Moehler (Symbolism, 21-35) holds that the religious faculty—the “image of God”; the pious exertion of this faculty—the “likeness of God.” He seems to favor the view that Adam received “this supernatural gift of a holy and blessed communion with God at a later period than his creation, i. e., only when he had prepared himself for its reception and by his own efforts had rendered himself worthy of it.” He was created “just” and acceptable to God, even without communion with God or help from God. He became “holy” and enjoyed communion with God, only when God rewarded his obedience and bestowed the supernaturale donum. Although Moehler favors this view and claims that it is permitted by the standards, he also says that it is not definitely taught. The quotations from Bellarmine and the Roman Catechism above make it clear that it is the prevailing doctrine of the Roman Catholic church.
So, to quote the words of Shedd, “the Tridentine theology starts with Pelagianism and ends with Augustinianism. Created without character, God subsequently endows man with character.... The Papal idea of creation differs from the Augustinian in that it involves imperfection. There is a disease and languor which require a subsequent and supernatural act to remedy.” The Augustinian and Protestant conception of man's original state is far nobler than this. The ethical element is not a later addition, but is man's true nature—essential to God's idea of him. The normal and original condition of man (pura naturalia) is one of grace and of the Spirit's indwelling—hence, of direction toward God.
From this original difference between Roman Catholic and Protestant doctrine with regard to man's original state result diverging views as to sin and as to regeneration. The Protestant holds that, as man was possessed by creation of moral likeness to God, or holiness, so his sin robbed his nature of its integrity, deprived it of essential and concreated advantages and powers, and substituted for these a positive corruption and tendency to evil. Unpremeditated evil desire, or concupiscence, is original sin; as concreated love for God constituted man's original righteousness. No man since the fall has original righteousness, and it is man's sin that he has it not. Since without love to God no act, emotion, or thought of man can answer the demands of God's law, the Scripture denies to fallen man all power of himself to know, think, feel, or do aright. His nature therefore needs a new-creation, a resurrection from death, such as God only, by his mighty Spirit, can work; and to this work of God man can contribute nothing, except as power is first given him by God himself.
According to the Roman Catholic view, however, since the image of God in which man was created included only man's religious faculty, his sin can rob him only of what became subsequently and adventitiously his. Fallen man differs from unfallen only as spoliatus a nudo. He loses only a sort of magic spell, which leaves him still in possession of all his essential powers. Unpremeditated evil desire, or concupiscence, is not sin; for this belonged to his nature even before he fell. His sin has therefore only put him back into the natural state of conflict and concupiscence, ordered by God in the concreated opposition of sense and reason. The sole qualification is this, that, having made an evil decision, his will is weakened. “Man does not need resurrection from death, but rather a crutch to help his lameness, a tonic to reinforce his feebleness, a medicine to cure his sickness.” He is still able to turn to God; and in regeneration the Holy Spirit simply awakens and strengthens the natural ability slumbering in the natural man. But even here, man must yield to the influence of the Holy Spirit; and regeneration is effected by uniting his power to the divine. In baptism the guilt of original sin is remitted, and everything called sin is taken away. No baptized person has any further process of regeneration to undergo. Man has not only strength to coöperate with God for his own salvation, but he may even go beyond the demands of the law and perform works of supererogation. And the whole sacramental system of the Roman Catholic Church, with its salvation by works, its purgatorial fires, and its invocation of the saints, connects itself logically with this erroneous theory of man's original state.
See Dorner's Augustinus, 116; Perrone, Prælectiones Theologicæ, 1:737-748; Winer, Confessions, 79, 80; Dorner, History Protestant Theology, 38, 39, and Glaubenslehre, 1:51; Van Oosterzee, Dogmatics, 376; Cunningham, Historical Theology, 1:516-586; Shedd, Hist. Doctrine, 2:140-149.
II. Incidents of Man's Original State.
1. Results of man's possession of the divine image.
(a) Reflection of this divine image in man's physical form.—Even in man's body were typified those higher attributes which chiefly constituted his likeness to God. A gross perversion of this truth, however, is the view which holds, upon the ground of Gen. 2:7, and 3:8, that the image of God consists in bodily resemblance to the Creator. In the first of these passages, it is not the divine image, but the body, that is formed of dust, and into this body the soul that possesses the divine image is breathed. The second of these passages is to be interpreted by those other portions of the Pentateuch in which God is represented as free from all limitations of matter (Gen. 11:5; 18:15).