A Catholic Perspective On Calvinism

Añadido: 2026-05-11

[00:00:00]Hello everyone. Welcome to the video.

[00:00:01]I'm going to be discussing Calvinism today. And specifically, I'm going to be discussing the uh the five points of Calvin. Of course, Calvinism named after this guy here, John Calvin. And uh here we have the uh the holy apostolic ceiling fan as well, which I'm told is a very important part of uh Calvinist theology by people online. Anyway, so I'm going to be talking about the first of the five points, but I'll go through all of them as I plan to do some uh follow-up videos on this topic. and they make up this acronym tulip here. So we've got total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, and the perseverance of saints. So for the purposes of today, as I said, we're going to be going over total depravity, which can be generally summarized here as uh uh people cannot choose God by themselves and are in states of perpetual sin. And that is all due to the fall as in what happened in the Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve. So I'm going to be offering a Catholic perspective on this um doctrine of Calvinism. And there are certain parts that are similar with with Catholic theology. So I bring up uh this example here. So here we have City of God book 13 chapter 3. This is the the uh the title of chapter 3. uh whether death which by the sin of our first parents has passed upon all men is the punishment of sin even to the good. So this uh chapter title uh is is one of the many proofs um not just many proofs in the city of God but many proofs in in uh church father writings that uh the church fathers early church fathers later church fathers they all believe in the idea as most Christians do today that we are all in states of perpetual sin and in need uh perpetually of God's grace due to the fall. Now the uh the difference comes in uh from the Catholic perspective with this top part here which is people cannot choose God by themselves due to the fall. Skipping out that middle part there. Now here is a part in uh this is Deuteronomy 309 to20.

[00:02:06]This is actually the end of 19 the beginning of 20 I believe uh which says here uh of course from the perspective of uh of Moses here. I know this is Exodus but it illustrates the uh the point. So, choose life such that you and your descendants may live loving God, obeying him. And then it then it goes on. The whole of uh the whole of Deuteronomy 30 is about various things that God will do uh for the Israelites, for his people and such. Um and what will happen uh should should they disobey him and etc. But this word here uh which where I've started the the quote choose um and this is something that from the Catholic perspective contradicts Calvinism a little bit because Calvinism the general idea we go back to here people cannot choose God by themselves. Now the response from that is obviously say a Calvinist might then say well you know that it's it's that you can't save yourself. Are you saying that because people under the the general Catholic view is that is that they can in fact uh choose to obey God and choose not to as we have the the doctrine of uh the belief in free will in Catholicism. And so a Calvinist might say then well are you saying that you save yourself? And and so I I did this little illustration here. This is the general idea of uh how Catholic salvation works. The idea being here's a flood and a storm, last patch of dry land. Here's a person here and God sends down a ladder. Now, this person can choose to climb the ladder, but they they are not forced to get on the ladder. If they wanted for whatever reason, I don't know, you'd have to be a crazy person to not take the ladder, but they could indeed uh stay on here and soon this land wouldn't be very dry and there'd be underwater. Not the best choice. Uh wouldn't be a particularly uh wouldn't be particularly a choice that I would make, but you could make that choice. God doesn't make you get on the ladder but he inclines you towards it.

[00:03:57]Now that is the that is the uh the contradiction of this bit. Uh people cannot choose God by themselves. Now if this person gets up to heaven what after climbing the ladder they wouldn't be able to say accurately um that they have saved themselves. They didn't bring themselves into heaven. All they did was get on the ladder. God still saved them.

[00:04:18]And without the grace of God, which is the uh metaphor here being the ladder, they wouldn't be in heaven. So the idea isn't that you save yourself. Um but the I have an illustration here. This is the uh this is the holy apostolic ceiling fan here uh predestining uh this person here. And God is sending down this claw to pick them up. Uh it looks a bit uh meaner than I wanted it to actually. I should probably I should have probably drawn it uh looking a little nicer. But anyway, this person doesn't get a choice in the matter. They've been predestined by God uh to go to heaven. And so the claw picks them up. They have no they have no choice. They they go up. This person here uh has been predestined not to go to heaven, which is the the difference between the the single and double predestination. And I realize I'm overlapping with some of the other uh points of Calvinism. So I'll I'll go over them again in in uh future videos.

[00:05:12]Uh but this person here isn't being uh saved by the ceiling fan uh for for whatever reason. Now I bring up this part here uh Matthew 7:21. So not everyone who says Lord Lord will enter the kingdom of heaven. I'm sure you've heard this Bible verse before. But only the one who does the will of my father.

[00:05:32]This is usually a verse brought up by Catholics like myself to defend the idea of of uh faith being partnered with works, which is a separate uh Protestant uh discussion to be had. Uh but the reason I bring this up is because in the Calvinist view, this this seems to me at least to be a little more sinister.

[00:05:53]Whereas if you look at it from a from a Catholic point of view, it's basically saying you can't just say, "Oh, I believe in God. I believe in God." and then go and do a bunch of bad things and still expect to get into heaven. That's the typical reading of this is that you can't be a performative Christian. You know, you have to actually uh you can't just say the things, you have to believe them and not just believe them but go and you know do the will of the father as as is said here. But the Calvinist view, the double predestination view is that uh again with with the with the idea of after the fall everyone being in sin is that God has decided that this person has been brought into the world and he has predestined that this person uh will not do the uh the will of the father and will and will pro uh will proclaim lord lord and then will not get into heaven. So the idea being that God has brought someone into the world for them effectively to be damned as as he has uh he has not given them free will as as Catholics understand it but rather has predestined him in order to uh in order to go to hell. And that to me uh from the Catholic perspective seems a little uh seems a little problematic. It seems to limit the grace of God. Anyway, that is all I have for the brief video.

[00:07:06]I will do some follow-up videos um on on the other points and there'll be a lot of overlap between them. Uh so thank you for watching and God bless and please do subscribe and have a blessed day.