Paul's Conception of Salvation in Romans
In this post today, we will be tackling a hotly-disputed issue, namely, that of our salvation and how it all plays out in the life of the Christian. We will be taking a look at the words of Saint Paul as seen in his Epistle to the Romans, touching on several very controversial topics in the Catholic/Protestant debate over this issue. And so, to get somewhat of a bird's eye view of this whole debate, it would benefit us greatly to walk slowly through all the chapters in this epistle, drawing out the great theological truths, and showing how the teachings of the Catholic Church on salvation are indeed those held and defended by Saint Paul.
So, to start out his epistle, Paul begins a detailed analysis of humanity's great wickedness and the utter despair they have without help from God. He describes how the human person has the natural law, God's eternal decree for the good and end of humanity, clearly evident to him in the natural world around us and in the human heart. God, the ever just and merciful Father, wills the good for these depraved people and wants to draw them into fellowship and life with Him. However, in a true act of justice and indeed mercy, God rightfully gives fallen humanity over to their manifold sins and transgressions, not creating the sin in their hearts, mind you, but letting them do that which they really desire to do. And so, we have a clear exposition of the status quo of humanity: Fallen from grace, full of sin, and separated from the love of God, born with the lack of grace we call 'original sin'. The great Council of Trent explains:
"[A]ll men had lost their innocence in the prevarication of Adam, having become unclean, and, as the apostle says, by nature children of wrath... they were so far the servants of sin, and under the power of the devil and of death, that not the Gentiles only by the force of nature, but not even the Jews by the very letter itself of the law of Moses, were able to be liberated, or to arise, therefrom; although free will, attenuated as it was in its powers, and bent down, was by no means extinguished in them."
As we see, all of us in our natural states are fallen from grace and thus experiences great temptations from disordered desires and temptations (what we know as concupiscence) and are indeed slaves to sin because we cannot free ourselves from the clutches of sin. We must note here that the human person still maintains free will to some extent, being able to choose mere natural goods like friendship, courage, chivalry, patience, fortitude, and the like, as opposed to sins and vices such as avarice, lust, greed, envy, despair, and the rest of the grave evils. Members of the Reformed churches in Protestantism often have much dispute with the Catholic understanding that fallen man retains some flicker of free will despite original sin. However, many of their critiques are simply misunderstandings of either the Biblical texts or of the Catholic teaching on original sin and free will. And so, because this little rabbit trail proves to be one of much debate between Reformed Protestants and us Catholics, let's dive deeper into this issue before we go on with the rest of Paul's epistle.
First of all, what is free will? Many people offer various kinds of responses to this question and it would appear, according to some even in the Reformed community, that John Calvin himself believed in some form or another of free will, however small and minimalist his view might have been. The Catechism of the Catholic Church describes free will in the following way:
"Freedom is the power, rooted in reason and will, to act or not to act, to do this or that, and so to perform deliberate actions on one's own responsibility. By free will one shapes one's own life. Human freedom is a force for growth and maturity in truth and goodness; it attains its perfection when directed toward God, our beatitude."
"Every act directly willed is imputable to its author: Thus the Lord asked Eve after the sin in the garden: "What is this that you have done?" He asked Cain the same question. The prophet Nathan questioned David in the same way after he committed adultery with the wife of Uriah and had him murdered."
Many people would see the logic of this answer to the question, recognizing the fact that as humans, as rational beings, we have the ability to choose and to refrain from different things. However, the Reformed camp comes at these assertions by explaining that as a result of the Fall, man is totally depraved and his heart is completely directed away from the good and towards evil. They would then use several verses from Sacred Scripture which illustrate man's severely-fallen nature and his ruin without God's saving grace. Indeed, both the Catholic Church and the Reformed tradition have much in common in recognizing man's depravity and the absolute necessity for God to intervene and save poor sinners from eternal destruction. As Saint Thomas noted, following the clear testimony of Sacred Scripture, the Fall affects us in the following ways: Through original sin (lack of sanctifying grace and original justice, concupiscence, physical frailty and death, and a darkened intellect and consequent ignorance about the things of God.
Both the Calvinist and the Catholic can agree with the statement that, as a result of original sin, we are inclined towards sin, we have an unnatural proclivity towards it because we are born children of wrath, lacking sanctifying grace. However, the Catholic Church has always rightly affirmed that free will is not lost as a result of original sin, though it is very much impaired and it is completely unable to direct itself towards God and express the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. Those of the Reformed tradition often describe man's total depravity as having one's heart in the wrong place. The Catholic Church agrees with this statement, saying in Her Catechism:
"Adam and Eve transmitted to their descendants human nature wounded by their own first sin and hence deprived of original holiness and justice; this deprivation is called 'original sin'. As a result of original sin, human nature is weakened in its powers, subject to ignorance, suffering and the domination of death, and inclined to sin (this inclination is called 'concupiscence')."
Because he is fallen from original grace and justice and is assailed by the throes of sin, man is completely unable to save himself, totally unable to lift himself up to God and His Kingdom. So, man is in absolute need of a Redeemer to buy him back and save him from his sins, delivering him into God's friendship and grace once more.
In his fallen state, man retains the ability to either sin or not to sin but this fact does not mean in the slightest that fallen man is able to pick himself up by his own bootstraps and save himself, nor does it mean that original sin has not affected him, cutting him off from the love and grace of God. Of course, it is hard for fallen man to pursue even natural goods and indeed, every man absolutely needs a Redeemer, for even the most virtuous man by nature falls into grave sin without the grace and help of God. He cannot ever hope to attain the supernatural good of God's grace or Heaven by any kind of natural good works, even if he followed all of them perfectly. And so, it is the unchanging teaching of the Catholic Church that every single man and woman absolutely needs a Savior to deliver them from their sins and into communion with God. When Catholics affirm the existence of free will, they are not saying that man is able to save himself apart from God, nor are they declaring that Our Lord and the grace He merited on His holy cross are not absolute necessities for the world's salvation.
And so, seeing how the Catholic teachings on original sin are truly Biblical, let us move on with our discussion of Paul's conception of salvation as exhibited in Romans.
In Romans 2:5-8, Saint Paul writes:
"Whereas thou, by the stubborn impenitence of thy heart, dost continue to store up retribution for thyself against the day of retribution, when God will reveal the justice of his judgements. He will award to every man what his acts have deserved; eternal life to those who have striven for glory, and honor, and immortality, by perseverance in doing good; the retribution of his anger to those who are contumacious, rebelling against truth and paying homage to wickedness."
It is clear from this passage that God, being the Sovereign Ruler and Judge of the Universe, will judge humanity, bringing the righteous to eternal life in Heaven and casting the wicked and the unrighteous into eternal death in Hell. Paul then says:
"There will be affliction then and distress for every human soul that has practiced wickedness, the Jew in the first instance, but the Gentile too; there will be glory and honor and peace for everyone who has done good, the Jew in the first instance, but the Gentile too. There are no human preferences with God. Those who have been sinners without regard to the law will be doomed without regard to the law; those who have been sinners with the law for their rule will be judged with the law for their rule."
These verses clearly show us that God will judge every single man for what he has done, both Jew and non-Jew. Both groups will be judged according to what God gave them as means for their salvation, the Law (aka. the Torah) in the case of the Jew, and "their own natures a rule to guide them" for the non-Jewish Gentile. This idea reminds us of Our Lord's words in Luke 12:48, "For to whom much is given, of him much shall be required. And from him to whom much was entrusted, much will be asked." To bring this whole issue to its focal point, Paul declares in verse 16, "And there will be a day when God (according to the gospel I preach) will pass judgement, through Jesus Christ, on the hidden thoughts of men."
Now, as we come near to the highly-disputed passages between Catholics and Protestants, we must be sure to grasp and understand Paul's view of salvation in a full and true way, not reading our own biases and views into it. The Apostle then addresses an imaginary Jewish interlocutor, saying:
"Thou claimest Jewish blood; thou reliest on the law; God is all thy boast; thou canst tell what is his will, discern what things are of moment, because the law has taught thee. Thou hast confidence in thyself as one who leads the blind, a light to their darkness; admonishing the fool, instructing the simple, because in the law thou hast the incarnation of all knowledge and all truth. Tell me, then, thou who teachest others, hast thou no lesson for thyself? Is it a thief that preaches against stealing, an adulterer that forbids adultery? Dost thou rob temples, thou, who shrinkest from the touch of an idol? Thy boast is in the law; wilt thou break the law, to God’s dishonor? The name of God, says the scripture, has become a reproach among the Gentiles, because of you."
