Evangelical Christianity, particularly of the Pentecostal variety, is growing by leaps and bounds in the Global South. When thinking about conversion to Christianity, Christians often call to mind the forgiveness of sins, the renewal of nature, and a sense of assurance. In short, they describe their experience with the familiar biblical terminology of being “born again.” Poor peasants from Guatemala and Honduras, for example, have heard the call of Christ upon their lives in the pointed preaching of an evangelical preacher, and they have found themselves wonderfully transformed in the midst of forgiveness, tears, and renewal.1
Theologically speaking, the doctrines that correspond to this vibrant, life-changing experience, marked by the graces of the Holy Spirit, are better known as justification, regeneration, and assurance. Since these salient teachings are at the heart of what Christian discipleship means, it is not surprising to learn that they are deeply rooted in Scripture, embedded in the writings of the church fathers, and fleshed out in the materials of the Reformation, both Protestant and Roman Catholic. In this chapter we will consider the doctrine of justification. In chapter 19, we will take up the doctrine of regeneration and assurance, as they too relate to the larger theme of conversion, that transformation of life and character brought about by no one less than a God of holy love.
We will begin this larger enterprise by laying out the official doctrinal position of the Roman Catholic Church on justification as found, for example, in Vatican II documents and in the Catechism. We will then explore the earlier Council of Trent and demonstrate to what extent it has served and continues to serve as a resource for such contemporary teaching.
Justification
Though the teaching on justification is amply expressed in Scripture and in the writings of the church fathers—indeed, Thomas C. Oden has produced an entire book demonstrating the significant evidence on this score found in the patristic period of the church2—this vital doctrine, which some have called articulus stantis et cadentis ecclesiae (the article by which the church stands or falls)3 receives relatively scant attention both in the documents of Vatican II and in the more recent Catechism. This has been something of a surprise. In fact, the exact phrase “justified by faith” appears only two times in each, and always in a way that is strongly associated with the sacrament of baptism: “All who have been justified by faith in Baptism are incorporated into Christ.”4 Indeed, as Alister McGrath points out, “The very term ‘justification’ itself appears to have been gradually eliminated from the homiletical and catechetical literature of Catholicism.”5
Though the phrase “justified by faith in Baptism” is repeated in both sets of documents, those of Vatican II and of the Catechism, the phrase itself is actually ambiguous. And appealing to the larger context of official Roman Catholic teaching is not as helpful here as one might initially expect, since the magisterium repeatedly identifies justification with the sacrament of baptism itself, such that there is, in effect, no justification apart from the sacrament. Indeed, it is precisely Rome’s sacramental configuration of justification, conceiving it within the parameters of baptism, that has led precisely to this kind of ambiguity. So then, does “justified by faith in Baptism” mean that one has faith in baptism, in other words, that one has a hearty trust that the sacrament itself is ever efficacious and therefore effectuates the condition of justification? Roman Catholic folk religion appears to favor just such an interpretation, and this view also accords well with the “problem” of infant baptism.6 Or does the phrase mean that one is justified by faith when baptized, faith itself being the only means by which the forgiveness of sins is ever received? Indeed, justification in this second sense can be expressed by way of a sign, in the sacrament of baptism, though faith itself would remain the instrument of its reception, such that faith is absolutely required. Again, in this second view it is not baptism but faith that justifies; it, and not the sacrament, is reckoned for righteousness (Rom. 4:5). The problem here is that both interpretations just offered can be supported from Roman Catholic materials, and this, no doubt, is part of the ongoing difficulty entailed in the sacramental construal of justification.
Beyond this, there is after all a sense in which justification can be clearly distinguished from baptism: one is a saving or soteriological reality; the other is a sign as well as a means of grace. Thus the sacrament may or may not be the occasion of the reception of such saving grace, even if the ritual is performed properly, especially in the case of adults. Rome struggles to acknowledge such a truth in its observation that “the instrumental cause is the sacrament of baptism, which is the sacrament of faith, without which no man was ever justified.”7 Indeed, modern NT scholarship affirms that “in the Pauline communities believers are justified when they are baptized and receive the Spirit,”8 yet also according to such scholarship, “This does not mean that justification is magically linked with the sacrament. This is refuted not merely by 1 Corinthians 1:17 but by the whole Pauline concept of faith.”9 In declaring that justification (and, one would suppose, the new birth as well) occurs when the baptismal ritual is performed, the Church of Rome once again demonstrates that faith in the sacrament itself (has it occurred or not?) is in effect the preferred and repeatedly acknowledged means of justification.
