When the Church says that a Christian is called to sanctification, she is not speaking first of a moral effort or of a spiritual achievement reserved for an elite. She is saying something greater and more peaceful: God Himself has undertaken to make us holy, and this work, begun in Baptism, must grow day after day until the face-to-face vision. Sanctification is not a devotional supplement added to Christian life: it is Christian life grasped in its movement, the story of God gradually transforming a soul into the image of His Son[1].
The word can sound intimidating. "To become holy" may seem like a claim about oneself, or an impossible mountain. That is a misunderstanding. Sanctification is first a gift before it is a task: God sanctifies, and man lets himself be sanctified by cooperating with Him. Saint Paul sums it up in a sentence the tradition has never ceased to ponder: "The will of God is your sanctification"[2]. It is therefore not an excessive ambition: it is God's own plan for every baptized person.
This article answers the question in its simplest angle — what is sanctification? — while avoiding two frequent confusions. Sanctification is not justification, the first moment when the sinner is made righteous and becomes a child of God; it is its continuation, the received righteousness that grows through time. Nor is it sanctifying grace itself, the habitual gift placed in the soul; it is the work that communicates this gift, develops it and brings it to completion. To understand sanctification is therefore to understand how the salvation already received works within the soul, until "Christ is formed in you" (Gal 4:19).
What is sanctification? The word and the reality
To make holy: set apart for God
The word sanctification comes from the Latin sanctus facere, "to make holy". In the Bible, to be holy (Hebrew qadoš, Greek hagios) does not first mean to be morally faultless: it means to be set apart, separated from the profane in order to belong to God. God alone is holy by nature — "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts" (Is 6:3) — and everything He touches becomes holy by participation: a place, a day, a people, a man. To sanctify someone is therefore to tear him away from the realm of sin and death in order to bring him into the realm of God, into His life and His light[3].
Sanctification is therefore not primarily self-improvement obtained by willpower, but a transfer of ownership: "You are not your own... you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body" (1 Cor 6:19-20). The saint is the one who belongs more and more totally to the One who purchased him.
The Catholic definition: God's work that makes us holy
The Catechism does not isolate sanctification in a separate chapter: it places it inside the grace of justification, as its dimension of growth. "Justification entails [...] the sanctification and renewal of the interior man"[4], it teaches, citing the Council of Trent. In other words, in the act by which God makes us righteous, He does not merely declare us innocent from the outside: He really transforms us from within, and this interior transformation has a name: sanctification. The same Catechism states: "The grace of the Holy Spirit has the power to justify us, that is, to cleanse us from our sins and to communicate to us 'the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ' and through Baptism"[5] — and this received righteousness is called to grow.
Sanctification can therefore be defined as: the continuous action of God who, through His Spirit, separates the baptized person from sin, unites him to Christ and progressively makes him holy, with man's free cooperation, until the perfection of charity in Heaven. It has a beginning (Baptism), a motor (the Holy Spirit), channels (the sacraments, prayer, charity, the Cross), a law (growth) and an end (divinization in glory).
Sanctification and sanctifying grace: the work and the gift
Sanctification must be carefully distinguished from sanctifying grace, otherwise the work and the gift are confused. Sanctifying grace is the habitual gift, divine life placed in the soul, the stable state that makes us children of God[6]. Sanctification is the work by which God communicates this gift, increases it and makes it bear fruit. Sanctifying grace is what is received; sanctification is the movement of receiving it and letting it grow. One is the treasure, the other the enrichment.
Sanctification and justification: the threshold and the path
The distinction from justification is more delicate, because Catholic theology refuses to separate them as radically as some Protestant theology does. For a Catholic, justification and sanctification are not two juxtaposed realities — an "imputed" righteousness from outside on one side, an interior holiness on the other — but one and the same gift grasped at two moments. Justification is the instant when the sinner passes "from the state of sin to the state of grace"[7]; sanctification is the duration in which this received grace grows and transforms. The Council of Trent fixed this continuity: the received righteousness "increases" through the observance of the commandments and good works, and the justified person is "further justified"[8].