In this passage, Paul is admonishing the hypocritical Jewish man who claims to follow the Law of the Torah for his salvation yet does not keep the Law, causing scandal to the non-Jewish peoples. As we shall see in just a second, Paul is beginning to show his audience that our salvation and righteousness does not come from the Law, the Torah, the mere tablets of stone with commands on them, nor does it come from things like circumcision or animal sacrifices. Rather, Saint Paul is beginning to belabor the point that salvation, righteousness, and justification comes from Our Lord Jesus Christ and His infinitely-meritorious death on Calvary. This next passage is crucial in understanding Paul's soteriology, his understanding of our salvation:
"Circumcision, to be sure, is of value, so long as thou keepest the law; but if thou breakest the law, thy circumcision has lost its effect. And if one who has never been circumcised observes the conditions of the law, does it not follow that he, though uncircumcised, will be reckoned as one who is circumcised? That he, who keeps the law, though uncircumcised in body, will be able to pass judgement on thee, who breakest the law, though circumcised according to the letter of it? To be a Jew is not to be a Jew outwardly; to be circumcised is not to be circumcised outwardly, in the flesh. He is a Jew indeed who is one inwardly; true circumcision is achieved in the heart, according to the spirit, not the letter of the law, for God’s, not for man’s approval."
Let's dive into these verses. So, Paul declares that the rite of circumcision, the removing of the foreskin as part of God's covenant with man, is of value and effect if the Jew lives up to what it signifies, namely, living a righteous and holy life according to God's will. Indeed, the Jewish people in the Old Covenant saw the rite of circumcision as the means by which a person entered into the life of God's covenant family according to God's electing plan. However, as Paul strives to show, the act of circumcision is of no avail if those who are circumcised outwardly are not also circumcised inwardly in the heart by the working of the Spirit.The bland and empty letter of the Law cannot justify a man; a person isn't justified by merely being a Jew. True righteousness comes through an inward change, a pouring of God's grace into one's heart, not by the act of circumcision and by hearing and possessing the Law as a Jew.
Paul continues with this important theme in Romans 3:1-2, "Of what use is it, then, to be a Jew? What value was there in circumcision? Much, I answer, in every respect; chiefly because the Jews had the words of God entrusted to them."
However, as we have seen and shall again see, Paul firmly believes that salvation is not through the empty letter of the Law, nor is it received by merely being born a Jew who hears the Law preached in the Temple. Rather, salvation and true righteousness comes through obeying the righteous requirements of God's commands and thus being justified. As Paul said in Romans 2:13, "To have heard the law read out is no claim to acceptance with God; it is those who obey the law that will be justified."
In Romans 3:9-20, we read some very important things about our fallen nature and the need for our justification:
"Well then, has either side the advantage? In no way. Jews and Gentiles, as we have before alleged, are alike convicted of sin. Thus, it is written, There is not an innocent man among them, no, not one. There is nobody who reflects, and searches for God; all alike are on the wrong course, all are wasted lives; not one of them acts honorably, no, not one. Their mouths are gaping tombs, they use their tongues to flatter. Under their lips the venom of asps is hidden. Their talk overflows with curses and calumny. They run hot-foot to shed blood; havoc and ruin follow in their path; the way of peace is unknown to them. They do not keep the fear of God before their eyes. So the law says, and we know that the words of the law are meant for the law’s own subjects; it is determined that no one shall have anything to say for himself, that the whole world shall own itself liable to God’s judgements. No human creature can become acceptable in his sight by observing the law; what the law does is to give us the full consciousness of sin."
These verses clearly illustrate the universal fact of original sin, in both Jew and Gentile, showing that the Law, the stipulations of the Torah, is not able to justify any man. What matters is an inward change and receiving true righteousness into one's soul.
"But, in these days, God’s way of justification has at last been brought to light; one which was attested by the law and the prophets, but stands apart from the law; God’s way of justification through faith in Jesus Christ, meant for everybody and sent down upon everybody without distinction, if he has faith."
In this short passage, Paul explains the great truth that salvation does not come from Torah, from the Law, and that God's universal call of salvation now extends to all men, not just to those who are Jews and have the Torah. Indeed, this is the point Paul is devoting much effort to prove, namely, that Christ is the principle by which we are saved and not the Torah, the dead letter of the Law which only accuses a person of sin and is not able to give supernatural and eternal life. Paul then goes on to say:
"All alike have sinned, all alike are unworthy of God’s praise. And justification comes to us as a free gift from his grace, through our redemption in Christ Jesus. God has offered him to us as a means of reconciliation, in virtue of faith, ransoming us with his blood. Thus God has vindicated his own holiness, shewing us why he overlooked our former sins in the days of his forbearance; and he has also vindicated the holiness of Jesus Christ, here and now, as one who is himself holy, and imparts holiness to those who take their stand upon faith in him. What has become, then, of thy pride? No room has been left for it. On what principle? The principle which depends on observances? No, the principle which depends on faith; our contention is, that a man is justified by faith apart from the observances of the law."
As any scholar of the Protestant Reformation and indeed Church History should know, this passage is one of the most highly-disputed passages in Sacred Scripture. In 1517, Martin Luther, citing Romans 3:28, advanced the novel and heretical doctrine of salvation by faith alone (Latin: Sola Fide). As eminent church historian and Anglican cleric Alister McGrath writes in his magnificently-crafted work Iustitia Dei, a history of the doctrine of justification:
"The essential distinguishing feature of the Reformation doctrines of justification is that a deliberate and systematic distinction is made between justification and regeneration. Although it must be emphasized that this distinction is purely notional, in that it is impossible to separate the two within the context of the ordo salutis, the essential point is that a notional distinction is made where none had been acknowledged before in the history of Christian doctrine. A fundamental discontinuity was introduced into the western theological tradition where none had ever existed, or ever been contemplated, before.The Reformation understanding of the nature of justification – as opposed to its mode – must therefore be regarded as a genuine theological novum."
And so, this novel and heretical Protestant idea was condemned as heresy by the Catholic Church at the Council of Trent which declared definitively:
CANON XII - "If any one saith, that justifying faith is nothing else but confidence in the divine mercy which remits sins for Christ's sake; or, that this confidence alone is that whereby we are justified; let him be anathema."
CANON XIX - "If any one saith, that nothing besides faith is commanded in the Gospel; that other things are indifferent, neither commanded nor prohibited, but free; or, that the ten commandments nowise appertain to Christians; let him be anathema."
Reading these two canons, many Protestants have automatically asserted that the Catholic Church has anathematized/condemned the true Gospel which is, according to them, justification by faith alone in which God imputes/ascribes righteousness to us without a real inward change in us (as Luther put it, we're like dunghills covered with snow). In this view, were are saved and justified at a single moment and only at this moment. For the rest of the person's life, then, no amount or gravity of sins can separate them from God because He chooses to ignore our sins and look at the righteousness of Christ instead which is pretended to belong to the believer. However, when a person dives into the text of Sacred Scripture, he does not find the Protestant view of salvation being taught, but rather, the true Catholic view as described by the Council of Trent. So, let's take a closer look at Romans 3.
In this great passage, Saint Paul is belaboring the point that salvation and indeed our justification does not come from the Law, the Torah, and its observance, but rather, from Our Lord Jesus Christ and faith. Now, is faith alone all that matters in our salvation, according to Paul? Does faith apart from hope and love save us? The answer to both of these questions is a definite "No!" Sacred Scripture never describes a man either being justified, or saved in general, by faith alone. What I have just said is extremely controversial so let us dive into Romans and examine the context and meaning of Saint Paul's statements.
Many Protestant readers of Paul's theology in Romans read into his words a Protestant Apostle Paul debating with and condemning the Catholic Judaizers who taught salvation by merit and good works. However, I contend (and many others have too) that this is an extremely inadequate and skewed reading of Paul's theology, especially in Romans. In Romans Chapter 1, we saw that humanity is fallen and needs the power of God for salvation from sin and adoption as His children in Christ Jesus in order to achieve true righteousness. In Romans Chapter 2 and 3, Paul shows us that 'works of law' or 'the Law' cannot save/justify a person. Also, as is clearly evident from the context, Paul is not waging against good works or keeping the commandments but is showing us how a person is not saved by being a Jew who has the Torah, the Law, and who does these works which are prescribed in it. This is evident in Romans 3:29-30, "Is God the God of the Jews only? Is he not the God of the Gentiles too? Of the Gentiles too, assuredly; there is only one God, who will justify the circumcised man if he learns to believe, and the Gentile because he believes."
