Molinism: The Bridge Between Calvinism & Arminianism

Humble_Disciple said:

Molinism might have only become well-known relatively recently, but the doctrine of prevenient grace, that God's enabling grace to believe the Gospel is provided to all people equally, is an ancient Christian doctrine based in scripture.

As far as the doctrine of eternal security, once you are born again through repentance and faith, how can you ever be unborn again? Just as you can't reverse your natural birth, how can you reverse your spiritual birth?

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I agree completely with your first paragraph, and add that man can still say no to prevenient grace.

As to the second, Adam was alive-and yet dead-due to his sin. We can die all over again: with "sin that leads to death". Man's spiritual separation from God constitutes his death, aka the "death of the soul", and sin is the reason. Once forgiven, cleansed, reconciled with God and made new creations, we're expected to walk like it now, as God's children, enabled by His Spirit to overcome sin. To return to sin, particularly sin so grievous as to oppose and destroy love, is to separate us from Him all over again, to mock the relationship established by faith.

Humble_Disciple said:

Calvinists are our brothers and sisters in Christ. Unlike Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses, Calvinists don't deny essential Christian doctrines.

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I saw the Calvinist sponsored "American Gospel" on Netflix that trashed the preachers I most admire. Judgement is in accordance to how one judges (Matt 7:1) - hope for their sakes they were hearing from God.

zippy2006 said:

That seems right if we are looking at things from the free will perspective, but if we look at things from the angle of Calvinism the difficulty with Molinism is the way it qualifies God's sovereignty. For example, the Molinist apparently believes that God would not be able to save everyone if he wanted to. Of course this is related to irresistible grace, but it also relates to the portrait of God. Is God a sovereign with full control over creation, including human salvation? Or is he a chess master with enormous ability of calculation, based on middle knowledge, which will bring the optimal number of people to salvation? These are two very different conceptions of God.

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I thnk that God has accepted to limit His infinite power by choosing to create man with a free will. I would like to report some verses from Saint Faustina's diary, which she attributes to Jesus:


580 “Ingratitude in return for so many graces is My Heart's constant food, on the part of [such] a chosen soul. Their love is lukewarm, and My Heart cannot bear it; these souls force Me to reject them. Others distrust My goodness and have no desire to experience that sweet intimacy in their own hearts, but go in search of Me, off in the distance, and do not find Me. This distrust of My goodness hurts Me very much. If My death has not convinced you of My love, what will? Often a soul wounds Me mortally, and then no one can comfort Me. They use My graces to offend Me. There are souls who despise My graces as well as all the proofs of My love. They do not wish to hear My call, but proceed into the abyss of hell. The loss of these souls plunges Me into deadly sorrow. God though I am, I cannot help such a soul because it scorns Me; having a free will, it can spurn Me or love Me. You, who are the dispenser of My mercy, tell all the world about My goodness, and thus you will comfort My Heart.”


DIARY II (522-1000) - Divine Mercy in my SOUL

Humble_Disciple said:

If you look at the OP, there are real examples from scripture of God's middle knowledge.

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I don't think anyone contests the idea that God could predict a contingent future. Even humans can do that with remarkable accuracy in some cases.

Molinists and Arminians agree with Calvinists that God's enabling grace is necessary to repent and believe the Gospel. The only question is to whether prevenient grace is given to all people equally or just a select few, and whether or not it can be ultimately rejected by self- hardened sinners.

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I am not sure why Molinism would be the "logical next step" for Calvinists, or what especially Calvinistic problem Molinism would be thought to provide an answer to. I hold to the common view that Molinism is incompatible with Calvinism (or TULIP). Even folks like Craig or yourself who claim that they are "compatible" at the same time believe that Calvinists would need to rejects parts of TULIP in order to accept Molinism.

The history of Jesuit vs. Calvinist/Jansenist polemics is long and fraught for a reason.

Humble_Disciple said:

According to William Lane Craig, when he visited Calvin College, all of the theologians said they were actually Molinists, not Calvinists:


It seems to that Molinism is the next logical step after Calvinism, that once you've accepted the Bible's passages on God's sovereignty, Molinism offers a way to reconcile them with other Biblical passages on human responsibility.


According to Molinism, God created our world, based on His middle knowledge, as the world where the most people possible would be saved, since God knew ahead of time who would reject the Gospel in every possible world.

As a Molinist, one can agree with Arminians that God's enabling grace to believe the Gospel is provided to all people equally (John 12:32, John 15:26, John 16:8-11, etc.), and with Calvinists that, once you are saved, your salvation is eternally secure (John 5:24, John 10:27-29, etc.)

Ecclesiastes 7:18
It is good to grasp the one and not let go of the other. Whoever fears God will avoid all extremes.

1 Corinthians 8:2-3
Anyone who claims to know all the answers doesn’t really know very much. But the person who loves God is the one whom God recognizes.

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It is possible that so-called calvinism that is in the forefront of modern theology is not the same as what Calvin taught, such as determinism which I don't think Calvin taught. But since you read a lot on Molinism, did you read this? Molinism 101