This is why, in concrete life, one cannot say, "I am justified; sanctification will come later", as if one could exist without the other. To receive God's righteousness is already to enter a movement of sanctification; to refuse to be sanctified is to stifle the righteousness received. The following table summarizes these distinctions without opposing them.
| Term | What it designates | Moment | Image |
|---|---|---|---|
| Justification | Being made righteous, passing from sin to grace | The threshold, the entry | The door crossed |
| Sanctifying grace | Divine life received and habitual | The permanent gift | The treasure deposited |
| Sanctification | The work that makes holy and makes grace grow | The whole of life | The path climbed |
| Salvation | Being definitively saved, united to God | The end, Heaven | The summit reached |
"The will of God is your sanctification"
"Be holy, for I am holy"
Sanctification is not an invention of late piety: it runs through all Scripture. Already in Leviticus, God gives His people a goal that seems beyond reach: "Be holy, for I, the Lord your God, am holy" (Lev 19:2; cf. Lev 11:44). The command can seem crushing — how could a man be holy "as" God is holy? — but it reveals the logic of all sacred history: God does not ask only for obedience; He wants to communicate His own holiness. Saint Peter takes up the call and universalizes it for the whole Church:
"As He who called you is holy, you also become holy in all your conduct, since it is written: You shall be holy, for I am holy." — First Letter of Saint Peter 1:15-16[9]
Sanctification, God's explicit will
The New Testament makes sanctification the very object of God's will for us. Saint Paul, writing to the Thessalonians, leaves no ambiguity:
"The will of God is your sanctification." — First Letter to the Thessalonians 4:3[10]
The sentence is decisive. Many people anxiously seek "God's will" for their life — what profession, what state of life, what decision. Paul answers in advance: what God wants, before any particular choice, is that we become holy. Every particular vocation is only one concrete way of fulfilling this first will[11]. And he adds that God Himself accomplishes it in us: "May the God of peace Himself sanctify you wholly, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless" (1 Thess 5:23) — sanctification is asked of God as a gift, not wrested from Him by effort alone.
"Without sanctification, no one will see the Lord"
The Letter to the Hebrews gives this work a decisive seriousness: it conditions the vision of God.
"Strive for peace with all, and for the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord." — Letter to the Hebrews 12:14[12]
This verse removes two opposite errors. Against laxity, it reminds us that one does not enter Heaven "as one is": "nothing unclean shall enter it" (Rev 21:27), and whatever remains imperfect at the moment of death must be purified — this is the meaning of purgatory. Against despair, it reminds us that this holiness is not our exploit but the work of grace to which we need only consent. Sanctification is therefore not optional: it is the wedding garment without which one cannot sit at the King's table (Mt 22:11-13).
Christ sanctifies Himself for us
The source of all our sanctification is Christ. On the eve of His Passion, He prays for His disciples:
"Sanctify them in the truth: Your word is truth. [...] And for them I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth." — Gospel according to Saint John 17:17-19[13]
"I sanctify Myself": in the mouth of the sinless Son, this cannot mean "I purify Myself". It means "I consecrate Myself, I offer Myself in sacrifice". The sanctification of the disciples therefore springs from Christ's oblation: because He gives Himself on the Cross, we can be sanctified. "By that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all" (Heb 10:10). All Christian holiness is participation in this single consecration.
The Holy Spirit, the Sanctifier
The Spirit's proper name
If Christ is the source, the Holy Spirit is the worker who applies the fruit of the Cross to each soul. Tradition gives Him the title Sanctifier: He is the One confessed in the Creed as "the Lord, the giver of life", the One who brings the Son's work to completion in hearts. The very word "holy" enters His name: He is the Holy Spirit, and He communicates holiness. "God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us" (Rom 5:5): this infused love is the interior principle of all sanctification[14].
