Why say "Sola Fide"?

[JonNC]

The answer is yes, as even non-believers can do good works, but grace is necessary for a man’s good works to be salutary–that is to say, meritorious for heaven. The Council of Trent taught this in its canons on justification:

Canon 1: If anyone shall say that man can be justified before God by his own works which are done either by his own natural powers, or through the teaching of the law, and without divine grace through Christ Jesus: let him be anathema.
Canon 2: If anyone shall say that divine grace through Christ Jesus is given for this only, that man may more easily be able to live justly and merit eternal life, as if by free will without grace he were able to do both, though with difficulty and hardship: let him be anathema.
Canon 3: If anyone shall say that without the anticipatory inspiration of the Holy Spirit and without his assistance man can believe, hope, and love or be repentant, as he ought, so that the grace of justification may be conferred upon him: let him be anathema.

You seem to be well-versed in theology, so I know I don’t have to explain to you what “anathema” means.
In the same council,

None of those things that precede justification, whether faith or works, merit the grace of justification. ‘For, if by grace, it is not now by works, otherwise,’ as the Apostle says, ‘grace is no more grace’” (DJ 8, quoting Rom. 11:6).

Well explained. Thanks

 

[Dougbro1]

You’re Welcome

 

[Darryl_B]

Sola Fide is the rejection of anything transactional in salvation. It is a concept you can spend all your days deliberating and never ever land at a spot where you can sit back relax and think ah now I understand, because you will just be thrown back into a tumultous cycle of buts.

Which is why there have been so many attempts at systematic defining with screeds of pages all failing miserably to achieve what they set out to do, make logical sense of a proposition that simply does not work.

 

[ltwin]

For Protestants, does Justification have to be prior chronologically to Sanctification? Or is Justification prior only in order?

I believe the way it goes (not 100% sure off the top of my head) is that justification is simultaneous with initial sanctification, but then progressive sanctification continues as a process. So, justification occurs (alongside regeneration, adoption), at which time we begin the process of sanctification.

As an aside, there is a theoretical difference between Calvinist and Arminian Protestants over the place of regeneration in the ordo salutis (order of salvation). I’m not sure where Lutherans fall on this (maybe @JonNC knows).

Calvinists say that all who are effectually called are regenerated, and regeneration (which is a divine act) causes faith and repentance (i.e. conversion) which then leads simultaneously to justification and adoption.

Arminians on the other hand say that prevenient grace enables conversion (faith and repentance) which then leads to justification, regeneration and adoption all simultaneously.

 

[MichaelP3]

Sola Fide is the rejection of anything transactional in salvation.

Very good take. Anything even remotely transactional should be utterly rejected unless the person in question think they “can” barter with GOD.

 

[Darryl_B]

Do you understand the difference between ‘barter’ and ‘transactional’? A wage is transactional a wage rise is barter.

Though it is strange that I can think of a number of old testament people who did seem to barter with God and they were not condemned to protestant hell.

 

[MichaelP3]

I actually did not expect this as I was complimenting you on your post but nevertheless here we are.

If it wasn’t for your second paragraph I would have thought you are missing the point. Transactions and bartering depends from where in the story you start. For instance if I haven’t started to even work for you I can still barter as to what mt wage will be and then we have an agreement and the transaction would follow. But I would think you know that. And to answer your question I would happily say “yes”.

To your second paragraph well we have amazing stories from the old testament. I for one do not include my own life as anything special to compare. I (me here) do not think I can offer God anything for Him to sweeten the deal. Now maybe some others on here think its possible and that is all on them. But for myself I am but a mere human. (It’s always safer to assume God is God)

Lastly, Protestants hell and Catholic hell is quite similar, some would even say its the same place …

 

[Wannano]

I actually did not expect this as I was complimenting you on your post but nevertheless here we are.

If it wasn’t for your second paragraph I would have thought you are missing the point. Transactions and bartering depends from where in the story you start. For instance if I haven’t started to even work for you I can still barter as to what mt wage will be and then we have an agreement and the transaction would follow. But I would think you know that. And to answer your question I would happily say “yes”.

