Prevenience & Justification

Though not exactly the same issue I raised yesterday, something related to the issue of Wesley's theology of infancy is our understanding of what prevenient grace is and what its benefits for humanity include. Spelling that out would take quite a while and though I'll likely be speaking about them from time to time, I want to focus my energy here on a particular aspect of prevenience; namely, how it is understood as a deletion of the guilt of original sin (or, "original guilt").

Original guilt is a topic that is often ignored in Wesleyan theological circles. This could be because of several reasons. I think the main ones are because original guilt is often misunderstood and it is seen as unimportant because our associated guilt with Adam has been cleared by the atonement in Christ. In order to make sure it is understood correctly, we must be careful to differentiate between "original" guilt and "actual" guilt. Put directly, all humans (everywhere & always) are guilty (in some sense) of original sin. Though it may sound like I'm speaking out of both sides of my mouth, guilt (in this sense) does not necessarily correspond to complicit action by all members of the guilty "party." In other words, we are guilty by association under the federal headship of our first parents. Where this is seen most poignantly in Wesley's thought, as far as I can tell, is in his description of the "natural man" and his application of the Ephesians 2:3 passage which says we were "by nature children of wrath."

This brings us to the second reason that "original guilt" is often ignored: that it has been negated by the atonement in Christ. To me that is a valid reason to not stress the point too much because although we may have a concept of "natural man" (i.e., one that is utterly without the grace of God), we do not know of any actual humans of which we can speak of in this way because God has endowed (preveniently graced, if you will) a measure of free will and "the light which enlightens everyone who comes into the world" through Christ's incarnation. If this grace offered in the atonement, which Wesley and I understand to be a "universal" one, removes the guilty status of all humans (at least until they actualize sin for themselves individually), then would we not say that prevenient grace is actually "justifying" in some sense? If so, then we may need to re-examine our understanding of "justification" and/or our understanding of "prevenient" grace because Wesley was adamant about not confusing the two. Thoughts?