Rather than the Law of the Jews, Our Lord Jesus Christ saves us by the grace He earned on Calvary. New life in the Holy Spirit as adopted sons and daughters of God and partakers in the Divine Nature (2nd Peter 1:4) truly does save us from sin by the power, working, and calling of God and fills us with grace which produces faith, hope, and charity. And so, the two overarching themes in Romans 3 were salvation/justification by either the principle of works (aka. observing the Jewish Law or Torah) or by the principle of faith in Christ which leads to a new life in righteousness.
In Romans Chapter 4, Paul goes on to discuss the concept of justification by faith in greater detail, bringing on the Old Testament figures Abraham and King David as examples to prove his point. First, Paul illustrates to his imaginary Jewish interlocutor how Abraham was justified not by keeping the Mosaic Law/Torah but by faith in God. Rather than being under the principle of the Torah or works of law, Abraham, prompted by the gift and power of God, had faith in the Almighty God and thus was a just man in God's sight. Part and parcel of Paul's theology is understanding what principle a person operates under, whether that of the Jewish Law or that of faith through grace in Christ. Here's a great example to help us understand and apply this differentiation, especially when it comes to grasping Paul's concept of working and wages.
Under the Jewish Law, a person is not a son or daughter of Christ in grace; he or she does not have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and the gift of justification by the righteousness of Christ. Indeed, circumcision, the point of entry into the Jewish Covenant family, cannot save/justify a man, being merely a sign and a symbol. Paul says:
"This blessing, then, does it fall only on those who are circumcised, or on the uncircumcised as well? We saw that Abraham’s faith was reckoned virtue in him. And in what state of things was that reckoning made? Was he circumcised or uncircumcised at the time? Uncircumcised, not circumcised yet."
We know from the testimony of the Old Testament Scriptures (especially what we read about in the Torah) and the ancient practice of the Jewish people that circumcision, the removal of the foreskin, was the sign and seal of a person's entrance into God's covenant family. Arguing with an imaginary Jew, indeed, the Judaizers, Paul declares that Abraham was not reckoned as righteousness by works, those of the Jewish Torah/Law or even those works done by nature. As we see in verse 5, Abraham's justification was totally gratuitous, the grace God bestowed on him was entirely unmerited.
Now, there are many people who try to create a whole different conception of salvation out of these verses, saying that Abraham, at a single once-and-for-all point of time, was imputed the righteousness of Christ by virtue of his faith alone. This is the typical Protestant view you would find today, especially in the Lutheran and Reformed communities. These people assume that their ideas about our salvation map perfectly onto Paul's discussion here in Romans 4 and that the Catholic view totally destroys the text by teaching the alleged heretical doctrines of "works-righteousness" and on a broader level, "infused righteousness". However, we shall see that the typical Protestant understanding of this passage does not do justice to Paul's words and that the Catholic view is the solidly Biblical and true one.
Protestants would assert that Abraham was justified by faith alone and that even after his justification, having received righteousness, he was still objectively sinful and corrupt but God ignored his sins and looks at Christ instead, skipping over Abraham. However, this two-fold view of salvation by faith alone with imputed righteousness does not hold water when it undergoes the scrutiny of Sacred Scripture. First of all, we know that Abraham, our father in faith, had already been justified by faith long before the justification we read about in Romans 4 and in Genesis 15. Going back to Genesis 12, we see Abram leaving his dwelling in the city of Ur to follow the Lord God out of obedience and faithfulness. Hebrews 11:8 tells us the following about this event, "By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance; he went out, not knowing where he was to go."
So, how is it that Abraham had saving faith before Romans 4 and Genesis 15 speak of him being justified before God? The answer is quite simple. By the unmerited gift of God's grace and not by any works, Abram was called out of Ur and was put into a right relationship with God by virtue of his faithful obedience. Having become a new man by the indwelling of grace and the Spirit in light of the merits of Christ's death, Abram was righteous before God, not in a legal fiction or a mere decree, but really and truly righteous before God as a result of his "participation in the Divine Nature" (2nd Peter 1:4). He was justified in this way, Paul argues, not by doing the works mandated by the Torah, thus restricting God's salvific will to the Jews, but by a meritorious act of obedience to God, made possible by a special grace of God, and rewarded with true righteousness.
In Genesis 15:6, years later, we read, "Abram put his faith in the Lord, who attributed it to him as an act of righteousness." Examining the context of this verse, we see that Abram, along with several other men, had defeated a host of evil kings in battle. Returning home from his victory, Abram was offered a share in the goods and spoils by the king of Sodom. However, he told the king that he had made an oath with the Lord God, promising that he wouldn't take anything for himself. In the next chapter, God comes to Abram, declaring, "Do not fear, Abram! I am your shield; I will make your reward very great" (Genesis 15:1). Abram pushes back, lamenting the fact that he and his wife have no children and that a servant of his would have to be his official heir. God consequently reaffirms His covenant with Abram, promising that he would have children and, quite astoundingly, that his descendants would be as many as the stars in the sky. And so, Abram put his faith in the Lord, an act of obedience and trust which God rewarded by granting him righteousness. Indeed, Saint Paul holds Abram's faith as the model for us Christians because we see in this passage the full expression of a person's relationship with God, namely, one of total faithfulness and trust.
Bringing this discussion full circle, we see that Paul uses the example of Abram (who would later become Abraham, the father of all the living) to prove to his imaginary Jewish interlocutor that righteousness comes by being in a right relationship with God by faith and through Our Lord Jesus Christ, not by circumcision or works of law, aka. the Torah. Our Protestant brethren must understand the fact that Paul is not trying to argue here in Romans 4 that we don't need to keep the commandments in order to be saved. Also, Paul is not arguing that our justification is a once-and-for-all event, because that would contradict other passages of Scripture. Rather, he is declaring that God's plan for the world's salvation/justification, being made right with God, is through the atoning death of Our Lord and by the calling and power of grace, not by the Torah or any Jewish observances. This becomes evident in verses 9-12 of the chapter which read:
"Is this blessedness only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? We have been saying that Abraham’s faith was credited to him as righteousness. Under what circumstances was it credited? Was it after he was circumcised, or before? It was not after, but before! And he received circumcision as a sign, a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. So then, he is the father of all who believe but have not been circumcised, in order that righteousness might be credited to them. And he is then also the father of the circumcised who not only are circumcised but who also follow in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised."
Paul clearly shows us that our entry into the New Covenant family of God is not through circumcision, nor is circumcision effective towards giving us righteousness. The Judaizers (who we hear more about in the Book of Acts) claim that Christians are still supposed to practice the Torah ('the Law') as a means to justification, especially circumcision which is the means by which a person comes initially into communion with God. Slamming his opponents, Paul writes in verse 13, "It was not through the law that the promise was made to Abraham and his descendants that he would inherit the world, but through the righteousness that comes from faith." The Law is powerless to save and only serves to produce wrath, Paul informs us. However, through the death of Jesus Christ and the grace that He bestows on the world, we are all, Jew and non-Jew alike, able to become children of God in the Spirit, being justified and having peace with God, standing in His grace.
Before we move on with our treatment of Paul's theology in Romans, we must dispel the notion that the righteousness of Christ we read about in verses 23-25 is merely imputed as a legal fiction to those who believe. While the Greek word logizomai meaning 'reckon' or 'credit' has to with a person's perspective towards something, aka. having a certain disposition towards it, nowhere does Scripture tell us that this said perspective or judgment made by an individual is a legal fiction or doesn't reflect reality. Sacred Scripture describes our salvation and justification before God in many ways, saying that we are declared righteous, that we are made righteous, that we will be made righteous, that we have righteousness, ect.