To your second paragraph well we have amazing stories from the old testament. I for one do not include my own life as anything special to compare. I (me here) do not think I can offer God anything for Him to sweeten the deal. Now maybe some others on here think its possible and that is all on them. But for myself I am but a mere human. (It’s always safer to assume God is God)

Lastly, Protestants hell and Catholic hell is quite similar, some would even say its the same place …

Quite interesting and insightful that Protestant Hell existed before the advent of Catholicism.

 

[Lutherish]

I have only skimmed through the responses and so I can’t say that I wont have any overlap, but I will hope to state clearly what “Faith Alone” means in my understanding of my (Lutheran) tradition.

The first point is to understand what Lutheran’s mean by Justification, and I believe this is more or less the quantitative data by which a God that demands perfection should allow a person to attain to heaven. For example, a credit score justifies (or the opposite) a person’s request for financing. In the Lutheran Theology, the believer cannot, on their own, have the credit history to meet God’s requirements to grant heaven on its own merit. But, God being loving, sent Jesus to live the perfect life, and thus grant his “credit history” to those who believe in him, through faith alone. This means that no matter what the person does in their own life, they cannot merit their own standing in God’s eyes. Even the act of faith that takes hold of God’s grace through Jesus is not sufficient to justify the believer as an action per se, because it is ultimately not built on the credit of the one believing but the one who is believed in. (Just like getting a parent to co-sign on a loan does not increase the credit score of the person who is taking out the loan, and thus does not increase the “merit” of the lendee). Faith then similar to the desire of a person who wants to live a financially responsible life, but has a financial mistake in their past that is unable to be overcome. Someone like that would try as hard as they could to live financially responsible because that life is important to them, but they would know that no matter how long they lived financially responsible, they know that they are unable to be absolutely perfectly responsible because they are human. In Lutheranism, God credits the desire(Faith) to live a financially responsible life as a perfectly responsible financial history (Justication). Lutherans say faith alone because Lutheran Theology states that all one can have is the faith that God will accept the desire as enough to justify a believer as perfect. Humans will never attain a perfect credit score, but if they believe that they must on their own, they will be given over to despair. A good life is a necessary outpouring of the authentic desire, but there is no amount of good done that can equal perfection. Thus all that is left is faith. I will end by saying that Justification by faith alone is only one aspect of the economy of salvation, and is meant as a fundamental building block of theology, not a formal exposition of theology. Seeing Sola Fide (like the Trinity) as a systematic theology or a complete explaination will always make it lacking in some way.

 

[JonNC]

Lastly, Protestants hell and Catholic hell is quite similar, some would even say its the same place …

Exactly the same. And there is one heaven.

 

[fhansen]

I disagree that there is even such a thing as Protestant theory. There is Baptist theology, and Calvinist theology, and Lutheran theology, etc.

Ok, fair enough. So that even if all agree on the validity of the five solas they may well still disagree on theology. And ironically perhaps the differences themselves result mainly from one of the solas, namely Sola Scriptura. As to Sola Fide the doctrine easily lends itself to varying understandings-and that’s my main point. For one, I continuously hear the question raised by Protestants on non-Catholic forums as to whether or not sin can separate one from God as long as one has faith, if they haven’t already concluded that no sin can do so. They may assert that its impossible for man to be righteous anyway, or they might ask how much righteousness is enough, whereas the Catholic would insist that we must at least be on that road, we must be oriented towards righteousness and free from persistence in sin grave enough to constitute a direct attack on love of God and neighbor.

The alone in faith alone is not a statement that says this is all you need. The alone means it is the only way we access justification. We are saved by GRACE alone. The alone means there is no other way we receive salvation. Salvation is by Grace alone.