The Confusion of Justification with Sanctification
Vatican II’s use of the word “justification” in a theological sense is indeed limited, with only a couple of references in its documents, though the Catechism does employ the term along with its cognates in several places. The problem with the Roman portrayal, however, is that the basic meaning of “to justify,” as found in such passages as Romans 4:3–5; Galatians 3:6; and James 2:23, is subsumed under the theme of sanctification, of “making holy.” To illustrate, the Catechism states, “Justification is at the same time the acceptance of God’s righteousness through faith in Jesus Christ. Righteousness (or ‘justice’) here means the rectitude of divine love. With justification, faith, hope, and charity are poured into our hearts, and obedience to the divine will is granted us.”10 Even more pointedly the Catechism goes on to state: “Justification is not only the remission of sins, but also the sanctification and renewal of the interior man.”11
The difficulty with Rome’s view, exegetically speaking, is that the use of the Greek word λογίζεσθαι (logizesthai) in Romans 4:5 and elsewhere (“However, to the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness”) is best rendered as credited or counted for or reckoned as righteousness, but not as making righteousness. This is something that the early church fathers such as Clement of Alexandria,12 for example, as well as the later Protestant Reformers, both Luther and Calvin, clearly understood. Though this may seem to be a technical, exegetical issue, yet much is actually at stake. Confounding justification with sanctification, mixing these doctrines such that holiness and the impartation of love are now identified with what “to justify” essentially means, amounts to backing away from—at least in some respect, and therefore to deem “fictive”—the radical Pauline notion that God justifies not the holy but sinners. What is at stake is nothing less than the graciousness and beauty of the gospel that faith in Jesus Christ is reckoned to the sinner as righteousness. Sinners do not need to clean themselves up first before they can be forgiven. Indeed, they already are forgiven through the atoning work of Christ, though that forgiveness must be received. Thus one must not mistake the consequences of the justified life, in all manner of holiness, for its very grounding. Indeed, “the fathers of the first four centuries [developed],” as Nick Needham observes, “this major strand of justification teaching where the meaning is forensic: a not-guilty verdict, an acquittal, a declaration of righteousness, a nonimputation of sin, an imputation of righteousness.”13
The sheer graciousness of the gospel, especially as it is expressed in Romans 4:5 (“However, to the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness”), can be seen in the distinction developed by the church fathers14 as well as by the Protestant Reformers between imputation on the one hand, and impartation on the other, especially with respect to the crucial issue of righteousness. Luther, for example, excoriated the scholastics in his own day by pointing out the error of contending that “Sacred Scripture requires us to have a supernatural quality infused into us from heaven, namely, love, which they call the formal righteousness that informs and adorns faith and makes it justify us.”15 This language of “infused” has led Darrell Bock and Mikel Del Rosario to observe, “And so in the Medieval as well as the Post-Reformation Catholic Church, grace is treated almost as if it’s a substance, something that can be dispensed through various avenues of change and means through the magisterium.”16
Bear in mind that imputation involves a forensic relation between God and humanity. Impartation, however, is concerned with a participatory ontology, or change in being, the infusion of love, as Luther rightly distinguished. Accordingly, “the notional distinction, necessitated by a forensic understanding of justification, between the external act of God in pronouncing sentence, and the internal process of regeneration,” McGrath observes, “must be considered to be the most reliable historical characterization of Protestant doctrines of justification.”17 Not surprisingly, the Reformed theologian R. C. Sproul has pointed out, “For Protestants God both makes just and declares just—but not in the same way. For Rome the declaration of justice follows the making inwardly just of the regenerate sinner. For the Reformation the declaration of justice follows the imputation of Christ’s righteousness to the regenerated sinner.”18
As well developed as this distinction is between justification/imputation, on the one hand (“the work that God does for us”19 in a new relation), and impartation/sanctification on the other hand (“the work that God does in us”20 by making believers holy), it is remarkable that the exact phrase “the righteousness of Christ is imputed to believers” is nowhere to be found in the Bible, as John Wesley himself, the father of Methodism, clearly recognized in his own day: “Do not dispute for that particular phrase ‘the imputed righteousness of Christ.’ It is not scriptural; it is not necessary.”21 To be sure, Scripture clearly employs the phrase “the righteousness of God,” as in Romans 1:17. According to the celebrated NT scholar Gerhard Kittel, “The δικαιοσύνη θεοῦ [dikaiosynē theou] is God’s righteousness as a conjunction of judgment and grace which He enjoys and demonstrates by showing righteousness, by imparting it as His pardoning sentence.”22 However, the NT never utilizes the exact phrase “the righteousness of Christ,” though it does employ the language of “To those who through the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ have received a faith as precious as ours” (2 Pet. 1:1).