A work of the whole Trinity
Sanctification is not, however, the work of the Spirit alone, as if He acted separately: it is the common work of the three Persons, according to the theological axiom that "the external works of the Trinity are undivided". The Father is the source who calls and sanctifies ("May the God of peace Himself sanctify you", 1 Thess 5:23); the Son is the model and the channel ("I sanctify Myself for them", Jn 17:19); the Spirit is the interior gift who completes the work ("sanctified by the Spirit", 2 Thess 2:13). To be sanctified is therefore to be introduced into the very life of the Trinity, until the Father and the Son make "their home" in the soul (Jn 14:23).
The universal call to holiness
A call addressed to all the baptized
For a long time, a false idea lingered: holiness would be the business of monks, nuns, mystics — an "extraordinary" path reserved for a few specialists, while ordinary Christians would settle for respectable mediocrity. The Second Vatican Council solemnly broke this division by devoting an entire chapter of Lumen gentium to the universal call to holiness. Its formula has become one of the Council's most quoted sentences:
"All the faithful of Christ of whatever rank or status are called to the fullness of the Christian life and to the perfection of charity." — Second Vatican Council, Lumen gentium, § 40[15]
The Catechism takes up this affirmation word for word[16][17] and draws the consequence: holiness is not a reserved goal, but "the high standard of ordinary Christian living", in the phrase Saint John Paul II placed at the heart of the third millennium[18]. To settle for a mediocre Christian life, he writes, "would be a contradiction" of the Baptism received.
Breaking with the idea of holiness "for specialists"
This doctrine has immense pastoral force. It means that the cashier, the student, the mother of a family, the worker, the retired person are called exactly to the same holiness as the great mystic — not to a holiness "at a discount". The difference is not one of degree of demand, but of path: each person is sanctified in and through his state of life, not despite it. Holiness does not consist in doing extraordinary things, but in doing ordinary things with extraordinary love — the whole intuition of the little way of Saint Therese of the Child Jesus, for whom "picking up a pin for love can convert a soul"[19].
Holiness according to one's state of life
Long before the Council, Saint Francis de Sales had fought, in the Introduction to the Devout Life, the illusion that devotion belonged only in cloisters:
"It is an error, indeed a heresy, to banish the devout life from the company of soldiers, from the shop of artisans, from the court of princes, from the household of married people. [...] Wherever we may be, we can and must aspire to the perfect life." — Saint Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Part I, ch. 3[20]
Sanctification therefore embraces states of life without flattening them: the soldier is sanctified through courage and justice, the artisan through honest work, the spouse through fidelity, the sick person through offered patience. No honest state is an obstacle to holiness; each is its own matter.
How sanctification is accomplished
First a gift: God acts first
The great law of sanctification is that it is first God's work, and only then ours. We do not sanctify ourselves by an effort that would wrench holiness from God: we consent to a work that He begins, sustains and completes. This is what the Catechism calls the paradox of grace: "The preparation of man for the reception of grace is already a work of grace"[21]. Saint Augustine said it in a famous phrase: "He who created you without you will not justify you without you"[22] — the first half recalls God's priority, the second the necessity of our free cooperation.
Then cooperation: "work out your salvation"
For sanctification does not crush freedom: it calls it and elevates it. Saint Paul holds the two truths together in one sentence, without opposing them:
"Work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for God is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure." — Letter to the Philippians 2:12-13[23]
"Work": there is a real part that belongs to us. "For God is at work in you": but this part itself is borne by grace. Sanctification is therefore a work both of God and of man, but in an order: God first, man responding. All Catholic spirituality stands in this proper balance — neither salvation by works alone (Pelagianism), nor a grace that would dispense with all effort (Quietism).
The ordinary means of sanctification
God has linked the growth of holiness to ordinary channels. To despise them while waiting for a "direct" and sensible sanctification is an illusion; to frequent them with faith is the sure path all the saints have walked.
