Chapter 9: the first verse has caused serious misunderstandings, as if it said: we do not know if God loves or hates us. First, God hates no one. And in semitic speech, they often say: I love one and hate the other, while meaning: I love one more than the other. At most it could mean we are not sure if God is or is not pleased with us. Could it mean we cannot be sure of the state of grace? There are some texts of the Council of Trent that have been taken very stringently. But we always need to consider the setting and context of conciliar texts. Trent was called to deal with Luther. Canon 13 (DS 1564) condemns the teaching: "no one is really made just unless he believes he has been made just. And absolution and justification are accomplished only by this faith (confidence)". The trouble was that Luther did not understand the word "faith" as used by St. Paul. Luther thought it means simply confidence that the merits of Christ apply to me - and then I am infallibly saved, and no matter how much I sin I am infallibly saved. In his Epistle of August 1, 1521 to Melanchthon, Luther said (Luther's Works, American Edition, vol. 248, p. 282): "Be a sinner and sin boldly.... No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even if we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day." It was such an outrageous notion that Trent meant to condemn.

Can we be at least morally certain we are in the state of grace? Definitely yes. In DS 1534 Trent said: "no one can know with the certitude of faith, which cannot be wrong that he has attained the grace of God." But who has asked for a special revelation in Scripture for him individually, or in an apparition that he is in the state of grace? We can be practically certain when we have done what we can. God is not a monster, seeking to trip us up, so we must worry: Am I really certain that I was sorry for my sins in Confession? St. Paul in Romans 8. 16 tells us: "The Spirit bear witness along with our spirit that we are sons of God." If sons, we have no need to scrupulously ask: Am I sure I had contrition?. Rather, being sons gives us a real claim to enter our Father's house.

St. Paul three times gives us an assurance that God will give us even final perseverance. In 1 Thess 5. 7 Paul exclaims; "May the God of peace make you completely perfect, so that your spirit and soul and body may be kept without blame at the coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ. He who promised is faithful: He will also do it." Again in 1 Cor 1. 8-9: "He will strengthen you without blame, up to the coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, through whom you have received a sharing in His Son, Jesus Christ, the Lord." Similarly in Philippians 1. 6:"I am confident of this very thing, that He who began in you a good work, will bring it to perfection until the day of Christ Jesus." The Council of Trent, in reacting against Luther, still quoted this last text, (DS 1541):"No one can know anything with absolute certitude but yet must put most firm confidence in the help of God, for unless they fail His grace, just as He has begun a good work in them, so He will bring it to perfection, bringing about that we will and that we work [alluding to Phil. 2. 13]."

Some regrettable theologians of an earlier era, in part influenced by the reaction against the outrageous claims of Luther, said we cannot be sure that God will offer each one the grace of final perseverance --. They contradict St. Paul triply. Some of them said the only reason needed so that

God might refuse a man the grace he needs to persevere - without which he cold not be saved - might be just "inculpable inadvertence" on the part of the man -a thing not a sin at all. So they claimed God might withhold this grace, essential for salvation, earned with such pain by Christ, promised three times by St. Paul - They claimed

God's desire to save us (1 Tim 2. 4) was so weak He might let a man go to hell because God would refuse the necessary grace without any sin at all!

But let us notice that it is one thing for God to offer the grace without which we could not persevere - another thing to be sure we would not reject it. However Pope Pius XI, in Explorata res. Feb. 2, 1912 (AAS 15. 104) wrote: "Nor would he incur eternal death whom the Most Blessed Virgin assists, especially at his last hour. This view of the Doctors of the Church, in harmony with the sentiments of the Christian people and supported by the experience of all times, depends especially on this reason [namely] , the fact that the Sorrowful Virgin shared in the work of redemption with Jesus Christ."

We notice two things: First, this is an assurance to cover the gap as it were. It assures us she will so manage things that we will not actually reject final perseverance. 2) He rests this statement on the universal belief of the faithful (which cannot be in error. Cf. LG 12) and especially on the fact that she shared in earning all graces at the Cross. (To fill in on this Cf. Wm. Most, Our Father's Plan.

Still further, it was not only one Pope but three who spoke this way: Benedict XV wrote (Inter Sodalicia, March 22, 1918: ASS 10. 182:"There is a most constant view among the faithful, proved by long experience, that whoever employs the same Virgin as Patron will not perish forever." Pius XII spoke similarly in Mediator Dei, Nov. 20, 1947. AAS 29. 1957, p. 584.

Now something taught repeatedly on the ordinary magisterium level - less than a solemn definition - cannot be in error. And we note too the appeal to universal belief, whose infallible validity was confirmed by Vatican II in LG §12.

Verses 4-6 go back to the usual wisdom thoughts: a living dog is better than a dead lion. The love and hate and envy of men have already perished. They no longer are involved in anything that is done on the face of the earth, under the sun. We saw earlier in commenting on Sirach 17. 27-28 that the state of the dead before Christ was such that even the just could not reach the vision of God - they lived in the dim Limbo of the Fathers where there was no liturgical praise of God, not did the covenant hold sway, nor did they know what was happening to their children on earth. And we saw the two sets of texts in Qoheleth in the introduction to this work, plus comments on Job, especially 14. 13ff