How then did such a phrase and its associated ideas emerge even from the early annals of the church? The notion of imputation developed around the same three passages noted earlier (Rom. 4:3–5; Gal. 3:6; James 2:23) as exegetes, both ancient and modern, came to terms with what λογίζεσθαι (logizesthai, “to reckon”) means in the context of δικαιοσύνη (dikaiosynē, “righteousness”). To illustrate, in the fourth century Ambrosiaster (the name given to a commentator on Paul’s Letters) pointed out: “Paul says this because to an ungodly person, that is, to a Gentile, who believes in Christ without doing the works of the law, his faith is reckoned for righteousness just as Abraham’s was.”23 More recently, as Kittel again explains, “What is reckoned is what is established by sovereign grace. Thus λογίζεσθαι acknowledges that thanks to God there is a full achievement of right in faith.”24 Furthermore, in reference to Romans 4:5b (“Their faith is credited as righteousness”), it was not unreasonable to ask, in whom had believers placed their faith? The answer, of course, was not God in general (corresponding to “the righteousness of God”) but more specifically Jesus Christ. It was, after all, faith in Jesus Christ in particular that was reckoned as righteousness. This was the way, the precious path, that God the Father had established through the power of the Holy Spirit to justify the sinner; it would be through faith in the Son of God, the Lamb of God slain before the foundation of the world—and there was, is, and will never be anything “fictive” about it.25
Synergism (Cooperant Grace)
Rome’s failure to comprehend the larger theological significance of properly distinguishing justification from the process of sanctification, the forensic from the participatory and ontological, results in other difficulties as well, especially in terms of the conception of grace involved in salvation. Thus operating almost exclusively within a synergistic conception of grace, entailing both divine and human working, the Catechism declares that “God’s free initiative demands man’s free response.”26 With cooperant grace, the problem of divine and human working—especially regarding the reception of justification as a forensic reality, a change in relation—is that such a synergistic view of grace invariably places the decisive burden on what humans do precisely because it is so readily assumed that God has already acted.
Justification, however, is not a human work but a divine one. Only God can justify the sinner. Therefore the very language of synergistic grace, of demanded and required human working, is somewhat misleading. To illustrate, the Catechism fails to recognize that “the free response” of humanity must also be understood in the context of sin, in the wake of the consequences of original sin (as Protestants would understand it) and of the lingering effects and powers of concupiscence (as Roman Catholics would). Thus not just any kind of freedom is being referred to here (such as the freedom to eat this or that, wear this or that, etc.) but the freedom to God, the freedom, in other words, to be redeemed, what Luther referred to as freedom coram Deo,27 liberty in the sight of God.
How free, then, is the sinner in terms of this special, soteriological understanding of liberty? Lest there be misunderstanding, we are not arguing that there is not a measure of freedom in this special setting (coram Deo). To the contrary, we affirm that a measure of freedom, in the face of the ongoing carnal nature, would have to be restored by God alone in a species of prevenient grace. Due to its sovereign restoration (that is, one without human cooperation), this freedom itself is best understood as an instance not of cooperant grace but of free grace. In other words, the very freedom whereby we can receive the gift of justification is itself a gift of God.