The sacraments, sources of sanctification
The sacraments are the "masterworks of God" in which the holiness of Christ is communicated to us. Baptism gives it in seed; Confirmation strengthens it; the Eucharist, "source and summit" of Christian life, is its daily food, for "he who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him" (Jn 6:56); Penance restores it when sin has wounded or killed it. Without this sacramental life, sanctification is deprived of its ordinary sap.
Prayer and listening to the Word
"Sanctify them in the truth: Your word is truth" (Jn 17:17): the Word of God, meditated and prayed, is an instrument of sanctification. Prayer is the breathing of the sanctified soul: it is in mental prayer that the Spirit works in depth, purifies intentions and gradually unites the human will to God's will. One is not sanctified without praying, because one does not grow in friendship without speaking to one's friend.
Charity, form and measure of holiness
The heart of sanctification is neither austerities, nor extraordinary phenomena, nor even the virtues taken in isolation: it is charity. Saint Thomas Aquinas states it clearly: "The perfection of the Christian life consists essentially in charity"[24]. One is holy to the exact measure in which one loves God and neighbor; the other virtues are holy only insofar as they are vivified by charity. This is why Lumen gentium defines the goal as "the perfection of charity", not as ascetical performance. The virtues through which this charity grows have their own articles — faith, hope, charity, humility — to which the reader is referred.
The Cross and trial
Finally, there is no sanctification without participation in the Cross. The Catechism says it plainly: "The way of perfection passes by way of the Cross. There is no holiness without renunciation and spiritual battle"[25]. Accepted trial, offered suffering, patience in contradiction are the crucible where the gold of charity is purified. This is what Saint Teresa of Avila and Saint John of the Cross will call the purifying "nights" — not misfortune, but the hand of God polishing the stone so it can fit into the building.
Sanctification is growth
One can always grow
Unlike justification, which is received in an instant, sanctification is progressive: it admits degrees and has no term on this earth. Against the Reformers, the Council of Trent defined that the righteousness received is not fixed but increases:
"Having been thus justified [...] they grow through good works [...] and are further justified." — Council of Trent, session VI, Decree on Justification, ch. 10[26]
This doctrine has a liberating consequence: wherever one may be, one can always "become more holy". There is no ceiling. An old fervent Christian can still grow; a convert of yesterday is already on the way. Holiness is never an acquired possession to be preserved, but a movement to be pursued.
The three ages of the spiritual life
The spiritual tradition has recognized three great stages in this growth, not watertight boxes but successive dominant notes:
| Stage | Dominant note | Main combat | Grace sought |
|---|---|---|---|
| Purgative way | Breaking with sin | Detaching oneself from mortal and then venial sin | Conversion, contrition |
| Illuminative way | Growing in the virtues | Purifying intentions, imitating Christ | Growth in charity |
| Unitive way | Union with God | Letting oneself be transformed, dying to self | Habitual union with God |
These three ways describe the same path seen at different altitudes: first detaching oneself from evil, then filling oneself with the good, finally living only from God. The beginner should not aim directly at the summit; the one at the summit should not forget that he was once a beginner.
Perfection consists in charity, not in phenomena
One point deserves emphasis against a recurring temptation: measuring one's sanctification by false criteria. Neither sensible consolations, nor visions, nor spectacular austerities are the measure of holiness. "If I give away all I have... but have not charity, I gain nothing" (1 Cor 13:3). The degree of holiness of a soul is measured by its degree of charity — that is, by the depth of its love of God and its self-gift to neighbor. Many canonized saints had no extraordinary experience; none lacked charity.
