The Catholic
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Faith and Works
Jesus saves by His grace, and His grace alone. Grace is applied to us through faith, which is much more than just a belief that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. The faith that saves is a true faith that produces good works. That is why good works are necessary for salvation. Faith must be active, and true faith "works through love" (Gal. 5:6). Therefore, Christians are saved by a true faith, a faith that produces good works: "A man is justified by works and not by faith alone" (Jas. 2:24).
We do not "earn" our salvation by good works, which are like "filthy rags". When a man is first justified, he does not do so by his works. But for justified believers, grace-empowered works increases grace in one's soul, and are no longer "filthy rags", because they are rewarded by God (Matt. 6:4,6,18; 16:27; 25:31-46). Sin, which is a failure to do a good work (Jas. 4:17), can result in the loss of grace and salvation. That is why works are necessary for salvation. We must remember that it is only by God's grace that we can perform good works. When God rewards these works, He is simply rewarding His own gifts, the fruits of His own graces.
Protestants who reject the idea that works have anything to do with salvation usually quote the gospel and epistles of John, and the epistles of Paul. What they conveniently ignore are the synoptic gospels, which support the Catholic view of salvation by faith and works: "For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 5:20); "You will know them by their fruits . . . Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire . . . Not every one who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven'" (Matt. 7:16-23); "And behold, one came up to him, saying, ‘Teacher, what good deed must I do, to have eternal life?' And he said to him . . . If you would enter life, keep the commandments' . . . The young man said to him, ‘All these I have observed; what do I still lack?' Jesus said to him, ‘If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me'" (Matt. 19:16-21); "‘Teacher, what must I do to inherit everlasting life?' Jesus answered him: ‘What is written in the Law'. He replied, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all you mind; and love your neighbor as yourself' Jesus said, ‘You have answered correctly. Do this and you shall live'" (Luke 10:25-37).
In order to refute such a notion, Protestants quote from the gospel of John: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only son, that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life" (John 3:16). Yes, salvation is a result of faith, but a true faith that produces good works. As John says elsewhere: "He who believes in the Son has eternal life; he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God rests upon him" (John 3:36). Here, John basically equates believing with obeying.
And consider these passages from the writings of John: "The hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation" (Jn 5:28-29). "If you love me, you will keep my commandments... He who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me; and he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him" (Jn 14:15,21). "By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments" (1 Jn 5:1-3). "We can be sure that we know God only be keeping his commandments. Anyone who says, ‘I know him,' and does not keep his commandments, is a liar, refusing to admit the truth" (1 Jn 2:3-4). "Those who keep his commandments remain in him and he in them" (1 John 3:24). "Another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds . . . And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire." (Rev. 20:11-15). "Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city" (Rev. 22:11-14).
The favorite source of Protestants is the Pauline epistles. We read: "Knowing that a man is not justified by legal observance but by faith in Jesus Christ, we too have believed in him in order to be justified by faith in Christ, not by legal observance; for by works of the Law no one will be justified" (Gal. 2:16). "For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, ‘Cursed be every one who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law, and do them.' Now it is evident that no man is justified before God by the law; for "He who through faith is righteous shall live"; but the law does not rest on faith, for ‘He who does them shall live by them.' Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us--for it is written, ‘Cursed be every one who hangs on a tree,' that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith" (Gal. 3:10-14). "For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God--not because of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph. 2:8-10). "For a man is justified by faith apart from the works of the Law" (Rom. 3:28).
These passages, as so many others throughout Romans and Galatians, speaks of the initial justification through faith, a free gift, as opposed to salvation based on our obedience to the Mosaic Law, a salvation given as a result of our efforts. No matter how many good works we do, or how faithful we are at obeying the Law, we will never be justified in this manner, because no man can perfectly obey the Law, and if a person tries to be justified by perfectly obeying the Law, as soon as he "falls into sin on one point", he is guilty "on all counts" (Jas. 2:10). However, we must do good works to remain justified after the gift of salvation has been freely given through faith, because the opposite of good works (or, a failure to do good works) is bad works (Jas. 4:17), or sin, and sin, if mortal, leads to spiritual death. In the Catholic scheme, salvation is by grace alone (only through God's actual graces can we make the act of faith that brings God's saving sanctifying grace, which makes our souls holy and capable of entering heaven, and increases as God's grace moves us to perform the works of mercy).
