Faith alone vs faith and works

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schulze43

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I was reading Ephesians 2:8 and following today and was thinking about how to explain this passage in a Catholic light to protestants. Obviously I believe that faith alone does not suffice for our salvation anyways a few things came to my mind and I wanted to make sure that all I was thinking was in line with Catholic teaching so if anyone could tell me if I am write or wrong that would be great:) or if anyone wants to add that would be great too:)

So grace (God’s free gift) is offered to us, and when we accept that grace and believe (ie have faith) we are justified. Then our faith becomes complete by the works that we do through God’s grace. Faith and works are inseparable. Without works faith is dead (James 2:17) The grace that God gives us leads us to do good works. We cannot do anything by ourselves except sin.

It is not that without works we have no faith, our faith is just dead. The devil himself believes in God but obviously he is not saved because he chose to serve himself and not God. I too only have a faith that is dead if I have no works. Our faith is a gift from God. Our good works, inspired by His grace and then offered back to Him, make Him happy. He rewards us with eternal life. None of the good is done by us.

I don’t know if this all makes sense or not so please tell me lol 🙂 thanks for the help!
 
schulze43 said:
I was reading Ephesians 2:8 and following today and was thinking about how to explain this passage in a Catholic light to protestants. Obviously I believe that faith alone does not suffice for our salvation anyways a few things came to my mind and I wanted to make sure that all I was thinking was in line with Catholic teaching so if anyone could tell me if I am write or wrong that would be great:) or if anyone wants to add that would be great too:)

So grace (God’s free gift) is offered to us, and when we accept that grace and believe (ie have faith) we are justified. Then our faith becomes complete by the works that we do through God’s grace. Faith and works are inseparable. Without works faith is dead (James 2:17) The grace that God gives us leads us to do good works. We cannot do anything by ourselves except sin.

It is not that without works we have no faith, our faith is just dead. The devil himself believes in God but obviously he is not saved because he chose to serve himself and not God. I too only have a faith that is dead if I have no works. Our faith is a gift from God. Our good works, inspired by His grace and then offered back to Him, make Him happy. He rewards us with eternal life. None of the good is done by us.

I don’t know if this all makes sense or not so please tell me lol 🙂 thanks for the help!
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you truly stepped very gingerly and covered all aspects and opinions -there is a lot of disagreement as regards faith alone or faith and good works.The answer is that neither is acceptable to Catholics or Protestants - in this wise just type in Catholic/Luthern conference in search box and click - this is now accepted and acceptable to all Christians it seems - a bit of unity that seems reasonable at last - twinc
 
Luther would be happy today, with the reformed Catholic Church 🙂

I doubt he would be pleased with the reformation of the Reformation - the ever ongoing creation of new denominations - it’s up to around 30,000 now.
 
Barbkw said:
Luther would be happy today, with the reformed Catholic Church 🙂

I doubt he would be pleased with the reformation of the Reformation - the ever ongoing creation of new denominations - it’s up to around 30,000 now.
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30,000!! That’s a lot of “works” for an incorrect “faith”!!!😃
 
schulze43 said:
Thank you for those links!🙂
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which links are you referring to - I hope you carefully and prayerfully took into consideration the first signs of a unity at the Catholic/Lutheran conference link - twinc
 
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