There’s no argument, as I think you know, about whether or not grace precedes everything. It’s about what proceeds from grace, how God wants us to respond, what He wants/expects us to do. For one, to say we are saved by GRACE alone doesn’t mean that a response to that grace is unnecessary, whether faith or works or anything else, even, as these, themselves, are recognized as gifts of grace. The main point here is simply that any gift can be rejected, left unopened to begin with or thrown out the door anytime later. Either way it makes sense to me that faith, in response to grace, opens up the doorway to salvation because it opens the doorway to relationship with God who, alone, saves. But the whole process nevertheless involves our continuous participation. It’s a walk, a journey taking place over the course of our lives.

continued:

 

[fhansen]

Through faith alone in Christ alone. Justification is by faith alone. The alone means there is no other way to access justification. The second alone means simply that it is only through Christ’s passion, death and resurrection that salvation possible at all.

I understand this-and from that standpoint this is true-salvation begins with faith. But is the justification necessarily permanent? Is there anything more needed, any more response to grace other than faith? Do we need to persist in faith? What does justification consist of? Is he expected to continue to walk in and even grow in it? What actually happens in man and can he lose that state of justice or not? These questions divide Protestantism as well in some cases.

Now, justification frees us to do the good works He places before us to do. We are bound to obey His commands, not out of fear, but out of joyful thanksgiving for His grace and love of our neighbor. Through faith alone in Christ alone. Justification is by faith alone. The alone means there is no other way to access justification. The second alone means simply that it is only through Christ’s passion, death and resurrection that salvation possible at all.

This gratitude motivation never sounded particularly convincing to me-or the way I’ve experienced things myself. In Catholic theology in any case we should act for the good of others, even to the point of loving one’s enemies, due to the love of God and neighbor that He places in our hearts-out of a real justice IOW that has been infused. And this infused vs imputed distinction is quite important as I’ve come to see it. In truth Christ won for us a real righteousness, “the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith” (Phil 3), if only in a seedling form at first that must be nurtured and fed and grown by God and our cooperation with Him as our salvation is worked out together.

Are good works (love of our neighbor) necessary? Yes. Why? Because it is the command of our Savior. We can choose to reject His call and live in sin, but we receive salvation through grace.

Ok, so that means we can forfeit salvation by rejecting His call/living in sin, whether at the beginning or at any time later on?

 

[Lutherish]

I understand this-and from that standpoint this is true-salvation begins with faith. But is the justification permanent? Is there anything more needed, any more response to grace other than faith? Do we need to persist in faith? What does justification consist of? Is he expected to continue to walk in and even grow in it? What happens in man and can he lose that state of justice or not? These questions divide Protestantism as well in some cases.

JonNC:

This gratitude motivation never sounded particularly convincing to me-or the way I’ve experienced things myself. In Catholic theology in any case we should act for the good of others, even to the point of loving one’s enemies, due to the love of God and neighbor that He places in our hearts-out of a real justice IOW that has been infused. And this infused vs imputed distinction is quite important as I’ve come to see it. In truth Christ won for us a real righteousness, “the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith” (Phil 3), if only in a seedling form at first that must be nurtured and fed and grown by God and our cooperation with Him as our salvation is worked out together.

JonNC:

Ok, so that means we can forfeit salvation by rejecting His call/living in sin, whether at the beginning or at any time later on?

1 - Lutherans tend to think of Justification as attaining the perfection of heaven. Since no one can per so perfect as to properly merit heaven, God credits the good-faith, honest attempt at entering a relationship with God as sufficient for the rewards of perfect. Thus one can lose Justification without the faith in the promise and the good faith effort.
2 - Lutheran’s tend to attribute good works to “Christ working in us” and so the good works we do are not our own and thus there is no sense of participation proper. Also, Lutherans tend to view the idea of viewing our participation in God’s will as sufficient to merit salvation as presumptuous.
3. Living in sin is considered by Lutherans (broadly) as one of two things: First it demonstrates a lack of faith in God’s commands for a well ordered existence, and thus endangers the Christian for a life of hell or Second: A result of sinful nature that is unable to be overcome at the time but that the believer is longing to overcome and trying to overcome with God’s help, and thus is not an impediment to the overall plan of God. Knowing what is wrong and rejecting Gods help is contemptable whereas knowing what is wrong but seeking to address it is deserving of God’s mercy, regardless of the lived life of the Christian.

