From Chapter One of Abbot Vonier's "A Key to the Doctrine of the Eucharist:"
I cannot end this chapter without quoting from Saint Thomas [of Aquinas] a beautiful passage in which he describes God's action, which he calls grace, keeping faith alive in the soul, even of the sinner:
Grace produces faith not only when faith begins to exist in the soul for the first time, but also while it habitually abides in the soul . . . . God brings about the justification of man in the same way as the sun produces light in the air. Grace, therefore, when it strikes with its rays the one who is already a believer is not less efficacious than when it comes for the first time to the unbeliever, because in both it is its proper effect to produce faith: in one case strengthening it and giving it increase, in the other case creating it as an entirely new thing.
St. Thomas of Aquinas, pray for us.
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