Foreknowledge and Grace

Following up on yesterday's post, here's another word from Molina on the topic of God's foreknowledge and human freedom:

I think it is sufficiently clear from what we have said thus far that (i) our freedom of choice and the contingency of things is perfectly compatible with divine foreknowledge, and that (ii) such foreknowledge in no way prevents it from being the case that with the help of God, who will always furnish as much help as each person needs, it is within our power to avoid all mortal sins, to recover from them after a lapse, and in the end either to attain or to lose eternal life, and that (iii) if we do not attain eternal life, then we ourselves are to blame in just the way we would be if there were in God no foreknowledge of future things.
— Luis de Molina, On Divine Foreknowledge, p. 194

Molina was a sixteenth century Jesuit (=Roman Catholic) theologian. A lot of Jesuits in the sixteenth century were reacting against the Reformation.

Here he says our freedom enables us to avoid sin and attain salvation, with God's help. Taking seriously our absolute need for God's help as a supplement to our freedom is important for those of us who have been shaped by the Reformation (and, to be fair, for all Catholics and Eastern Orthodox too). We have this help, so the rest of the statement holds basically as is. But we do need this help; without it we are quite literally helpless.

Most of the time we call this help grace