The Tridentine Decree on Justification and the Anathemas against Protestant Teaching

The sixth session of the Council of Trent ended on 13 January 1547 with a decree on justification of sixteen chapters and thirty-three canons; González calls it the heart of the council's theological work. Justification begins with prevenient grace, independently of merits, but free will must then accept or reject the salvation offered. Justification itself is "not only the remission of sins, but also the sanctification and renewal of the inner man": God does not merely impute the righteousness of Christ but, with the cooperation of free will, actually makes the believer righteous. The council named as the single formal cause of justification the righteousness of God by which God makes us righteous, and thereby rejected the Regensburg compromise of two causes (1541). The council also rejected the reformers' teaching on assurance of salvation.