Though they can be recognized by their acceptance of divine truth, their love of the Eucharist, and their upright conduct, these are not the means by which they achieve salvation but rather a sign of election. Calvin’s notion of “double predestination”—of some being marked for damnation just as surely as others are fated for salvation—has too often been regarded as the centerpiece of his theology. It is said to have made his God a kind of insanely cruel monster and to explain the severity of the regimen that Calvin imposed upon Geneva. In fact, however, Calvin regarded predestination as
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