The goal of sanctification: divinization
"Participants of the divine nature"
Where does this path lead? To an end so high that reason alone would never have dared it: divinization. Sanctification does not aim only to make us better human beings, but to make us "participants of the divine nature":
"His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness [...] so that through them you may become participants of the divine nature." — Second Letter of Saint Peter 1:3-4[27]
The Greek Fathers called this reality theosis, "deification". It is obviously not a matter of becoming God by nature — the abyss between Creator and creature remains — but of receiving, by grace, a share in God's own life, to the point that tradition did not fear Saint Athanasius's audacious formula:
"The Word of God became man so that we might be made God." — Saint Athanasius of Alexandria, On the Incarnation of the Word, 54[28]
Holiness completed: the vision of God
The Catechism takes up this audacity as the heart of God's design: "The Son of God became man so that we might become God"[29], and "God calls man [...] to become a participant of the divine nature"[30]. Sanctification is therefore only the earthly face of a reality that will be completed in Heaven in the beatific vision: "We shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is" (1 Jn 3:2). Holiness begun in Baptism is the seed of glory; Heaven is simply sanctification brought to its fullness, when charity, freed from every obstacle, sees God face to face.
The summit of sanctification: living in the Divine Will
From doing God's will to living in it
At the end of this path there is a summit that the spirituality dear to Ignispedia especially highlights: the passage from doing God's will to living in the Divine Will. As long as the soul obeys God as an external law, it remains a faithful servant; but when its will, wholly surrendered, lets itself be moved from within by the divine will, it enters the very mode of life of Heaven, so that "Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven" (Mt 6:10) becomes its continual breathing. This is the completion of all sanctification: no longer only the moral union of wills, but unity of life.
The "holiness of holinesses"
This eminent form of holiness is announced in a private revelation — what Jesus said to the Servant of God Luisa Piccarreta —, to be distinguished from the teaching of the Magisterium: Jesus calls it the "holiness of holinesses"[31]. By "Sanctifying Fiat" is meant the third Fiat, that is, the act by which God restores to man life in His Will, as Adam lived it before the fall; by "holiness of holinesses" is meant this original holiness thus recovered, the highest because it makes the soul live by the very life of God. It is therefore not one more holiness alongside the others, but the restoration of the soul in the original holiness God willed in Eden, which Redemption alone had not yet fully restored. This is the proper object of the Ignispedia dossiers on the Sanctifying Fiat and the Divine Will, to which the reader is referred for deeper treatment. Let us retain the essential point here: sanctification, begun in Baptism, knows no ceiling; it calls the soul, if it wills, up to that transforming union where "it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me" (Gal 2:20).
Frequent objections and misunderstandings
"Holiness is not for me"
This is the most widespread misunderstanding, and the most contrary to the Gospel. It confuses holiness with perfection already attained, whereas holiness is a path, not a starting state. The saints are not people without weaknesses: they are sinners who never stopped rising again and letting God work in them. "A righteous man falls seven times, and rises again" (Prov 24:16). To say "it is not for me" is to refuse God the will He has expressed: "your sanctification" (1 Thess 4:3). The real question is never "am I capable?" but "do I let Him act?"
"Isn't becoming holy a form of pride?"
Some object that aspiring to holiness would be presumptuous. The opposite is true: the refusal to be sanctified, under cover of humility, is often laziness or fear in disguise. Sanctification is not a project of self-glorification, but consent to let God act — therefore an act of deep humility. The saint does not watch himself becoming holy; he looks at God and lets himself be transformed. "It is not the man who commends himself that is accepted, but the man whom the Lord commends" (2 Cor 10:18).
"Grace is enough: why so much effort?"
At the opposite extreme, some conclude that, since everything is grace, effort would be useless — the old Quietist temptation. But Scripture holds both ends together: "work out your salvation... for God is at work in you" (Phil 2:12-13). Grace does not cancel our cooperation: it makes it possible and carries it. To wait passively for holiness without combat is to bury the talent received (Mt 25:24-30). Sanctification is received and worked out, in that inseparable order.