And so, it is not good for a person reading the Bible to latch onto a single verse that they find appealing and then form a judgment about that verse, saying that it says x,y, or z. The fact that God declares a person to be righteous is not in any way, shape, or form contradictory to or exclusive of the fact that God makes a person righteous. In fact, Paul tells us in Romans 5:19 that "through the obedience of one the many will be made righteous." 1st Corinthians 5:17 likewise says that "whoever is in Christ is a new creation: the old things have passed away; behold, new things have come." 2nd Peter 1:4 declares an amazing thing, namely, that a person "may come to share in the Divine Nature, after escaping from the corruption that is in the world because of evil desire." Finally, in Romans 7:6, Paul tells us that "we are released from the Law, dead to what held us captive, so that we may serve in the newness of the Spirit and not under the obsolete letter." This is the new life a person enters into by grace through faith in Our Lord.
The common Protestant understanding of Christ's righteousness is that God imputes it to the believer in a legal fiction without any kind of change in the person's objective status before God. We are commonly told that God no longer sees the person or his actions but "sees only Christ instead". While it is true that our sins are washed away when we are justified and God no longer judges us for them or holds us guilty of them, this fact does not imply that there is no objective change of the person's status before God. Rather, as Paul tells us in Romans chapter 5, a person who is saved goes from being in Adam to being in Christ, serving in the new life through the power and working of the Holy Spirit. For Saint Paul, the act of faith is not just something whereby God transfers Christ's righteousness and imputes it to the believer. Faith, on the contrary, is the highest expression of a person's relationship with God by grace in light of Christ's meritorious death on Calvary. The man who like Abraham trusts God with all faith will be filled with the hope and love of God which will be poured into his heart, making him a new man, justified and made right with God. This man will be called truly righteous on account of the fact that he is united with and reconciled to God the Most High through new life under the Spirit and in grace, all on account of Christ's death. Rather than living under the letter of the Law which only accuses of sin and doesn't actually save us from sin, living in grace involves being forgiven of our sins and also living in a new life of holiness.
Moving into Chapter 5 of Romans, Paul begins his lengthy treatment of our new life in Christ after we have been justified. We see a clear exposition of the three great theological virtues in Romans 5:2-5, reading as follows:
"... we have gained access by faith to this grace in which we stand, and we boast in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we even boast of our afflictions, knowing that affliction produces endurance, and endurance [produces] proven character, and proven character [produces] hope, and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the holy Spirit that has been given to us."
Indeed, these gifts, these graces, are made possible by the generosity and kindness of our God through the atoning death of Jesus Christ. Saint Paul tells us that the blood of Christ justifies us and saves us from the wrath of God. "How is this?" many people might wonder. The Jews in Paul's time no doubt asked that very question.
The answer is very clear and remarkably powerful: Our Lord Jesus Christ, fully and truly both God and man, human and Divine, was the only one who could reconcile the world with God, bringing those who had been separated by sin, the human race all born into Adam, back into communion with God, being reborn in Christ. Our Lord is the sole Mediator between God and man because He is the only Person who is able to act as a representative of humanity, being fully man, and yet at the same time fully Divine and thus capable of meriting for us what we could not hope to earn, namely, the grace of God by which we are made right with Him and by which we are reborn and filled with the Holy Spirit. All of these facts fly in the face of the typical Protestant conception of salvation which basically asserts that God merely changes His mind about us and imputes the perfect law-keeping righteousness of Christ to us, regardless of how much we might sin and be disobedient to the Father. As we have seen, Paul does not accept this view and teaches the Catholic view instead which has been passed down throughout the long years of Christendom.
And so, having gone through all of these disproofs for the Protestant views, let us restate and reaffirm the Catholic theology of Saint Paul as we find in Romans. First, as the Council of Trent declares, nothing we do, whether faith or works, moves God to save us. This fits in perfectly with Paul's words in Romans 2 and 3 which declare that the Torah, the Law of the Hebrew people, cannot justify us by giving us righteousness. Also, as we know from Paul's discussion concerning the salvation of the Gentiles in chapter 2, the good and righteous works that these non-Jewish people perform through the grace of Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit is only a result of them having been essentially (meaning, in their core or essence) changed by the unmerited gift of God from above. We know that all men will be judged by their works, their life of either obedience or disobedience to God on this Earth. Paul, arguing with his imaginary Jewish opponent, tells us that the Law, meaning the Torah of the Jews, cannot justify a man, nor can it give righteousness and life in the Holy Trinity. Paul describes it as a mere bare letter which is dead and only convicts us without giving us life and communion with God. Then, by faith and baptism, a person is introduced to new life in the Spirit and receives justification, being made at peace with the Father through the merits of the Son. Just as Christ died and rose for our justification, Paul tells us that we die, are buried, and rise again with Him through the Holy Sacrament of Baptism. Romans 6:3-6 declares:
"You know well enough that we who were taken up into Christ by baptism have been taken up, all of us, into his death. In our baptism, we have been buried with him, died like him, that so, just as Christ was raised up by his Father’s power from the dead, we too might live and move in a new kind of existence. We have to be closely fitted into the pattern of his resurrection, as we have been into the pattern of his death; we have to be sure of this, that our former nature has been crucified with him, and the living power of our guilt annihilated, so that we are the slaves of guilt no longer."
This passage is highly problematic for those Protestant groups who do not believe in the saving efficacy of the Sacrament of Baptism. These people often believe that faith is the sole means of grace and being united to Christ and His sacrifice, viewing the Sacraments as symbols without any promise or power. However, as this passage and many, many others show, Baptism does save us because it is intrinsically united and connected to the one sacrifice of Our Lord; It is an outward sign, instituted by Christ, that pours grace into our souls by bringing us into the very life of the Holy Trinity. Just as Christ died, was buried, and rose again for our justification, so too the saved in the New Covenant die to sin and rise to justification and a new life through Baptism, which is the Sacrament of faith.
Many Protestants view Baptism and faith as being opposed to one another, saying that we can only take one or the other in regards to how a person enters into the New Covenant people of God. However, the Catholic Church has always affirmed that both faith and Baptism are needed for salvation because the clear teaching of Sacred Scripture affirms this doctrine. In fact, when asked how a man is born again in John 3:5, Our Lord Jesus Christ did not say "by faith" but "by water and Spirit," a clear reference to Baptism, given the immediate context. As scholarship has shown, every single one of the early Church Fathers, men who helped to build and grow the Church Our Lord founded and who laid down their lives out of love for Him, commented that this verse is a reference to the Sacrament of Baptism. Even the Protestant Reformer Martin Luther believed that Baptism was a Sacrament which gave grace and made a person reborn in the Spirit, as is evident in his Small Catechism. Whereas Saint Paul speaks of "One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism" in Ephesians 4:5, Protestantism gives us constant division, many competing and contradictory faiths, baptisms into false churches, and even false portrayals of Our Lord and His teachings. None of this what Christ or His Apostles intended, at all.
Seeing as how this post is quite lengthy, it would be best to draw it to a close here and now, concluding with some basic summaries. First, I totally and strongly affirm all the teachings of Saint Paul in the Letter to the Romans, denying not a single one. I firmly believe that our salvation as Catholic Christians does not come from either works done by mere human nature or works done under the Jewish Law. In fact, nothing we do or have can move God to save or justify us. I believe that salvation comes by faith and trust in God, energized and radically augmented by the Holy Sacrament of Baptism which gives us grace by uniting us to Christ and regenerating us. Then, as a result of having been saved, we are called to mortify our members, presenting them as means towards our sanctification and growth in righteousness.
Because we are not under the Law and are under the Spirit instead, we have a new life of grace and are called to a radical life of holiness. If we do not persevere in this life of righteousness, we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven and we will be cast into Hell forever. This is why Paul warns those people in Romans 11:22 that they might not fall from grace. Because we will be judged by our works at the final judgment, we must persist in righteous deeds and cast away all dead works.
In addition to this, I affirm all of the teachings of the Council of Trent on our salvation, denouncing all of the allegations and teachings of the Protestants like Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli. Finally, it is my hope and my fervent prayer that all non-Catholic Christians recognize the error of their ways and then come back into the fold of the Church, the Shepherd here on Earth which guides us to our future life in Heaven.
Let us then end with the powerful words of Saint Paul in Romans 13:
"The man who loves his neighbor has done all that the law demands. (All the commandments, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt do no murder, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet, and the rest, are resumed in this one saying, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.) Love of our neighbor refrains from doing harm of any kind; that is why it fulfills all the demands of the law (Romans 13:8-10)."