 

[fhansen]

And we are able to obey the command to love by grace through faith.

Certainly both are a gift of grace, and faith is the beginning (from man’s side) of the relationship with God from which grace flows. But this equating of faith with righteousness, as if nothing else, no other personal righteousness such as love or anything else required, is a common theme I’ve heard when discussing these issues with non-Catholics, which I often do on Christian forums incidentally.

Love is not a side-benefit of faith. Scripture makes it abundantly clear that faith which does not express itself in love is not justifying. I’d be curious if you could point me to Protestants who teach this? They don’t sound very knowledgeable of Scripture if they believe you can truly know a God who is Love without love

It’s the preaching I’ve heard and the emphasis I’ve observed in confessions, etc. Love is mentioned, but as a requisite for being justified such that one could maintain, as the RCC teaches, “At the evening of life we shall be judged on our love”, would be problematic with most understandings of Sola Fide IMO.

Yes, there is a difference between Catholics and Protestants regarding infusion versus imputation. There is also a difference between how both traditions categorize things. Catholics would lump sanctification and regeneration all under justification. Protestants, however, separate these out (though regeneration and adoption tend to be discussed as occurring simultaneously with justification). Justification concerns our standing before God. Regeneration concerns being made a new creation, from spiritually dead to spiritually alive. Sanctification is the process of being made righteous.

Yes, and separating justification and sanctification is anathema (had to use the term ) in Catholicism as the realization of and continuous maintenance and growth in actual justice, primarily defined as faith, hope, and, most importantly, love, is considered to be the way in which salvation is worked out.

 

[Darryl_B]

What you did was move the bar and then told me you agree with the moved bar. That is not the same thing as agreeing. You have also moved the bar again by using the term “sweeten the deal”.

I were referencing a parable of Jesus, one of the many which present transactional interaction.

Abba Father can be happy. Do you have children? If you do are they able ever to do anything that makes you happy? I think you have a wrong perception of God. If we perhaps look at the interaction of Jesus Christ with the people around him who would you picture yourself as.

With regards to protestant hell, it is not God’s hell that I refer to, that is the one that He controls, I am referring to protestant hell.

 

[JonNC]

For clarification, the quotes attributed to me in your post are actually @fhansen

 

[EZweber]

I have only skimmed through the responses and so I can’t say that I wont have any overlap, but I will hope to state clearly what “Faith Alone” means in my understanding of my (Lutheran) tradition.

The first point is to understand what Lutheran’s mean by Justification, and I believe this is more or less the quantitative data by which a God that demands perfection should allow a person to attain to heaven. For example, a credit score justifies (or the opposite) a person’s request for financing.

I’m talking about the rest of your post in this. The Catholic understanding of justification is slightly different. When we are justified, it produces a change in being. We are made a new person. This is different from what I understand to be Lutheran theology, in which you are covered by the merits of Christ to “hide” your sins. In Catholic theology the sin is completely destroyed.

 

[JonNC]

E

I understand this-and from that standpoint this is true-salvation begins with faith.

Agreed

But is the justification necessarily permanent?
Not in the Calvinist sense. Grace can be rejected.

Is there anything more needed, any more response to grace other than faith?
Love the Lord. Love your neighbor. On these two hang all the laws and the prophets.
Luther put it this way: “There is no justification without sanctification, no forgiveness without renewal of life, no real faith from which the fruits of new obedience do not grow.”

Do we need to persist in faith?
Yes, with the guidance and assistance of the Holy Spirit.

What does justification consist of?

