Garrigou-Lagrange

Can fallen man, without the concurrence of actual grace, prepare himself for sanctifying grace? To this question the Semi-Pelagians answered Yes, saying the beginning of salvation comes from our nature and that grace comes with this initial natural movement of good will. They were condemned by the Second Council of Orange, which affirmed the necessity of actual, prevenient grace in our preparation for conversion.

- Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, Reality: A Synthesis of Thomistic Thought. (St.Louis:Herder Book, 1950), page#.

Further insight into actual grace. I think this is interesting because I think blessings have been rejected in large part because they are seen as semi-pelagian or superstitious, but the corrective is neither Pelagian nor Lutheran. A Catholic understanding of grace, distinguished by STA help us to see that if blessings are an instrumental cause of actual grace, God's sovereignty is protected and man's duty to sanctify is fulfilled.

I've just had an epiphany. If one could elaborate the scriptural mandate to sanctify, just as once clearly can demonstrate a mandate to pray "when you pray say this: Our Father", it might give insight into the necessity of blessings in the life of grace in the soul. One immediate thought: the institution at the last supper includes the reference to our Lord "blessing" the bread and wine, and instructing his apostles to repeat the offering / blessing / Eucharist.

Garrigou-Lagrange

This explains why we must always pray. The necessity of prayer is founded on the necessity of actual grace. Except for the first grace, which is gratuitously given to us without our praying for it, since it is the very principle of prayer, it is a thoroughly established truth that prayer is the normal, efficacious, and universal means by which God wishes that we should obtain all the actual graces we need.

- Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life. Vol.1. (St.Louis:Herder Book, 1947), #.

Further elucidation of the concept of actual grace and its necessity in the life of grace of the soul.

Garrigou-Lagrange

It is a truth of faith defined against the Pelagians and the Semi-Pelagians,(2) that, without this grace, we can neither dispose ourselves positively to conversion, nor persevere for a notable time in good, nor above all persevere until death. Without actual grace, we cannot produce the slightest salutary act, or, with even greater reason, reach perfection.

- Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life. Vol.1. (St.Louis:Herder Book, 1947), #.

Further example of Garrigou-Lagrange's presentation of the necessity of actual grace.

Garrigou-Lagrange

Even in the natural order, no created agent acts or operates without the cooperation of God, first Mover of bodies and spirits. In this sense, St. Paul says in his discourse on the Areopagus: "Although He (God) be not far from every one of us; for in Him we live and move and are." (1) With even greater reason in the supernatural order, that we may produce acts of the infused virtues and of the gifts, we need a divine motion, which is called actual grace

- Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life. Vol.1. (St.Louis:Herder Book, 1947), #.

Garrigou-Lagrange talks about the necessity of actual grace. This is significant because in order to talk about the meaning of blessings, and "exciting pious devotion" or even a more precise "disposition", we need to know the meaning of actual grace.