"Meanwhile, make no mistake about the age we live in; already it is high time for us to awake out of our sleep; our salvation is closer to us now than when we first learned to believe. The night is far on its course; day draws near. Let us abandon the ways of darkness, and put on the armor of light. Let us pass our time honorably, as by the light of day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in lust and wantonness, not in quarrels and rivalries. Rather, arm yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ; spend no more thought on nature and nature’s appetites (Romans 13:11-14)."
So, to start out his epistle, Paul begins a detailed analysis of humanity's great wickedness and the utter despair they have without help from God. He describes how the human person has the natural law, God's eternal decree for the good and end of humanity, clearly evident to him in the natural world around us and in the human heart. God, the ever just and merciful Father, wills the good for these depraved people and wants to draw them into fellowship and life with Him. However, in a true act of justice and indeed mercy, God rightfully gives fallen humanity over to their manifold sins and transgressions, not creating the sin in their hearts, mind you, but letting them do that which they really desire to do. And so, we have a clear exposition of the status quo of humanity: Fallen from grace, full of sin, and separated from the love of God, born with the lack of grace we call 'original sin'. The great Council of Trent explains:
"[A]ll men had lost their innocence in the prevarication of Adam, having become unclean, and, as the apostle says, by nature children of wrath... they were so far the servants of sin, and under the power of the devil and of death, that not the Gentiles only by the force of nature, but not even the Jews by the very letter itself of the law of Moses, were able to be liberated, or to arise, therefrom; although free will, attenuated as it was in its powers, and bent down, was by no means extinguished in them."
As we see, all of us in our natural states are fallen from grace and thus experiences great temptations from disordered desires and temptations (what we know as concupiscence) and are indeed slaves to sin because we cannot free ourselves from the clutches of sin. We must note here that the human person still maintains free will to some extent, being able to choose mere natural goods like friendship, courage, chivalry, patience, fortitude, and the like, as opposed to sins and vices such as avarice, lust, greed, envy, despair, and the rest of the grave evils. Members of the Reformed churches in Protestantism often have much dispute with the Catholic understanding that fallen man retains some flicker of free will despite original sin. However, many of their critiques are simply misunderstandings of either the Biblical texts or of the Catholic teaching on original sin and free will. And so, because this little rabbit trail proves to be one of much debate between Reformed Protestants and us Catholics, let's dive deeper into this issue before we go on with the rest of Paul's epistle.
First of all, what is free will? Many people offer various kinds of responses to this question and it would appear, according to some even in the Reformed community, that John Calvin himself believed in some form or another of free will, however small and minimalist his view might have been. The Catechism of the Catholic Church describes free will in the following way:
"Freedom is the power, rooted in reason and will, to act or not to act, to do this or that, and so to perform deliberate actions on one's own responsibility. By free will one shapes one's own life. Human freedom is a force for growth and maturity in truth and goodness; it attains its perfection when directed toward God, our beatitude."
"Every act directly willed is imputable to its author: Thus the Lord asked Eve after the sin in the garden: "What is this that you have done?" He asked Cain the same question. The prophet Nathan questioned David in the same way after he committed adultery with the wife of Uriah and had him murdered."
Many people would see the logic of this answer to the question, recognizing the fact that as humans, as rational beings, we have the ability to choose and to refrain from different things. However, the Reformed camp comes at these assertions by explaining that as a result of the Fall, man is totally depraved and his heart is completely directed away from the good and towards evil. They would then use several verses from Sacred Scripture which illustrate man's severely-fallen nature and his ruin without God's saving grace. Indeed, both the Catholic Church and the Reformed tradition have much in common in recognizing man's depravity and the absolute necessity for God to intervene and save poor sinners from eternal destruction. As Saint Thomas noted, following the clear testimony of Sacred Scripture, the Fall affects us in the following ways: Through original sin (lack of sanctifying grace and original justice, concupiscence, physical frailty and death, and a darkened intellect and consequent ignorance about the things of God.
Both the Calvinist and the Catholic can agree with the statement that, as a result of original sin, we are inclined towards sin, we have an unnatural proclivity towards it because we are born children of wrath, lacking sanctifying grace. However, the Catholic Church has always rightly affirmed that free will is not lost as a result of original sin, though it is very much impaired and it is completely unable to direct itself towards God and express the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. Those of the Reformed tradition often describe man's total depravity as having one's heart in the wrong place. The Catholic Church agrees with this statement, saying in Her Catechism:
"Adam and Eve transmitted to their descendants human nature wounded by their own first sin and hence deprived of original holiness and justice; this deprivation is called 'original sin'. As a result of original sin, human nature is weakened in its powers, subject to ignorance, suffering and the domination of death, and inclined to sin (this inclination is called 'concupiscence')."
Because he is fallen from original grace and justice and is assailed by the throes of sin, man is completely unable to save himself, totally unable to lift himself up to God and His Kingdom. So, man is in absolute need of a Redeemer to buy him back and save him from his sins, delivering him into God's friendship and grace once more.
In his fallen state, man retains the ability to either sin or not to sin but this fact does not mean in the slightest that fallen man is able to pick himself up by his own bootstraps and save himself, nor does it mean that original sin has not affected him, cutting him off from the love and grace of God. Of course, it is hard for fallen man to pursue even natural goods and indeed, every man absolutely needs a Redeemer, for even the most virtuous man by nature falls into grave sin without the grace and help of God. He cannot ever hope to attain the supernatural good of God's grace or Heaven by any kind of natural good works, even if he followed all of them perfectly. And so, it is the unchanging teaching of the Catholic Church that every single man and woman absolutely needs a Savior to deliver them from their sins and into communion with God. When Catholics affirm the existence of free will, they are not saying that man is able to save himself apart from God, nor are they declaring that Our Lord and the grace He merited on His holy cross are not absolute necessities for the world's salvation.
And so, seeing how the Catholic teachings on original sin are truly Biblical, let us move on with our discussion of Paul's conception of salvation as exhibited in Romans.
In Romans 2:5-8, Saint Paul writes:
"Whereas thou, by the stubborn impenitence of thy heart, dost continue to store up retribution for thyself against the day of retribution, when God will reveal the justice of his judgements. He will award to every man what his acts have deserved; eternal life to those who have striven for glory, and honor, and immortality, by perseverance in doing good; the retribution of his anger to those who are contumacious, rebelling against truth and paying homage to wickedness."
It is clear from this passage that God, being the Sovereign Ruler and Judge of the Universe, will judge humanity, bringing the righteous to eternal life in Heaven and casting the wicked and the unrighteous into eternal death in Hell. Paul then says:
"There will be affliction then and distress for every human soul that has practiced wickedness, the Jew in the first instance, but the Gentile too; there will be glory and honor and peace for everyone who has done good, the Jew in the first instance, but the Gentile too. There are no human preferences with God. Those who have been sinners without regard to the law will be doomed without regard to the law; those who have been sinners with the law for their rule will be judged with the law for their rule."
These verses clearly show us that God will judge every single man for what he has done, both Jew and non-Jew. Both groups will be judged according to what God gave them as means for their salvation, the Law (aka. the Torah) in the case of the Jew, and "their own natures a rule to guide them" for the non-Jewish Gentile. This idea reminds us of Our Lord's words in Luke 12:48, "For to whom much is given, of him much shall be required. And from him to whom much was entrusted, much will be asked." To bring this whole issue to its focal point, Paul declares in verse 16, "And there will be a day when God (according to the gospel I preach) will pass judgement, through Jesus Christ, on the hidden thoughts of men."
Now, as we come near to the highly-disputed passages between Catholics and Protestants, we must be sure to grasp and understand Paul's view of salvation in a full and true way, not reading our own biases and views into it. The Apostle then addresses an imaginary Jewish interlocutor, saying:
"Thou claimest Jewish blood; thou reliest on the law; God is all thy boast; thou canst tell what is his will, discern what things are of moment, because the law has taught thee. Thou hast confidence in thyself as one who leads the blind, a light to their darkness; admonishing the fool, instructing the simple, because in the law thou hast the incarnation of all knowledge and all truth. Tell me, then, thou who teachest others, hast thou no lesson for thyself? Is it a thief that preaches against stealing, an adulterer that forbids adultery? Dost thou rob temples, thou, who shrinkest from the touch of an idol? Thy boast is in the law; wilt thou break the law, to God’s dishonor? The name of God, says the scripture, has become a reproach among the Gentiles, because of you."
