When Latin writers came up with the term deificatio, derived from the verb, deificare, they were not making a distinction from “divinization,” but providing another word for it. It was already obvious, from the standpoint of Christian theology, that no mortal becomes God. The Eastern Orthodox Church has retained theōsis as a concept for theological reflection, while the Western churches—separated by time, language, and philosophy from the Greek thinkers of the early church—