CONCLUSION


CONCLUSION

We are now better able to solve the objections against original sin. 1. Original sin is not repugnant to divine justice, because it is the privation of grace and the preternatural gifts, which were not owing to our nature. The just God could grant these gratuitous gifts to the human race on the condition that Adam, the head of elevated nature, should not sin and not forfeit these gratuitous gifts for himself and for us.

2. Original sin is not repugnant to God's wisdom or goodness. As St. Thomas explains, "Nothing prohibits human nature from being brought to something higher after sin. God permits sin and evil that He may elicit something better. Hence it is said, 'Where sin abounded, grace did more abound.' "[1624] And in the blessing of the paschal candle the Church chants, "O happy fault, that merited so great a Redeemer.!"

God could not permit evil except for some greater good, but we cannot say "a priori" for what good God permitted original sin. After the Incarnation took place, however, it is sufficiently clear that God permitted the abundance of sin that grace might more abound. He permitted this universal evil in the human race so that He might give us something better and more efficacious for salvation through the redemptive Incarnation. Christ, the head of the Church, infinitely excels Adam. The Blessed virgin Mary is incomparably more perfect than Eve, and the Eucharistic sacrifice offered in every church immeasurably exceeds the divine worship offered in the terrestrial paradise.

Once the existence of original sin has been admitted, we can more easily explain the present condition of the human race. This doctrine solves the enigma of the coexistence in man of such great frailty and misery and such strong aspirations for the sublime. "Some signs appear," says St. Thomas, "of original sin in the human race."[1625] In Pascal's words, "Without this mystery man is more incomprehensible than the mystery is to man."[1626] From experience, therefore, man is able to know his profound need for the Redemption that would elevate him again to the life of grace, which is the seed of eternal life.