Suppose someone should be caught in the act of adultery and the foulest crimes and then be thrown into prison. Suppose, next, that judgment was going to be passed against him and that he would be condemned. Suppose that just at that moment a letter should come from the Emperor setting free from any accounting or examination all those detained in prison. If the prisoner should refuse to take advantage of the pardon, remain obstinate and choose to be brought to trial, to give an account, and to undergo punishment, he will not be able thereafter to avail himself of the Emperor’s favor. For when he made himself accountable to the court, examination, and sentence, he chose of his own accord to deprive himself of the imperial gift. This is what happened in the case of the Jews. Look how it is. All human nature was taken in the foulest evils. “All have sinned,” says Paul. They were locked, as it were, in a prison by the curse of their transgression of the Law. The sentence of the judge was going to be passed against them. A letter from the King came down from heaven. Rather, the King himself came. Without examination, without exacting an account, he set all men free from the chains of their sins. All, then, who run to Christ are saved by his grace and profit from his gift. But those who wish to find justification from the Law will also fall from grace. They will not be able to enjoy the King’s loving-kindness because they are striving to gain salvation by their own efforts; they will draw down on themselves the curse of the Law because by the works of the Law no flesh will find justification. (Discourses Against Judaizing Christians, Discourse I:6-II:1). - Chrysostom

Is he expected to continue to walk in and even grow in it?
Of course

What actually happens in man and can he lose that state of justice or not?

Thus faith is a divine work in us, that changes us and regenerates us of God, and puts to death the old Adam, makes us entirely different men in heart, spirit, mind, and all powers, and brings with it [confers] the Holy Ghost. - Luther

These questions divide Protestantism as well in some cases.
Which is why discussions of doctrine and practice should not be phrased as “what Protestantism teaches”.

 

[ltwin]

But this equating of faith with righteousness, as if nothing else, no other personal righteousness such as love or anything else required, is a common theme I’ve heard when discussing these issues with non-Catholics, which I often do on Christian forums incidentally.

The righteousness that is required is Christ’s righteousness, which we receive by faith. This does not mean that we as Christians do not have responsibilities to work out our salvation. We have a responsibility to take advantage of the means of grace that have been provided for us, to constantly feed on God’s word, to yield to the ministry of the Holy Spirit, and maintain unbroken fellowship with God through prayer. Through faith, obedience and yielding to God’s will, we continue to have fellowship with God. It is not obedience that saves us. It is not even faith that saves us. We are not saved by these nor are we kept saved by these. Rather, it is faith and obedience that keeps us in fellowship with Christ, who is faithful to keep that which we have committed to him.

It’s the preaching I’ve heard and the emphasis I’ve observed in confessions, etc. Love is mentioned, but as a requisite for being justified such that one could maintain, as the RCC teaches, “At the evening of life we shall be judged on our love”, would be problematic with most understandings of Sola Fide IMO.

Love preceding justification is certainly not a requirement for justification. However, faith that does not work through love is not a saving faith.

We receive the gift of faith through the Gospel call and the work of the Holy Spirit. We repent of our sins and place our hope in Christ. The Spirit indwells us, and we are reborn and made alive spiritually. We receive new desires, new motivations and new loyalties. The Spirit sheds love abroad in our heart. At that moment, the Spirit begins His sanctifying work in us, producing the Fruit of the Spirit-- love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

Love is a spiritual grace that identifies the essence of our nature. God is love, and his children are charged to be imitators of him:

“Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God” (Ephesians 5:1-2).

 

[JonNC]

The Catholic understanding of justification is slightly different. When we are justified, it produces a change in being. We are made a new person. This is different from what I understand to be Lutheran theology, in which you are covered by the merits of Christ to “hide” your sins. In Catholic theology the sin is completely destroyed.

I think this is overstated sometimes. While we have different views of concupiscence, Lutherans do not dismiss the fact that we grow in grace.
Again , from Luther and quoted in the Lutheran confessions:

Thus faith is a divine work in us, that changes us and regenerates us of God, and puts to death the old Adam, makes us entirely different men in heart, spirit, mind, and all powers, and brings with it [confers] the Holy Ghost.

That doesn’t sound to me like there is no change in us.