In this passage, Paul is admonishing the hypocritical Jewish man who claims to follow the Law of the Torah for his salvation yet does not keep the Law, causing scandal to the non-Jewish peoples. As we shall see in just a second, Paul is beginning to show his audience that our salvation and righteousness does not come from the Law, the Torah, the mere tablets of stone with commands on them, nor does it come from things like circumcision or animal sacrifices. Rather, Saint Paul is beginning to belabor the point that salvation, righteousness, and justification comes from Our Lord Jesus Christ and His infinitely-meritorious death on Calvary. This next passage is crucial in understanding Paul's soteriology, his understanding of our salvation:
"Circumcision, to be sure, is of value, so long as thou keepest the law; but if thou breakest the law, thy circumcision has lost its effect. And if one who has never been circumcised observes the conditions of the law, does it not follow that he, though uncircumcised, will be reckoned as one who is circumcised? That he, who keeps the law, though uncircumcised in body, will be able to pass judgement on thee, who breakest the law, though circumcised according to the letter of it? To be a Jew is not to be a Jew outwardly; to be circumcised is not to be circumcised outwardly, in the flesh. He is a Jew indeed who is one inwardly; true circumcision is achieved in the heart, according to the spirit, not the letter of the law, for God’s, not for man’s approval."
Let's dive into these verses. So, Paul declares that the rite of circumcision, the removing of the foreskin as part of God's covenant with man, is of value and effect if the Jew lives up to what it signifies, namely, living a righteous and holy life according to God's will. Indeed, the Jewish people in the Old Covenant saw the rite of circumcision as the means by which a person entered into the life of God's covenant family according to God's electing plan. However, as Paul strives to show, the act of circumcision is of no avail if those who are circumcised outwardly are not also circumcised inwardly in the heart by the working of the Spirit.The bland and empty letter of the Law cannot justify a man; a person isn't justified by merely being a Jew. True righteousness comes through an inward change, a pouring of God's grace into one's heart, not by the act of circumcision and by hearing and possessing the Law as a Jew.
Paul continues with this important theme in Romans 3:1-2, "Of what use is it, then, to be a Jew? What value was there in circumcision? Much, I answer, in every respect; chiefly because the Jews had the words of God entrusted to them."
However, as we have seen and shall again see, Paul firmly believes that salvation is not through the empty letter of the Law, nor is it received by merely being born a Jew who hears the Law preached in the Temple. Rather, salvation and true righteousness comes through obeying the righteous requirements of God's commands and thus being justified. As Paul said in Romans 2:13, "To have heard the law read out is no claim to acceptance with God; it is those who obey the law that will be justified."
In Romans 3:9-20, we read some very important things about our fallen nature and the need for our justification:
"Well then, has either side the advantage? In no way. Jews and Gentiles, as we have before alleged, are alike convicted of sin. Thus, it is written, There is not an innocent man among them, no, not one. There is nobody who reflects, and searches for God; all alike are on the wrong course, all are wasted lives; not one of them acts honorably, no, not one. Their mouths are gaping tombs, they use their tongues to flatter. Under their lips the venom of asps is hidden. Their talk overflows with curses and calumny. They run hot-foot to shed blood; havoc and ruin follow in their path; the way of peace is unknown to them. They do not keep the fear of God before their eyes. So the law says, and we know that the words of the law are meant for the law’s own subjects; it is determined that no one shall have anything to say for himself, that the whole world shall own itself liable to God’s judgements. No human creature can become acceptable in his sight by observing the law; what the law does is to give us the full consciousness of sin."
These verses clearly illustrate the universal fact of original sin, in both Jew and Gentile, showing that the Law, the stipulations of the Torah, is not able to justify any man. What matters is an inward change and receiving true righteousness into one's soul.
"But, in these days, God’s way of justification has at last been brought to light; one which was attested by the law and the prophets, but stands apart from the law; God’s way of justification through faith in Jesus Christ, meant for everybody and sent down upon everybody without distinction, if he has faith."
In this short passage, Paul explains the great truth that salvation does not come from Torah, from the Law, and that God's universal call of salvation now extends to all men, not just to those who are Jews and have the Torah. Indeed, this is the point Paul is devoting much effort to prove, namely, that Christ is the principle by which we are saved and not the Torah, the dead letter of the Law which only accuses a person of sin and is not able to give supernatural and eternal life. Paul then goes on to say:
"All alike have sinned, all alike are unworthy of God’s praise. And justification comes to us as a free gift from his grace, through our redemption in Christ Jesus. God has offered him to us as a means of reconciliation, in virtue of faith, ransoming us with his blood. Thus God has vindicated his own holiness, shewing us why he overlooked our former sins in the days of his forbearance; and he has also vindicated the holiness of Jesus Christ, here and now, as one who is himself holy, and imparts holiness to those who take their stand upon faith in him. What has become, then, of thy pride? No room has been left for it. On what principle? The principle which depends on observances? No, the principle which depends on faith; our contention is, that a man is justified by faith apart from the observances of the law."
As any scholar of the Protestant Reformation and indeed Church History should know, this passage is one of the most highly-disputed passages in Sacred Scripture. In 1517, Martin Luther, citing Romans 3:28, advanced the novel and heretical doctrine of salvation by faith alone (Latin: Sola Fide). As eminent church historian and Anglican cleric Alister McGrath writes in his magnificently-crafted work Iustitia Dei, a history of the doctrine of justification:
"The essential distinguishing feature of the Reformation doctrines of justification is that a deliberate and systematic distinction is made between justification and regeneration. Although it must be emphasized that this distinction is purely notional, in that it is impossible to separate the two within the context of the ordo salutis, the essential point is that a notional distinction is made where none had been acknowledged before in the history of Christian doctrine. A fundamental discontinuity was introduced into the western theological tradition where none had ever existed, or ever been contemplated, before.The Reformation understanding of the nature of justification – as opposed to its mode – must therefore be regarded as a genuine theological novum."
And so, this novel and heretical Protestant idea was condemned as heresy by the Catholic Church at the Council of Trent which declared definitively:
CANON XII - "If any one saith, that justifying faith is nothing else but confidence in the divine mercy which remits sins for Christ's sake; or, that this confidence alone is that whereby we are justified; let him be anathema."
CANON XIX - "If any one saith, that nothing besides faith is commanded in the Gospel; that other things are indifferent, neither commanded nor prohibited, but free; or, that the ten commandments nowise appertain to Christians; let him be anathema."
Reading these two canons, many Protestants have automatically asserted that the Catholic Church has anathematized/condemned the true Gospel which is, according to them, justification by faith alone in which God imputes/ascribes righteousness to us without a real inward change in us (as Luther put it, we're like dunghills covered with snow). In this view, were are saved and justified at a single moment and only at this moment. For the rest of the person's life, then, no amount or gravity of sins can separate them from God because He chooses to ignore our sins and look at the righteousness of Christ instead which is pretended to belong to the believer. However, when a person dives into the text of Sacred Scripture, he does not find the Protestant view of salvation being taught, but rather, the true Catholic view as described by the Council of Trent. So, let's take a closer look at Romans 3.
In this great passage, Saint Paul is belaboring the point that salvation and indeed our justification does not come from the Law, the Torah, and its observance, but rather, from Our Lord Jesus Christ and faith. Now, is faith alone all that matters in our salvation, according to Paul? Does faith apart from hope and love save us? The answer to both of these questions is a definite "No!" Sacred Scripture never describes a man either being justified, or saved in general, by faith alone. What I have just said is extremely controversial so let us dive into Romans and examine the context and meaning of Saint Paul's statements.
Many Protestant readers of Paul's theology in Romans read into his words a Protestant Apostle Paul debating with and condemning the Catholic Judaizers who taught salvation by merit and good works. However, I contend (and many others have too) that this is an extremely inadequate and skewed reading of Paul's theology, especially in Romans. In Romans Chapter 1, we saw that humanity is fallen and needs the power of God for salvation from sin and adoption as His children in Christ Jesus in order to achieve true righteousness. In Romans Chapter 2 and 3, Paul shows us that 'works of law' or 'the Law' cannot save/justify a person. Also, as is clearly evident from the context, Paul is not waging against good works or keeping the commandments but is showing us how a person is not saved by being a Jew who has the Torah, the Law, and who does these works which are prescribed in it. This is evident in Romans 3:29-30, "Is God the God of the Jews only? Is he not the God of the Gentiles too? Of the Gentiles too, assuredly; there is only one God, who will justify the circumcised man if he learns to believe, and the Gentile because he believes."
