Sola fide

Dear JPK,

Regarding your first question:

i) I assume that you believe in our Lord’s divine foreknowledge. So I assume you believe that our Lord posed this challenge to the rich man in order to provoke a certain reaction. The intended effect of this “shock therapy” was to make the rich young man realize that he was not as selfless and devoted to God has he had hitherto imagined. So the point of the challenge was not to commend the worth of good works, but to make the young man perceive his own unworthiness.

That, indeed, is a primary purpose of the law. To expose our sin (Rom 3:20). Jesus put him to the test, and he failed the test—which is why Jesus put him to the test in the first place.

ii) Let us remember that this story does not stand alone. In the Lucan version, cited by Deavel, it follows on the heels of the parable about the Pharisee and the tax-collector (18:9-14). That supplies the surrounding context. That provides an addition interpretive clue.

iii) There is nothing wrong with commending good works. But the question at hand is, what is the function of good works? Do they make us right with God? Deavel did absolutely nothing to show that Jesus is addressing the same narrow issue as Paul is addressing.

iv) But suppose, for the sake of argument, that he is addressing the very same issue. If that is how you choose to take Lk 18, then you end up with a purely Pelagian scheme of salvation. We are not saved by grace. We are not saved by faith in Christ. We are saved by law-keeping, plain and simple.

Regarding your second question:

i) Deavel made the blanket statement that good works do not merit justification. But this is misleading, for Tridentine theology subdivides justification into different stages. And this, in turn, generates a traditional distinction between condign and congruent merit.

ii) Yes, congruent merit does not obligate God to justify the sinner. There is, however, a reason why it is still called “merit” rather than mercy. And there’s a further reason why it is said to be “congruent.” There is a moral quality in some sinners, as over against other sinners, that makes it more fitting or “congruous” for God to justify them.

iii) There is also the larger question of whether the Pauline doctrine of justification allows Roman Catholicism to qualify and quantify the justification of the sinner in this fashion.

iv) When you cite Rom 2:6-7, you are turning good works into meritorious works. But Rom 2 does not make that equation.

v) As I said before, rewards and punishments may be motivational rather than meritorious.

vi) The fact that God makes a promise, and keeps his promise, does not imply that the object of his promise merited its fulfillment. For example, a D.A. may cut a deal with a hit-man to turn state’s evidence against his mob boss in exchange for immunity and witness protection. If the D.A. keeps his word, it isn’t because the hit-man merited immunity and witness protection.

vii) There is a fundamental asymmetry between reward and punishment, merit and demerit. To say that a sinner cannot merit a reward is not to say that a sinner cannot (de)merit a just desert. The damned are worthy of judgment in a way that the redeemed are unworthy of grace. To say that one is deserving of his fate does not imply the same for the other. All men, as fallen men, are deserving of damnation.