Sanctification and sin: the saints' battle
Finally, people are sometimes surprised that saints knew falls, darkness and long struggles. This is, on the contrary, the mark of authenticity: "There is no holiness without renunciation and spiritual battle"[32]. As long as this life lasts, sanctification is militant; concupiscence remains even in the baptized, not as a sin but as a field of battle. The difference between the saint and another person is not the absence of temptation, but fidelity in rising again and beginning anew, "forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead" (Phil 3:13).
What sanctification is not
To finish, it is useful to name the counterfeits that threaten the idea of sanctification today, often by emptying it of grace and reducing it to a merely human effort.
| Counterfeit | What it claims | What it lacks |
|---|---|---|
| Moralism | Becoming faultless by one's own strength | The first grace: God sanctifies |
| Perfectionism | Never falling, demanding perfection of oneself | Mercy and the humility of the sinner raised up |
| Self-development | Improving oneself, flourishing, "becoming oneself" | God as goal: sanctification unites us to Him, not to ourselves |
| Seeking the extraordinary | Measuring holiness by visions and wonders | Charity, the only true measure of holiness |
Authentic sanctification is recognized by this: it descends from God before it rises from man, it has charity for its heart, humility for its root, and God Himself — not an accomplished self — for its end. It is neither a dream reserved for mystics, nor a tense effort turned in on oneself, but the calm and generous response to the most beautiful of God's wills: "What God wills is your sanctification."
Further reading
- What is justification? — the threshold: the first instant when the sinner is made righteous.
- What is sanctifying grace? — the gift: divine life received and increased.
- What is actual grace? — the punctual helps that sustain growth.
- What is salvation? — the end toward which sanctification leads.
- Can one lose salvation? — why the holiness received is not an automatic possession.
- Are we saved by faith alone? — faith and charity, the debate with Protestants.
- How to grow in faith — the first theological virtue and its growth.
- How to grow in charity — the heart and measure of all holiness.
- How to grow in humility — the root of sanctification.
- The Divine Will — the summit: living in God's will.
- The Sanctifying Fiat — the "holiness of holinesses" and the return to original holiness.
Notes and References
Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 1995: "Justification entails the sanctification of his whole being"; "The Holy Spirit is the master of the interior life." Sanctification is presented there as the growth dimension of justification (cf. Rom 6:19, 22).
1First Letter to the Thessalonians 4:3: "For this is the will of God, your sanctification." Greek text: τοῦτο γάρ ἐστιν θέλημα τοῦ Θεοῦ, ὁ ἁγιασμὸς ὑμῶν.
2 10Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 2013, citing Lumen gentium § 40: "All Christians in any state or walk of life are called to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection of charity. [...] All the faithful are invited and obliged to try to achieve the holiness and perfection of their own state of life."
3 11 16Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 1989, citing the Council of Trent (session VI, decree on justification, ch. 7; DS 1528): "Justification is not only the remission of sins, but also the sanctification and renewal of the interior man."
4Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 1987: "The grace of the Holy Spirit has the power to justify us, that is, to cleanse us from our sins and to communicate to us 'the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ' (Rom 3:22) and through Baptism."
5Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 2000: "Sanctifying grace is an habitual gift, a stable and supernatural disposition that perfects the soul itself to enable it to live with God, to act by His love." It is distinguished from actual grace, a punctual help.
6Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 1990: "Justification establishes cooperation between God's grace and man's freedom. [...] It includes the remission of sins, sanctification, and the renewal of the inner man." The passage "from the state of sin to the state of grace" (cf. § 1989) designates the instant of justification.
7Council of Trent, session VI (13 January 1547), Decree on Justification, ch. 10, De accepti iustitiæ incremento ("On the increase of the righteousness received"; DS 1535): the justified, "increasing in virtue [...] are further justified" (magis iustificantur). Confirmed by canon 24 (DS 1574) against the idea that the righteousness received does not increase through good works.
8 26First Letter of Saint Peter 1:15-16: "As He who called you is holy, be holy yourselves in all your conduct; since it is written, 'You shall be holy, for I am holy.'" Quotation from Leviticus 11:44 and 19:2.
