All thinkers
Theologian · Early modern
Luis de Molina
1535–1600 · Molinism
Catholic
Latin
Jesuit; his Concordia was examined by the Congregatio de Auxiliis (1598–1607), which ended with Paul V permitting both Molinism and Thomism to be taught.
Spanish Jesuit at Évora, Molina's Concordia of Free Choice with the Gifts of Grace (1588) proposed that God knows by “middle knowledge” (scientia media) what every possible creature would freely do in every circumstance, and so chooses the order of graces that will in fact win consent. Grace is efficacious not of itself but through the free consent God foresaw; predestination follows foreseen merits. He also wrote a major treatise on justice and law.
Why he matters: He defined the Jesuit answer to the Reformers and to the Dominicans: a doctrine of grace that leaves freedom intact at every step. The Church has never censured it, and it remains a permitted school.
Where to be careful
Dominican critics (Báñez) charged that middle knowledge makes God's election depend on the creature and smells of Semi-Pelagianism; the Church forbade that charge, as it forbade the Jesuit countercharge of Calvinism.
Reading
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On Divine Foreknowledge (Part IV of the Concordia)Luis de Molina, SJ (trans. Alfred J. Freddoso) · Middle knowledge in his own words, with a superb introduction.
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Predestination: Biblical and Theological PathsMatthew Levering · Chapter on Molina and Báñez; fair to both.
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On Justice and Right (De Iustitia et Iure, selections)Luis de Molina, SJ · His economic and legal thought, part of the Salamanca inheritance.
Documented positions
Where this thinker stands on each dispute the test covers.
Settled teaching
Its center
Open question
Beyond teaching, not condemned
Condemned error
I
God and Being · What is, and whence it is.
Can reason know that God exists?
Natural theology
Fideism or agnosticism
Natural theology
How is God related to the world?
Creation from nothing
Pantheism or emanation
Creation from nothing
Is the world governed by purpose?
Providence and final causes
Chance and mechanism
Providence and final causes
Do natures and essences really exist?
Realism
Nominalism
Realism
God's essence and His energies
Absolute simplicity
Essence–energies distinction
Absolute simplicity
How should we speak of God?
Cataphatic (analogical) way
Apophatic (negative) way
Cataphatic (analogical) way
Is 'being' said of God and of creatures in the same sense?
Between
Analogy of being
Univocity of being
How does creation speak of God?
Natures studied in their own right
Natures studied in their own right
A book of signs and vestiges
II
Faith, Reason and Truth · How we know, and whom we trust.
Faith and reason: who has the last word?
Between
Rationalism
Fideism
Where does knowledge begin?
Senses and abstraction
Senses and abstraction
Illumination and innate ideas
Is truth objective?
Objective truth
Relativism and pragmatism
Objective truth
Who interprets revelation?
Living Tradition and Magisterium
Private judgment
Living Tradition and Magisterium
How should Scripture be read?
Fundamentalist literalism
Critical reductionism
Fundamentalist literalism
What is theology for?
A science ordered to knowing
A science ordered to knowing
A wisdom ordered to loving
Does doctrine develop?
Between
Always the same, in the same words
A living development
Are the world's learning and arts a danger or a gift?
A gift to be baptized
A danger: Athens has nothing to do with Jerusalem
A gift to be baptized
III
The Human Person · Soul, body, freedom and the Fall.
Is there a spiritual soul?
Immortal spiritual soul
Mind is brain
Immortal spiritual soul
Is the body really you?
Body–soul unity
Dualism
Body–soul unity
Are you free?
Free will
Determinism
Free will
How fallen is human nature?
Basically good
Totally depraved
Basically good
Does nature desire God?
Pure nature
Pure nature
Natural desire for the vision of God
The body and its desires
Between
Contempt for the flesh
Desire as its own law
Person and community
Individualism
Individualism
Collectivism
Marriage, sex and the body's meaning
Given by nature and grace
Given by nature and grace
Defined by consent and identity
What makes you this one and no other?
This matter, this body
This matter, this body
A positive thisness (haecceity)
What is suffering for?
A share in the Cross
An evil to be relieved
A share in the Cross
IV
The Moral Life · Law, virtue, conscience and the good.
Is morality objective and knowable?
Natural law
Relativism
Natural law
Why is the good good?
Eternal law (intellectualism)
Divine command (voluntarism)
Eternal law (intellectualism)
Are some acts always wrong?
Intrinsically evil acts
Consequentialism
Intrinsically evil acts
Rules or character?
Between
Morality of obligation
Morality of virtue and beatitude
What is conscience?
Conscience bound to truth
Autonomous conscience
Conscience bound to truth
In doubtful cases
Laxism
Rigorism
Laxism
What is happiness?
Beatitude in God
Earthly flourishing
Beatitude in God
What is heaven's happiness, at its heart?
The intellect's vision of God
The intellect's vision of God
The will's love and enjoyment of God
V
Grace and Salvation · How God saves, and whom.
How does grace move the will?
Molinist
Thomist (Bañezian)
Molinist
How are we made right with God?
Infused, transforming grace
Forensic imputation
Infused, transforming grace
Who can be saved?
Strict exclusivism
Strict exclusivism
Indifferentism
What is salvation for?
Deification
Pardon and escape
Deification
Hell and hope
The many are lost
The many are lost
All will be saved
Would the Word have become flesh had Adam not sinned?
Christ came to redeem sinners
Christ came to redeem sinners
Christ was willed first (absolute primacy)
Where does your eye rest in Christ: His divinity or His humanity?
The eternal Word made flesh
The eternal Word made flesh
The man Jesus of Nazareth
VI
Church and Society · Authority, the state, wealth and the nation.
Church and state
Social kingship of Christ
Laicism
Social kingship of Christ
The economic order
Laissez-faire capitalism
Socialism
Laissez-faire capitalism
Where does authority come from?
Authority from God
Social contract
Authority from God
The nation and the Church
Nation does not matter
Nation or race first
Nation does not matter
May the state restrain false religion?
The confessional state: error has no rights
The confessional state: error has no rights
Civil liberty for every religion
Which form of government best suits a Christian people?
Democracy and participation
Monarchy and hierarchy
Democracy and participation
May a Christian take up the sword?
Yes: war can be just and sometimes a duty
Never: the way of the Cross is nonviolence
Yes: war can be just and sometimes a duty
VII
Worship, Prayer and the Two Lungs · Liturgy, icons, the Spirit, and the See of Peter.
Liturgical development
Receive and develop organically
Reconstruct and innovate
Receive and develop organically
Icons and images
Veneration of images
Iconoclasm
Veneration of images
The way of prayer
Discursive meditation
Stillness and the Jesus Prayer
Discursive meditation
The procession of the Holy Spirit
From the Father and the Son (Filioque)
From the Father through the Son
From the Father and the Son (Filioque)
The office of Peter
Universal and immediate primacy
Conciliarism
Universal and immediate primacy
What do the sacraments do?
Efficacious ex opere operato
Signs only
Efficacious ex opere operato
When the Pope speaks
Every word binds
Resist and judge
Every word binds
Holy Orders and the Church's constitution
A clerical Church
A clerical Church
Reformable by the people
Should the faith take the forms of each culture it enters?
The Gospel in each people's own forms
One form everywhere
The Gospel in each people's own forms
What are the Eastern Catholic Churches?
Between
Rites of the one Roman Church
Sister Churches with their own rights and theology
Contemplation or action?
Action: the apostolate and the works of mercy
Action: the apostolate and the works of mercy
Contemplation: the one thing needful