Rather than the Law of the Jews, Our Lord Jesus Christ saves us by the grace He earned on Calvary. New life in the Holy Spirit as adopted sons and daughters of God and partakers in the Divine Nature (2nd Peter 1:4) truly does save us from sin by the power, working, and calling of God and fills us with grace which produces faith, hope, and charity. And so, the two overarching themes in Romans 3 were salvation/justification by either the principle of works (aka. observing the Jewish Law or Torah) or by the principle of faith in Christ which leads to a new life in righteousness.
In Romans Chapter 4, Paul goes on to discuss the concept of justification by faith in greater detail, bringing on the Old Testament figures Abraham and King David as examples to prove his point. First, Paul illustrates to his imaginary Jewish interlocutor how Abraham was justified not by keeping the Mosaic Law/Torah but by faith in God. Rather than being under the principle of the Torah or works of law, Abraham, prompted by the gift and power of God, had faith in the Almighty God and thus was a just man in God's sight. Part and parcel of Paul's theology is understanding what principle a person operates under, whether that of the Jewish Law or that of faith through grace in Christ. Here's a great example to help us understand and apply this differentiation, especially when it comes to grasping Paul's concept of working and wages.
Under the Jewish Law, a person is not a son or daughter of Christ in grace; he or she does not have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and the gift of justification by the righteousness of Christ. Indeed, circumcision, the point of entry into the Jewish Covenant family, cannot save/justify a man, being merely a sign and a symbol. Paul says:
"This blessing, then, does it fall only on those who are circumcised, or on the uncircumcised as well? We saw that Abraham’s faith was reckoned virtue in him. And in what state of things was that reckoning made? Was he circumcised or uncircumcised at the time? Uncircumcised, not circumcised yet."
We know from the testimony of the Old Testament Scriptures (especially what we read about in the Torah) and the ancient practice of the Jewish people that circumcision, the removal of the foreskin, was the sign and seal of a person's entrance into God's covenant family. Arguing with an imaginary Jew, indeed, the Judaizers, Paul declares that Abraham was not reckoned as righteousness by works, those of the Jewish Torah/Law or even those works done by nature. As we see in verse 5, Abraham's justification was totally gratuitous, the grace God bestowed on him was entirely unmerited.
Now, there are many people who try to create a whole different conception of salvation out of these verses, saying that Abraham, at a single once-and-for-all point of time, was imputed the righteousness of Christ by virtue of his faith alone. This is the typical Protestant view you would find today, especially in the Lutheran and Reformed communities. These people assume that their ideas about our salvation map perfectly onto Paul's discussion here in Romans 4 and that the Catholic view totally destroys the text by teaching the alleged heretical doctrines of "works-righteousness" and on a broader level, "infused righteousness". However, we shall see that the typical Protestant understanding of this passage does not do justice to Paul's words and that the Catholic view is the solidly Biblical and true one.
Protestants would assert that Abraham was justified by faith alone and that even after his justification, having received righteousness, he was still objectively sinful and corrupt but God ignored his sins and looks at Christ instead, skipping over Abraham. However, this two-fold view of salvation by faith alone with imputed righteousness does not hold water when it undergoes the scrutiny of Sacred Scripture. First of all, we know that Abraham, our father in faith, had already been justified by faith long before the justification we read about in Romans 4 and in Genesis 15. Going back to Genesis 12, we see Abram leaving his dwelling in the city of Ur to follow the Lord God out of obedience and faithfulness. Hebrews 11:8 tells us the following about this event, "By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance; he went out, not knowing where he was to go."
So, how is it that Abraham had saving faith before Romans 4 and Genesis 15 speak of him being justified before God? The answer is quite simple. By the unmerited gift of God's grace and not by any works, Abram was called out of Ur and was put into a right relationship with God by virtue of his faithful obedience. Having become a new man by the indwelling of grace and the Spirit in light of the merits of Christ's death, Abram was righteous before God, not in a legal fiction or a mere decree, but really and truly righteous before God as a result of his "participation in the Divine Nature" (2nd Peter 1:4). He was justified in this way, Paul argues, not by doing the works mandated by the Torah, thus restricting God's salvific will to the Jews, but by a meritorious act of obedience to God, made possible by a special grace of God, and rewarded with true righteousness.
In Genesis 15:6, years later, we read, "Abram put his faith in the Lord, who attributed it to him as an act of righteousness." Examining the context of this verse, we see that Abram, along with several other men, had defeated a host of evil kings in battle. Returning home from his victory, Abram was offered a share in the goods and spoils by the king of Sodom. However, he told the king that he had made an oath with the Lord God, promising that he wouldn't take anything for himself. In the next chapter, God comes to Abram, declaring, "Do not fear, Abram! I am your shield; I will make your reward very great" (Genesis 15:1). Abram pushes back, lamenting the fact that he and his wife have no children and that a servant of his would have to be his official heir. God consequently reaffirms His covenant with Abram, promising that he would have children and, quite astoundingly, that his descendants would be as many as the stars in the sky. And so, Abram put his faith in the Lord, an act of obedience and trust which God rewarded by granting him righteousness. Indeed, Saint Paul holds Abram's faith as the model for us Christians because we see in this passage the full expression of a person's relationship with God, namely, one of total faithfulness and trust.
Bringing this discussion full circle, we see that Paul uses the example of Abram (who would later become Abraham, the father of all the living) to prove to his imaginary Jewish interlocutor that righteousness comes by being in a right relationship with God by faith and through Our Lord Jesus Christ, not by circumcision or works of law, aka. the Torah. Our Protestant brethren must understand the fact that Paul is not trying to argue here in Romans 4 that we don't need to keep the commandments in order to be saved. Also, Paul is not arguing that our justification is a once-and-for-all event, because that would contradict other passages of Scripture. Rather, he is declaring that God's plan for the world's salvation/justification, being made right with God, is through the atoning death of Our Lord and by the calling and power of grace, not by the Torah or any Jewish observances. This becomes evident in verses 9-12 of the chapter which read:
"Is this blessedness only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? We have been saying that Abraham’s faith was credited to him as righteousness. Under what circumstances was it credited? Was it after he was circumcised, or before? It was not after, but before! And he received circumcision as a sign, a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. So then, he is the father of all who believe but have not been circumcised, in order that righteousness might be credited to them. And he is then also the father of the circumcised who not only are circumcised but who also follow in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised."
Paul clearly shows us that our entry into the New Covenant family of God is not through circumcision, nor is circumcision effective towards giving us righteousness. The Judaizers (who we hear more about in the Book of Acts) claim that Christians are still supposed to practice the Torah ('the Law') as a means to justification, especially circumcision which is the means by which a person comes initially into communion with God. Slamming his opponents, Paul writes in verse 13, "It was not through the law that the promise was made to Abraham and his descendants that he would inherit the world, but through the righteousness that comes from faith." The Law is powerless to save and only serves to produce wrath, Paul informs us. However, through the death of Jesus Christ and the grace that He bestows on the world, we are all, Jew and non-Jew alike, able to become children of God in the Spirit, being justified and having peace with God, standing in His grace.
Before we move on with our treatment of Paul's theology in Romans, we must dispel the notion that the righteousness of Christ we read about in verses 23-25 is merely imputed as a legal fiction to those who believe. While the Greek word logizomai meaning 'reckon' or 'credit' has to with a person's perspective towards something, aka. having a certain disposition towards it, nowhere does Scripture tell us that this said perspective or judgment made by an individual is a legal fiction or doesn't reflect reality. Sacred Scripture describes our salvation and justification before God in many ways, saying that we are declared righteous, that we are made righteous, that we will be made righteous, that we have righteousness, ect.
And so, it is not good for a person reading the Bible to latch onto a single verse that they find appealing and then form a judgment about that verse, saying that it says x,y, or z. The fact that God declares a person to be righteous is not in any way, shape, or form contradictory to or exclusive of the fact that God makes a person righteous. In fact, Paul tells us in Romans 5:19 that "through the obedience of one the many will be made righteous." 1st Corinthians 5:17 likewise says that "whoever is in Christ is a new creation: the old things have passed away; behold, new things have come." 2nd Peter 1:4 declares an amazing thing, namely, that a person "may come to share in the Divine Nature, after escaping from the corruption that is in the world because of evil desire." Finally, in Romans 7:6, Paul tells us that "we are released from the Law, dead to what held us captive, so that we may serve in the newness of the Spirit and not under the obsolete letter." This is the new life a person enters into by grace through faith in Our Lord.
