I was refering to what they post on this site. You can find out for yourself if you search the threads. Hearer has a thread on salvation by works. Scotth has a thread on salvation by works (Scotth is Orthodox Catholic, I'm sure he doesn't mind telling you the difference). And I personally have worked with Catholics in Pro-life activism. So I believe you are wrong, Amanda for saying I haven't talked to Catholics first. A Catholic man I worked with loved to boast of the Mass and works. Don't pretend you are the only one who knows Catholics.
Dear jonathanbchristian: Consider the following please:
"Father Paul and Saint Paul" "As soon as we reached my parents' house in the northern suburbs of Houston, I tore into the packages that were waiting for me and began voraciously reading the books that they contained. In the four weeks that we spent with our parents, I spend every spare minute eagerly seeking the answers to the remaining questions I had about Orthodoxy. Of course, some of the dozen or so books proved to be more helpful than others. One book that I found especially helpful was An Eastern Orthodox Response to Evangelical Claims, by Fr. Paul O'Callaghan. In this work, Fr. Paul lists common objections and questions to Orthodox distinctives and then convincingly answers them. Many of the questions listed were the exact things for which I needed clarification. Through the book, Fr. Paul helped me overcome many of my doubts about Orthodoxy.
"A second critical book that I read was The Orthodox Study Bible (OSB), which at the time consisted of the New King James translation of the New Testament with commentary and study aids written by Orthodox scholars. I had wondered how the Orthodox Church interpreted the numerous passages that I thought firmly supported Sola Fide. St. Paul repeatedly affirms that salvation does not come as a result of keeping the Mosaic Law, but by faith. (1) Like all Evangelicals, I assumed that because salvation is by faith, it is by faith alone. Of all the New Testament passages that seemed to teach this idea, none seemed to do so as clearly as Ephesians 2:8-9, which I had memorized and quoted hundreds of times. In these verses, St. Paul affirms: "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast." To me, this was a one-passage proof par excellence that works play no role whatsoever in a person's salvation.
"But the OSB helped me to understand for the first time in my life that there was another side to the story. All of a sudden, passages that affirm the necessity of good works for salvation seemed to appear out of nowhere! Consider the following statements of Jesus:
"... if you want to enter into life, keep the commandments" (Matt. 19:17).
"... those who have done good [will go] to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of condemnation" (John 5:29(.
"Most assuredly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word, he shall never see death" (John 8:51).
"Even in my beloved book of Romans, the book that seemed above all others to teach Sola Fide, I read the following words of St. Paul, to my great consternation:
[God] will render to each according to his deeds, eternal life to those who by patient continuance in doing good seek for glory, honor, and immortality, but to those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness -- indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish on every soul of man who does evil -- but glory, honor, and peace to everyone who works what is good ... (Rom. 2:6-10).
"These and other New Testament passages (2) presented me with a dilemma. Was there a contradiction? Did Jesus and St. Paul disagree on how one is saved? Was St. Paul conflicted, sometimes affirming and sometimes denying that works are necessary for salvation? Finally, St. James helped me find the solution to the problem. For St. James is the only New Testament author to use the phrase "faith alone." We find the important phrase in James 2:24: "You see that a man is justified by work, and not by faith alone (emphasis added). This verse, more than any other, had never made sense to me as an evangelical Protestant. My solution had been to ignore it and other such verses that did not fit into the scheme of Baptist theology. Now, I felt that I finally understood this and the other troublesome passages. Taking these verses together with the "no works" passages, I finally understood the New Testament's teaching on the relationship of faith and works, namely, while salvation is not by works alone, neither is it by faith alone. For as St. James affirms earlier, "faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead" (2:17). In other words, true saving faith and works are inseparable; they are two sides of the same coin. Works are necessary for salvation exactly because faith is necessary for salvation."
(pages 101-103: From Baptist to Byzantium: How a Baptist Missionary Traveled Halfway Around the World To Find the Ancient Orthodox Faith. by Father James Early. Salisbury, MA: Regina Orthodox Press, 2009.).
Notes.
1. See, for example, Rom. 3:22,27; Rom. 4:4-5; Rom. 11:6; Gal. 2:16.
2. See, for example, Matt. 7:21 and 25:34-36; John 10:27-28; Acts 10:35; 2 Cor. 5:10; Rev. 20:12. I had certainly never underlined or highlighted any of these verses in my Bible!
God save us in His mercy, to help us work out our salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God Who works in us both to will and to do of His good pleasure. Amen. In Erie PA Scott R. Harrington
