All men without exception are predestined to grace, since I died for all.
Those who remain faithful—
at least to the natural law of the Good—are predestined to glory. Thus at the end of the ages, each one who has lived as a just man, will have his reward.
God knows from eternity those who are destined for glory before they are born into life—that is, "predestined". Pay attention, then, for here is the point for understanding
with justice the justice of God.
There are those who are predestined, certainly. And God knows them before time [even] exists for them. But they are not predestined because God, with evident injustice, gives them every means to become glorious, and by every means prevents any traps for them of the demon, of the world, and of the flesh. No. God gives them what He gives to all. But they use the gifts of God with justice, and hence they win the future and eternal glory
by their [own] free will.
God knows that they will reach this eternal glory. But
they do not know it, nor does God tell them in any way. Extraordinary gifts are
not—of themselves—a sure sign of glory: they are a more severe means than others to test the spirit of a man in his will, virtue, and fidelity to God and to His Law. God knows. He rejoices in anticipation to know that this creature will reach glory; just as He suffers in anticipation to know that this other creature will, voluntarily, reach damnation.
But in no way does He intervene to force the free choice of any creature so that it may arrive where God wants all to arrive: in Heaven.
Certainly the creature's correspondence with Divine help increases its capacity to will. Because God all the more pours Himself out, as a man loves Him in truth: that is, with a charity of actions, and not [just] of words.
And again: certainly, the more a man lives as a just man, the more God also communicates with and manifests Himself to him: an anticipation of that knowledge of God which is the bliss of the saints in Heaven; and from this knowledge comes an increase of the capacity to want [will] to be perfect. But again and always, man is free with his will, and, if after having already reached perfection, one disavows the good he has practiced up till then, and sells himself to the Evil One: God would leave him free to do it. There would be no merit if there were coercion.
To conclude: God knows—from eternity—those who are the future eternal inhabitants of Heaven. But man, with his free will, must want [will] to reach Heaven by using well the supernatural helps which the Eternal Father gives to each of His creatures. And this [must he do] even to his last breath—whatever the extraordinary gifts he has received,
3 and [whatever] the degrees of perfection he has reached.
Remember:
no one has ever truly arrived, until his "walk" is finished. That is, no one is sure of having merited glory, until his time has ended, and immortality has begun. — Jesus,
Lessons on the Epistle of St. Paul to the Romans
