Where Mercy Lives: He Came to Himself

This essay develops a structural account of grace based on a single governing principle: grace is one in its source and differentiated at the point of reception according to the orientation of the soul that receives it. From this principle, the essay distinguishes three modes of reception—sustenance, seeking, and reconciliation—and argues that these are not separate gifts, but distinct forms taken by the same grace under differing conditions of spiritual orientation. Using the parable of the prodigal son as its narrative framework, the essay proposes a theological anthropology of return in which perception, memory, and willing constitute the restoration of orientation toward the divine source. Mercy is therefore located not in arbitrary divine distribution, but in the meeting between grace and a soul restored to communion.