The common Protestant understanding of Christ's righteousness is that God imputes it to the believer in a legal fiction without any kind of change in the person's objective status before God. We are commonly told that God no longer sees the person or his actions but "sees only Christ instead". While it is true that our sins are washed away when we are justified and God no longer judges us for them or holds us guilty of them, this fact does not imply that there is no objective change of the person's status before God. Rather, as Paul tells us in Romans chapter 5, a person who is saved goes from being in Adam to being in Christ, serving in the new life through the power and working of the Holy Spirit. For Saint Paul, the act of faith is not just something whereby God transfers Christ's righteousness and imputes it to the believer. Faith, on the contrary, is the highest expression of a person's relationship with God by grace in light of Christ's meritorious death on Calvary. The man who like Abraham trusts God with all faith will be filled with the hope and love of God which will be poured into his heart, making him a new man, justified and made right with God. This man will be called truly righteous on account of the fact that he is united with and reconciled to God the Most High through new life under the Spirit and in grace, all on account of Christ's death. Rather than living under the letter of the Law which only accuses of sin and doesn't actually save us from sin, living in grace involves being forgiven of our sins and also living in a new life of holiness.
Moving into Chapter 5 of Romans, Paul begins his lengthy treatment of our new life in Christ after we have been justified. We see a clear exposition of the three great theological virtues in Romans 5:2-5, reading as follows:
"... we have gained access by faith to this grace in which we stand, and we boast in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we even boast of our afflictions, knowing that affliction produces endurance, and endurance [produces] proven character, and proven character [produces] hope, and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the holy Spirit that has been given to us."
Indeed, these gifts, these graces, are made possible by the generosity and kindness of our God through the atoning death of Jesus Christ. Saint Paul tells us that the blood of Christ justifies us and saves us from the wrath of God. "How is this?" many people might wonder. The Jews in Paul's time no doubt asked that very question.
The answer is very clear and remarkably powerful: Our Lord Jesus Christ, fully and truly both God and man, human and Divine, was the only one who could reconcile the world with God, bringing those who had been separated by sin, the human race all born into Adam, back into communion with God, being reborn in Christ. Our Lord is the sole Mediator between God and man because He is the only Person who is able to act as a representative of humanity, being fully man, and yet at the same time fully Divine and thus capable of meriting for us what we could not hope to earn, namely, the grace of God by which we are made right with Him and by which we are reborn and filled with the Holy Spirit. All of these facts fly in the face of the typical Protestant conception of salvation which basically asserts that God merely changes His mind about us and imputes the perfect law-keeping righteousness of Christ to us, regardless of how much we might sin and be disobedient to the Father. As we have seen, Paul does not accept this view and teaches the Catholic view instead which has been passed down throughout the long years of Christendom.
And so, having gone through all of these disproofs for the Protestant views, let us restate and reaffirm the Catholic theology of Saint Paul as we find in Romans. First, as the Council of Trent declares, nothing we do, whether faith or works, moves God to save us. This fits in perfectly with Paul's words in Romans 2 and 3 which declare that the Torah, the Law of the Hebrew people, cannot justify us by giving us righteousness. Also, as we know from Paul's discussion concerning the salvation of the Gentiles in chapter 2, the good and righteous works that these non-Jewish people perform through the grace of Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit is only a result of them having been essentially (meaning, in their core or essence) changed by the unmerited gift of God from above. We know that all men will be judged by their works, their life of either obedience or disobedience to God on this Earth. Paul, arguing with his imaginary Jewish opponent, tells us that the Law, meaning the Torah of the Jews, cannot justify a man, nor can it give righteousness and life in the Holy Trinity. Paul describes it as a mere bare letter which is dead and only convicts us without giving us life and communion with God. Then, by faith and baptism, a person is introduced to new life in the Spirit and receives justification, being made at peace with the Father through the merits of the Son. Just as Christ died and rose for our justification, Paul tells us that we die, are buried, and rise again with Him through the Holy Sacrament of Baptism. Romans 6:3-6 declares:
"You know well enough that we who were taken up into Christ by baptism have been taken up, all of us, into his death. In our baptism, we have been buried with him, died like him, that so, just as Christ was raised up by his Father’s power from the dead, we too might live and move in a new kind of existence. We have to be closely fitted into the pattern of his resurrection, as we have been into the pattern of his death; we have to be sure of this, that our former nature has been crucified with him, and the living power of our guilt annihilated, so that we are the slaves of guilt no longer."
This passage is highly problematic for those Protestant groups who do not believe in the saving efficacy of the Sacrament of Baptism. These people often believe that faith is the sole means of grace and being united to Christ and His sacrifice, viewing the Sacraments as symbols without any promise or power. However, as this passage and many, many others show, Baptism does save us because it is intrinsically united and connected to the one sacrifice of Our Lord; It is an outward sign, instituted by Christ, that pours grace into our souls by bringing us into the very life of the Holy Trinity. Just as Christ died, was buried, and rose again for our justification, so too the saved in the New Covenant die to sin and rise to justification and a new life through Baptism, which is the Sacrament of faith.
Many Protestants view Baptism and faith as being opposed to one another, saying that we can only take one or the other in regards to how a person enters into the New Covenant people of God. However, the Catholic Church has always affirmed that both faith and Baptism are needed for salvation because the clear teaching of Sacred Scripture affirms this doctrine. In fact, when asked how a man is born again in John 3:5, Our Lord Jesus Christ did not say "by faith" but "by water and Spirit," a clear reference to Baptism, given the immediate context. As scholarship has shown, every single one of the early Church Fathers, men who helped to build and grow the Church Our Lord founded and who laid down their lives out of love for Him, commented that this verse is a reference to the Sacrament of Baptism. Even the Protestant Reformer Martin Luther believed that Baptism was a Sacrament which gave grace and made a person reborn in the Spirit, as is evident in his Small Catechism. Whereas Saint Paul speaks of "One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism" in Ephesians 4:5, Protestantism gives us constant division, many competing and contradictory faiths, baptisms into false churches, and even false portrayals of Our Lord and His teachings. None of this what Christ or His Apostles intended, at all.
Seeing as how this post is quite lengthy, it would be best to draw it to a close here and now, concluding with some basic summaries. First, I totally and strongly affirm all the teachings of Saint Paul in the Letter to the Romans, denying not a single one. I firmly believe that our salvation as Catholic Christians does not come from either works done by mere human nature or works done under the Jewish Law. In fact, nothing we do or have can move God to save or justify us. I believe that salvation comes by faith and trust in God, energized and radically augmented by the Holy Sacrament of Baptism which gives us grace by uniting us to Christ and regenerating us. Then, as a result of having been saved, we are called to mortify our members, presenting them as means towards our sanctification and growth in righteousness.
Because we are not under the Law and are under the Spirit instead, we have a new life of grace and are called to a radical life of holiness. If we do not persevere in this life of righteousness, we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven and we will be cast into Hell forever. This is why Paul warns those people in Romans 11:22 that they might not fall from grace. Because we will be judged by our works at the final judgment, we must persist in righteous deeds and cast away all dead works.
In addition to this, I affirm all of the teachings of the Council of Trent on our salvation, denouncing all of the allegations and teachings of the Protestants like Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli. Finally, it is my hope and my fervent prayer that all non-Catholic Christians recognize the error of their ways and then come back into the fold of the Church, the Shepherd here on Earth which guides us to our future life in Heaven.
Let us then end with the powerful words of Saint Paul in Romans 13:
"The man who loves his neighbor has done all that the law demands. (All the commandments, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt do no murder, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet, and the rest, are resumed in this one saying, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.) Love of our neighbor refrains from doing harm of any kind; that is why it fulfills all the demands of the law (Romans 13:8-10)."
"Meanwhile, make no mistake about the age we live in; already it is high time for us to awake out of our sleep; our salvation is closer to us now than when we first learned to believe. The night is far on its course; day draws near. Let us abandon the ways of darkness, and put on the armor of light. Let us pass our time honorably, as by the light of day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in lust and wantonness, not in quarrels and rivalries. Rather, arm yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ; spend no more thought on nature and nature’s appetites (Romans 13:11-14)."
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