The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) - Day 266: The Gift of Grace (2025)

Episode Date: September 22, 2025

In this summary of the Catechism’s teaching on holiness, justification, and merit, we briefly consider the work of God’s grace and mercy. His grace moves us from sin and toward him, making us his sons and daughters and bringing us into the very life of the Trinity. This gift of grace invites us to respond to his promptings and invitations freely. Finally, God offers “all the graces needed to attain eternal life.” Today’s readings are Catechism paragraphs 2017-2029. This episode has been found to be in conformity with the Catechism by the Institute on the Catechism, under the Subcommittee on the Catechism, USCCB. For the complete reading plan, visit ascensionpress.com/ciy Please note: The Catechism of the Catholic Church contains adult themes that may not be suitable for children - parental discretion is advised.

We can't lose our faith the way we lose our car keys. We either give it away or we let it decay because we don't use it. Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz. And in my new book, Unshakeable, building a life of virtue in a world of chaos, I tell faith-filled stories that inspire you to live a life of virtue that flows from the unshakable power of God. Although we're surrounded by a culture that mocks virtue, we can feed ourselves stories that really do uphold what is good and promote a virtuous life. When we live this way, we experience freedom and joy like never before.

It's my prayer that the stories in my book, Unshakeable, will inspire you to fight the battle for a virtuous life and win through trust in an unshakable God. Order your copy at ascensionpress.com. Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz, and you're listening to The Catechism in a Year podcast, where we encounter God's plan of sure goodness for us, revealed in scripture and passed down through the tradition of the Catholic faith. The Catechism in a year is brought to by Ascension. In 365 days, we'll read

through the Catechism of the Catholic Church discovering our identity and God's family as we journey together toward our heavenly home. This is Day 266. It's not a good day for reading paragraphs 2017 to 29. As always, I'm using the Ascension edition of the Catechism, which includes the foundations of faith approach, but you can follow along with any recent version of the catechism of the Catholic Church. You can also download your own catechism in a year reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com slash CIY. And lastly, you can click follow or subscribe

on your podcast app for daily updates and daily notifications today. Day 266, day 2017 to 2029. It is not lost on me that this is, you know, the year. The year we are in right now, whether you're listening in 2023, 2024, 2027, it's your paragraph is your year. I don't. Does that make sense? I don't know. Sometimes I look at numbers and think, okay, here we are. But it's nugget day, you guys. And not only is it nugget day. We are reading so many nuggets. They're 2017 to 2029. Because why? We've been looking at salvation. And the salvation that requirement that were, A, first that were called, that were called by the Lord God to belong to him in this completely unique way. He's given us grace. And we're justified by grace through faith. We're getting itself out and love. Of course, we're called to respond to that grace with our free will.

And, you know, we have merit, we have Christian holiness, all these topics we've been talking about for the last number of days. We get to be summarized here in our Nuggets, Nugget 2017 to 2029. So before we launch into this thorough Nugget Day, as one might say, the entire chicken, we are going to say a prayer. Father in heaven, we give you praise and glory. Thank you so much for getting us here. Thank you so much for leading us and guiding us to this day, to this moment where we have an opportunity to be reminded of the great call you've placed in our lives what you've done for us by your life death and resurrection the life death of resurrection of your son by pouring out your holy spirit into our hearts

by giving us your spirit your life your grace through the sacraments helping us live that out in faith lord god in this moment this day we ask you to please help us help us to not only boldly proclaim the faith but to allow the faith to guide every step of our lives every thought we have every movement of our heart let that faith that trust in you be the impetus that guides us let our love for you actually even more so your love for us be the power that moves us in jesus name we pray amen in the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit amen it is a 266 we're reading paragraphs 2017 to 2029 in brief the grace of the holy spirit confers upon us the righteousness of god Uniting us by faith and baptism to the passion and resurrection of Christ, the Spirit makes us

sharers in his life. Like conversion, justification has two aspects. Moved by grace, man turns toward God and away from sin, and so accepts forgiveness and righteousness from on high. Justification includes the remission of sins, sanctification, and the renewal of the inner man. Justification has been merited for us by the passion of Christ. It is granted. granted us through baptism. It conforms us to the righteousness of God who justifies us. It has for its goal the glory of God and of Christ and the gift of eternal life. It is the most excellent work of God's mercy. Grace is the help God gives us to respond to our vocation of becoming his adopted sons. It introduces us into the intimacy of the Trinitarian life. The divine initiative

in the work of grace, precedes, prepares, and elicits their free response of man. Grace responds to the deepest yearnings of human freedom, calls freedom to cooperate with it, and perfects freedom. Sanctifying grace is the gratuitous gift of his life that God makes to us. It is infused by the Holy Spirit into the soul to heal it of sin and to sanctify it. Sanctifying grace makes us pleasing to God. Charisms, special graces of the Holy Spirit, are oriented to sanctifying grace and are intended for the common good of the church.