9Letter to the Hebrews 12:14: "Strive for peace with all men, and for the holiness [Greek ἁγιασμός] without which no one will see the Lord."
12Gospel according to Saint John 17:17-19, priestly prayer of Christ: "Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth. [...] And for their sake I consecrate Myself, that they also may be consecrated in truth." The verb ἁγιάζω here means "to consecrate, to offer in sacrifice".
13Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 2003 and § 733-736: the Holy Spirit, "God's gift", is the interior principle of sanctification; "God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us" (Rom 5:5).
14Second Vatican Council, dogmatic constitution Lumen gentium (21 November 1964), ch. V, § 40: "All the faithful of Christ of whatever rank or status are called to the fullness of the Christian life and to the perfection of charity." Chapter V is entitled "The universal call to holiness in the Church."
15Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 2028 (summary In brief): "The call to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection of charity is addressed to all those who believe in Christ" (citing Lumen gentium, § 40); "Christian perfection has but one limit: that of having none" (Saint Gregory of Nyssa, Life of Moses).
17Saint John Paul II, apostolic letter Novo millennio ineunte (6 January 2001), § 30-31: holiness is "the high standard of ordinary Christian living"; "it would be a contradiction to settle for a life of mediocrity, marked by a minimalist ethic." Full text on Vatican.va.
18Saint Therese of the Child Jesus, letter to her sister Celine, 22 May 1894 (LT 165): "Everything is so great in religion... picking up a pin for love can convert a soul. What a mystery!..."
19Saint Francis de Sales (1567-1622), Introduction to the Devout Life (1609), Part I, ch. 3 ("That devotion is suitable to every vocation and profession"): "It is an error, indeed a heresy, to wish to banish the devout life from the company of soldiers, from the shop of artisans, from the court of princes, from the household of married people." Critical edition: Œuvres, Annecy edition, vol. III.
20Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 2001, citing Saint Augustine (De gratia et libero arbitrio, 17): "The preparation of man for the reception of grace is already a work of grace."
21Saint Augustine, Sermon 169, 11, 13 (PL 38, 923): "Qui ergo fecit te sine te, non te iustificat sine te" — "He who created you without you will not justify you without you." Cited in the Catechism § 1847.
22Letter to the Philippians 2:12-13: "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for God is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure."
23Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, II-II, q. 184, a. 1: "The perfection of the Christian life consists essentially (essentialiter) in charity — principally in the love of God, secondarily in the love of neighbor." The virtues and counsels are only means ordered to this charity.
24Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 2015: "The way of perfection passes by way of the Cross. There is no holiness without renunciation and spiritual battle. Spiritual progress entails the ascesis and mortification."
25 32Second Letter of Saint Peter 1:3-4: "His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness [...] that through these you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of passion, and become partakers of the divine nature (θείας κοινωνοὶ φύσεως)." Scriptural foundation of theosis.
27Saint Athanasius of Alexandria (c. 296-373), De incarnatione Verbi, 54, 3: "Αὐτὸς γὰρ ἐνηνθρώπησεν, ἵνα ἡμεῖς θεοποιηθῶμεν" — "He became man so that we might be made God." Taken up by Saint Irenaeus (Adversus haereses, V, preface) and cited in the Catechism § 460.
28Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 460, citing Saint Irenaeus, Saint Athanasius and Saint Thomas Aquinas: "The Son of God became man so that we might become God. [...] The only-begotten Son of God, wanting to make us sharers in His divinity, assumed our nature."
29Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 1988, citing Saint Athanasius: "Through the power of the Holy Spirit we take part in Christ's Passion by dying to sin, and in His Resurrection by being born to a new life; we are members of His Body [...] branches grafted onto the vine which is Himself." God calls man to "become a participant of the divine nature."
30Jesus to Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, vol. 11, 15 March 1912: "My daughter, Life in My Will is the Holiness of Holinesses." (French edition, trans. Guy Harvey, Lumen Luminis).
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