Paul does not condemn the Catholic notion that works are necessary to salvation. After all, the act of "accepting Jesus as Lord and Savior" is something we do, just as good works are. The difference lies in the fact that faith and works are simply the result of grace, and so they are not something we can take credit for. It is God working through us (Phil 2:13). Being justified through Law and being justified through grace are different. Paul puts Law into its proper perspective. Without grace, good works are powerless to save; rather, it is grace that saves. It comes to us through faith and remains in us through our faith-filled obedience to the spirit of the Law, summed up in the two great commandments (Luke 10:27-28), which are called the "teaching of the Law" (Matt. 22:40), which was not done away with, but is still in force (Matt.5:17-20). We must be a "doer" (Rom. 2:13) of the "law of Christ" (Gal 6:2), the "law of the Spirit" (Rom. 8:2-4), which is still in force, summed up by the two great commandments. We can deny our faith by the way we live (1 Tim. 5:8).
"If you have yourselves circumcised, Christ will be of no use to you. I point out once more to all who receive circumcision that they are bound to the law in its entirety. Any of you who seek your justification in the law have severed yourselves from Christ and fallen from God's favor." (Gal. 5:2-6). This passage is important in understanding Paul's theology. Paul here says that if you accept the teaching of the Judaizers that you have to obey the Mosaic Law to be saved, and circumcision requires you to obey the whole Mosaic Law (circumcision was also a declaration that you agreed to keep the entire Mosaic Law), then you could not be saved, because no one has the power to keep the entire Mosaic Law.
Perhaps the most important verse in understanding Paul's teachings on salvation is this: "To the one working, the wage is not reckoned according to grace but according to obligation" (Rom. 4:4). What Paul taught is that people who try to earn their salvation by good works are trying to obligate God to "pay" or reward him with salvation. This renders the relationship between God and man as purely legal, a contract, as it were, and is condemned: "Who has ever given to God that God should repay him?" (Rom.11:35). God desires a personal relationship, however, and when a man has one with God, out of His graciousness, God chooses to reward the believer. This is much different than trying to obligate God by performing the works of the Mosaic Law, apart from establishing a relationship with Him. Paul actually teaches that works are necessary for salvation: "For he will render to every man according to his works: To those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honour and immortality, he will give eternal life; but for those who are factious and do not obey the truth, but obey wickedness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honour and peace for every one who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek . . . For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified." (Romans 2:5-13).
And then there is the epistle of James: "But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves . . . What does it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has faith, but has not works? Can his faith save him . . . faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead . . . I by my works will show you my faith . . . Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he offered his son Isaac upon the altar . . . the scripture was fulfilled which says, ‘Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as . . . You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone . . . For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so faith apart from works is dead" (Jas. 1:24-2:26; see also Ps. 106:30-31, Jas. 1:23-27}. This makes it clear that faith and works are necessary for salvation. Protestants explain this by saying that the passage talks about being justified before man and not by God. But according to verse 14, the passage is talking about salvation, and verse 23 makes it clear that in context, the passage discusses a justification by God, and not only in the eyes of men.
Does this passage from James contradict the writings of Paul? No. Paul discusses the initial justification by faith, and James discusses further justification–an increase of sanctifying grace. This is evident by the fact that Abraham was already justified by the time he attempted to sacrifice Isaac. This occurred in Genesis 15. Hebrews 11:8 is a reference to Genesis 12, and says that Abraham trusted God by a true, justifying faith, made obvious by the fact that his faith "pleased" God (Heb. 11:6). Therefore, it is also a mistake to cite Romans as proof that Abraham was saved by faith alone: "For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the scripture say? ‘Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.'" (Rom. 4:2-3). Paul's point was that the Mosaic Law, which was given to Moses centuries after Abraham, could not be the source of our salvation, because Abraham was obviously not saved by the Mosaic Law.
Finally, two passages contradict the sola fide position: "Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs which he did; but Jesus did not trust himself to them, because he knew all men and needed no one to bear witness of man; for he himself knew what was in man" (Jn 2:23-25); "As he spoke thus, many believed in him. Jesus then said to the Jews who had believed in him, ‘If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples . . . I know that you are descendants of Abraham; yet you seek to kill me, because my word finds no place in you. I speak of what I have seen with my Father, and you do what you have heard from your father." (Jn 8:29-31,37-38). Obviously, these "believers" refused to "obey" (Rom. 1:5, 16:26), and were therefore not justified. Elsewhere, we read: "Cornelius, your prayer has been heard, and your alms have been remembered before God . . . in every nation any one who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him." (Acts 10:31, 35).
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