God also acts through many actual graces to be distinguished from habitual grace, which is permanent in us. We can have merit in God's sight only because of God's free plan to associate man with the work of his grace. Merit is to be ascribed in the first place to the grace of God, and secondly to man's collaboration. Man's merit is due to God. The grace of the Holy Spirit can confer true merit on us by virtue of our adoptive filiation and in accordance with God's gratuitous justice. Charity is the principal source of merit in us before God. No one can merit the initial grace which is at the origin of conversion. Moved by the Holy Spirit, we can merit for ourselves and for others all the graces needed to attain eternal life, as well as necessary

temporal goods. All Christians are called to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection of charity. Christian perspective has but one limit, that of having none. If any man would come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. All right, there we are, paragraphs 2017 to 29 nuggets and so many nuggets and so much goodness. Oh my gosh. Like what an incredible grace. I mean, and that's it. It's grace. So how much, how much of Catholic theology is permeated and defined is only understood in light of grace. I mean, honestly, let's go back to the very first bullets. Virtually every bullet. Actually, I think from 2017 to 29 to 2029, I think almost every bullet, every nugget has the word grace in it, which highlights the fact that grace is central

to everything. Because what God has done for us is grace. It's his gift. It's his gratuitous, unmerited, and free gift. So paragraph 2017, we highlight this. The grace of the Holy Spirit confers upon us the righteousness of God. How? By uniting us, by faith and baptism, remember, that's that, those are our, that's our entryway into the life of grace. To the passion and resurrection of Christ, the spirit makes us sharers in his life. So by God's free gift through baptism and faith, we become what? We become shares in his divine life, which means we become his adopted sons and daughters. We actually become partakers of the divine nature. We're a new creation. I like this in paragraph 2018. It says, like conversion, justification has two aspects. So what are

the two aspects in conversion, two aspects of conversion. One, first aspect of conversions, I turn away from sin, but that's not, that's not all, right? Go back to the book of Exodus. When God sets his people free from slavery, he sets them free from something, right? He sets them free from slavery, but he also sets them free for something, not just freedom. He says them free from slavery, not just for freedom, but it sets them free from slavery for new life, for worship, in order to belong to him. And similarly, the grace of conversion has two aspects, right? So I turn away from sin and turn to God. It's not just enough to turn away from sin.

I have to also turn toward God. Now, sometimes people have this in their lives where they think, you know what, I'm tired of it. I can't live this way anymore. These choices I've been making. They're dumb. They hurt me. They hurt the people around me.

So I'm going to stop doing the negative thing. That's wonderful. But that's not true conversion unless they're not only turning away from this evil, but also turning toward God. Not just turning toward, hey, here's a new leaf or new life. I'm turning towards God. So conversion is that, right? It's turning away from sin, turning toward God,

and justification is very similar. Two aspects. Move by grace, man turns toward God and away from sin. And so accepts forgiveness and righteousness from on high. Those movements of grace and free will that God moves us by his grace. And we respond by the power of his grace in our free will. I love paragraph 2020. It is maybe one of the second longest, maybe third longest paragraph here,

nugget here. but prayer of 2020 highlights this justification has been merited for us by what not by our own deeds not by our own works has been merited for us by the passion of christ it has granted us how through baptism this remember these things it's because of jesus because he's done for us and given to us by the holy spirit working through baptism what does it do it conforms us to the righteousness of god who justifies us and brings us in that right relationship with the father it has for its goal the glory of God and of Christ and the gift of eternal life. I don't know if you've ever thought about this.

The fact that God has given us his grace, one of the goals of that is that God is glorified. I mean, you realize this, that every time a person is baptized, every time a person turns away from sin, every time a person allows God's grace to transform his life, God is glorified. That's the goal. The goal is that the God who is love, the God who made this whole world, that made it full of his goodness, he's glorified when we turn away from sin. He's glorified when grace transforms our hearts, has as its goal, the glory of God and of Christ, and the gift of eternal life. The goal is also that you and I can share in that eternal life for eternity, right? Forever. I love this last

sentence in paragraph 2020. It is the most excellent work of God's mercy. It's justification, this all this transformation, this glorification of God and sanctification of man. is the most excellent work of God's mercy. It's just, oh, man, what an incredible gift. And you're part of this. I mean, think about this, this paragraph 2020, I mean, all, everything we're talking about, this is not about what God wants to do in someone else's life.

This is, you know, here's God's miracle of creation. Here's got a miracle of redemption. Here's God's miracle of sanctification, justification. The most excellent work of God's mercy isn't just in someone else. It's not just in St. Francis of Assisi or St. Therese or St. Rez or John Paul II or Mother Teresa, it's in you. The most excellent work of God's mercy is accomplished in you. I mean, it's wherever you, I mean, think about this, wherever you are right now. If you're sitting at your desk, if you're in your car, if you're out for a walk or for a

run, the most excellent work of God's mercy has been accomplished and is being accomplished in you right now. What an incredible, incredible gift. And also, remember it's God's work. I like a paragraph 2022 highlights the divine initiative in the work of grace precedes, prepares, and elicits the free response of man. Remember, we have this thing called prevenient grace, right? The grace that moves before we even are aware of this. So the divine initiative, because God is always the one who initiates. We'll talk about this again when it comes to prayer, but our prayer is always a response.

