indicating that Abram was already a man of faith in God, Lane suggests (implicitly) that the chapters in Genesis have not been placed in chronological order, and that the justification event described in Gen 15:6 might have occurred before the events of Genesis 12-14, or at least before all the events in Gen 12-14 indicating that Abram had faith, even though the inerrant Scripture explicitly states that the events narrated in Genesis 15 temporally followed those of the preceding chapter(s) when the author writes in Genesis 15:1, “After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision.”

In philosophy, Lane’s [implicit] suggestion that the chapters are out of chronological order, based on no internal evidence but only to save the paradigm, is what we sometimes call “adding epicycles.” The paradigm must be saved at all costs, even if it means positing a rearrangement of the chapters of the Bible, based on an assumption that the author must not have put them in chronological order. It seems to me, however, that a better response is to allow the biblical data to revise the paradigm. If Abram was already a man of faith in God prior to Genesis 15:6, then our conception of justification must be made compatible with that. Genesis 15:6 then can be understood as an increase in justification, as described in Trent VI.10, through the act of faith whereby Abram believed the promises God made to him in Gen 15:1-5.

from comment   8         here    http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2014/05/trent-and-the-gospel-a-reply-to-tim-challies/      

concerning Trent Canon Canon 24. on justification
If anyone says that the justice received is not preserved and also not increased before God through good works,[125] but that those works are merely the fruits and signs of justification obtained, but not the cause of its increase, let him be anathema.

Below is the quote from the comment:

But are you able to tell me which scripture passages do support Trent 6 Canon 24?

Your question presupposes the Protestant idea that every doctrine must be deducible from some prooftexts. In the Catholic paradigm, the Apostolic deposit is composed of Scripture and Tradition together. (See my explanation in VIII. Scripture and Tradition in my reply to Michael Horton’s last comment in our Modern Reformation interview.

The increase in justification, in Catholic doctrine, is similar (though different in other respects) to what Protestants conceive of as progressive sanctification, because in Catholic doctrine there is no change in justification that is not also at the same time and to the same degree a corresponding change in sanctification. One cannot be just and be unholy at the same time, because God is Truth. (I have addressed the problem of “legal fiction” previously in comments #108, #114, #157, and #159 of the “Does the Bible Teach Sola Fide?” post, in comment #39 of the “Imputation and Infusion: A Reply to R.C. Sproul Jr.” post, in comment #146 of “From Calvin to the Barque of Peter: A Reformed Seminarian becomes Catholic” post, and in comment #219 of the “Imputation and Paradigms” post.)

In Romans 6, St. Paul begins by asking about the increase of grace, whether it is through continuing to sin. And his answer is ‘no.’ By our union with Christ we are to walk in newness of life (Rom 6:4), alive to God in Christ Jesus (Rom 6:11). Then he says,

and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness [ὅπλα ἀδικίας] but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness [ὅπλα δικαιοσύνης] to God. (Rom 6:13)

In the Catholic paradigm this increase in righteousness [δικαιοσύνης] is an increase in justification because it is a growth in agape, which is righteousness. To be an instrument of righteousness is to be an instrument of the increase in justification. Just as in our former state the members of our bodies were instruments for making us increase in unrighteousness, so by grace and in a state of grace and justification our members become instruments by which we grow in righteousness, and therefore grow in justification. That’s why he goes on to say:

Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness [εἰς δικαιοσύνην]? (Rom 6:16)

Obedience “resulting in righteousness” is obedience that results in justification. He is not here talking about initial justification. In the context, he is talking about growing in righteousness in our daily lives, i.e. increasing in justification, because he is contrasting it with continuing to live in sin. One way this growth in righteousness takes place is through our obedience, for he says:

But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. I am speaking in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness, resulting in further lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness, resulting in sanctification [δοῦλα τῇ δικαιοσύνῃ εἰς ἁγιασμόν]. (Rom 6:17-19)

Becoming obedient from the heart, and slaves of righteousness, and presenting the members of our bodies as slaves to righteousness, results in sanctification. It results in a growth or increase in holiness and righteousness, and thus an increase by grace in the righteousness we have received, through a greater participation in agape.

Elsewhere St. Paul speaks of cleansing ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. (2 Cor 7:1) Perfecting holiness involves an increase in righteousness (i.e.agape), and thus an increase in justification. (On the relation of agape and justification see “Imputation and Paradigms” and the discussion following it.) And since St. Paul is saying that we are to do this, and because in the Catholic paradigm growth in sanctification is growth in righteousness and justification, it follows that we are to participate in increasing our justification.

And this increase in justification (or growth in righteousness) is what St. James is speaking of in James 2, when he writes:

Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up Isaac his son on the altar? You see that faith was working with his works, and as a result of the works, faith was perfected; and the Scripture was fulfilled which says, “And Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness,” and he was called the friend of God. You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone. In the same way, was not Rahab the harlot also justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way? For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead. (James 2:21-26)

This is not initial justification, again, because that would be Pelagianism, and because Abraham was already in a state of grace, as I have shown in the second half of comment #140 of the “Imputation and Paradigms” thread. Nor is it final justification, because James speaks of it in the past tense, as something that occurred at the moment Abraham (and Rahab) acted. Rather, James is talking about growing in righteousness, i.e. growing in justification. A true faith, i.e. a living faith, is perfected through good works done in grace, because through these good works the agent grows in righteousness, i.e. in justification.

You asked:

Also how is the concept of ‘increase in justification’ different from “growing in sanctification” – a common term used by Protestants? Is it only a matter of semantics or is there a real conceptual difference?

I addressed this in my second paragraph of comment #150 in the “Justification: The Catholic Church and the Judaizers in St. Paul’s Letter to the Galatians” post.