Our choosing good is always a response. So the divine initiative in the work of grace precedes, prepares, and elicits the free response of man. Grace responds to the deepest yearnings of human freedom and calls freedom to cooperate with it and perfects freedom. So God's grace, remember, we talked about this a little bit briefly. God's grace does not overwhelm human freedom. God's grace does not eradicate human freedom.

God's grace does not just qualify or nullify human freedom. God's grace works with human freedom. And not only does it work with human freedom, it perfects human freedom. What do we mean by that? Well, think about this. if you've ever fallen into sin you know what sin does sin makes us a slave and so so those who sin are slaves of sin every one of us because i'm now less free to say no to sin and yes to grace i'm now

less free to do actually what i'm made to do because i've now bound myself to this sin but grace sets us free it sets us free to be able to say yes to the good and to be able to free to say no to the bad that's what we're made for. I mean, this is the crazy thing. You are made. I mean, your heart, and we know this. Even if sometimes we're attracted to sin because of concupiscence, remember that being drawn to sin. We know that your heart, in my heart, longs for God's plan. Longs for God himself. Our hearts are restless until they rest in you. We talked about a couple days ago. And so we recognize this. This is so true that God's grace perfects human freedom. And it's so, so incredible. remember that what sanctifying grace is remember there we talked about maybe we'll say we'll say three

kinds of grace here in in this last little nugget section there's sanctifying grace or habitual grace right that's permanent that has made us it's the gift of god in paragraph 2023 it's the gift of his life that god makes to us that it's infused with the holy spirit into the soul to heal it of sin and sanctified is infused by the holy spirit into the soul to heal it of sin and sanctify it so sanctifying grace makes us pleasing to god it makes us god's sons and daughter So that's sanctifying grace. Remember, it's habitual, it's permanent. We have carisms, which are special graces of the Holy Spirit that are oriented towards to build off the sanctifying grace, right? So they're intended for what? These charisms are intended for the building up

of the church. So miracles and mighty works and prophecy and tongues, those kind of gifts, those charisms are not intended just for the person to whom they've been given. They're intended to be used to build up the body of Christ, intended to build up to the church. What do you mean? Well, Here's an example. Whenever missionaries and whenever the apostles would go into a new place, they would not only preach the truth about Jesus, but then in order to prove that what they preached was true, they would have mighty works that would build up the body of Christ. So that's what those chasmas are for. And the third sense of grace that we can talk about today are actual graces. In paragraph 2024, it says God also acts through many actual graces to be distinguished from habitual

grace, which is permanent in us. And so this is so good. Last couple notes. We talked about merit, maybe two days ago, three days ago, two or three days ago, not yesterday, the day before. We'll say how I got merit. In paragraph 2025 and 26, talk about merit. And it's so amazing that we can talk about merit and at the same time, whenever we even talk about what we have merited, we cannot talk about what we've merited apart from what God has done in us. So the very first line, 2025, we can have merit in God's sight only because of God's free plan

to associate man with the work of his grace. Merit is to be ascribed in the first place to the grace of God. And secondly, to man's collaboration. So man's merit is due to God. I love this. It's so humbling, but it's so true. It's so true. It is that sense of, okay, yes, even the good that I do, God, it comes from you.

Even the little good that I do is your gift to me, Lord God. And that is so, so when I say humbling, I don't mean it's demeaning, right? We know that that term humble or humility or humbling doesn't mean demeaning. It means honest. So the honest truth is that the only good in me comes from the Lord God. And it's so good. And 2026, the race of the Holy Spirit can confer true merit on us by virtue of our adoptive affiliation and in accordance with God's gratuitous justice.

It is this love. Love is the principal source of merit in us before God. And it's so good. And just, oh, man, you guys, what incredible gift to be reminded you. of. Now tomorrow, tomorrow we're going to take the next step. And the next step is article three here in salvation. And we're talking about the church. And we're talking about the fact that the church has many roles, right, but two titles that the catechism is going to pause over and hover over and dive deeply into is the fact that the church is both mother

and teacher. It's like mater and magestra. I think that's the way you might say it in certain languages like Latin. Matar, meaning mother and magistra, meaning teacher magistra. I don't know if it's a hard g or not. Anyways, but the church has mother and teachers that we're going to be talking about in the next couple days because here is the reality. The reality is that we are called in the moral life. We're called in life of Christ to let the church, let the church established by Jesus Christ, founded by God himself and infused by the gift of the Holy Spirit, the soul of the church is the Holy Spirit. We're called to let that church, not just let that church. We're called to live in that church as the church is our mother and the church is our teacher. So we'll talk about that tomorrow.

And so I'm so excited. You guys, but what a grace. What a great gift today to be able to conclude this last article, section article two and about how God's gift of salvation is free. God's gift of salvation is unmerited. God's gift of grace is true and it's offered to you and to me right now. all we have to do is say yes i'm so so grateful i'm praying for you please pray for me my name's father mike i cannot wait to see you tomorrow god bless