On the one hand, like Lutherans and Calvinists, Wesleyans freely acknowledge an Augustinian understanding of original sin that displays the utter corruption of the sinner, the distortion of will and desire, which thereby delimits freedom precisely coram Deo. Yet on the other hand, like Anglicans, Wesleyans affirm that God has preveniently and in some measure acted, countering such sin and human impotence, to bring about in some measure a restoration of freedom, and this is done sovereignly precisely due to the extent and reach of corruption. Article 10 of the historic Thirty-Nine Articles expresses this truth well: “The condition of Man after the fall of Adam is such, that he cannot turn and prepare himself, by his own natural strength and good works, to faith, and calling upon God. Wherefore we have no power to do good works pleasant and acceptable to God, without the grace of God by Christ preventing us [i.e., coming beforehand], that we may have a good will, and working with us, when we have that good will.”28 Furthermore, unlike Roman Catholics, Wesleyans view such freedom not as always having been present but as a genuine restoration in the face of the depravity of original sin. By a sovereign act of God, then, a measure of freedom is restored, an act that bespeaks not cooperant grace but free grace.
Sola Fide?
Beyond this, Rome’s failure to distinguish justification as the work that God does for us from sanctification as the work that God does in us has prevented this particular theological tradition from understanding that both justification and initial sanctification (in the form of the new birth) are not human works, entailing significant human acting to get the job done so to speak, but sheer gifts of God, that is, in a very real sense the works of God alone. Rome repeatedly flinches at any suggestion of monergism. And although the Catechism does employ the language of grace as free in the context of justification, such freedom is immediately caught up, once again, in a synergistic context of both divine and human working, as in the following: “Grace is favor, the free and undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call to become children of God.”29 However, what the Continental Reformers understood so clearly was that only God can forgive sins; only God can make a soul holy. In a certain sense, neither of these actions is a human work. The reception of these gifts must be comprehended not in terms of cooperant grace (for neither justification nor the new birth is given on the basis of prior human cooperation or working [Eph. 2:8–9]) but in terms of free grace, highlighting what only the Most High can do.
Like Lutherans and Calvinists, Wesleyans affirm the importance of free grace in underscoring what only God can do. Wesleyanism—informed by the rich streams of the Anglican and the magisterial Reformation, the latter largely through the influence of Moravianism—is very similar to Calvinism, for example, on the issue of justification: “I think on Justification just as I have done any time these seven-and-twenty years, and just as Mr. Calvin does,” Wesley remarked. “In this respect I do not differ from him a hair’s breadth.”30 However, unlike Lutherans and Calvinists (and in a way similar to Roman Catholics), Wesleyans acknowledge that these gifts of justification and regeneration must be received even if only with the outstretched hand of a beggar. Indeed, there is a receiving of grace before there is any responding, and this is an important step in the process of redemption that Roman Catholic theology often obscures or simply repudiates. For want of better language, there is an “openness and a receptiveness” (almost in a passive sense), best understood in terms of the integrity of the personhood and the image of God that yet remain even in the sinner (now marked by prevenient grace) and issue in a measure of freedom. The outstretching of the hand is hardly a work; instead, describing the reception of grace in this way underscores that what is so graciously granted and received is an utter gift from the Deity, representing what only God can do. Moreover, unlike Roman Catholics, Wesleyans (as noted earlier) conceive such freedom to receive saving grace as accruing from God’s action in restoring the faculties of prevenient grace (a measure of freedom, conscience, etc.), which are themselves best understood as instantiations of free grace.31
For Wesleyans, not one of these observations just made denies that cooperant, synergistic grace has a role to play in the process of redemption. It’s just that such grace is associated not with justification itself but with the divine and human working prior to justification (in receiving convincing grace) or as following justification (in the good works of a lively faith). The human working expressed in this synergistic notion of grace is not and could never be the basis upon which justification is granted. So then, it is the rich and well-developed understanding of free grace that belongs in this theological context, since it is precisely this particular grace that highlights not only what God alone can do but also that both justification and the new birth are sheer gifts of the Almighty and therefore must be received by grace through faith alone. What’s so remarkable about the treatments in both Vatican II documents and the Catechism is that the exact phrase “free grace” (or the Augustinian “operant grace”) is not mentioned at all. Little wonder, then, that the Roman Catholic tradition has balked at employing the language of sola fide (by faith alone). It lacks the theological wherewithal and apparently the will to affirm it.
Merit
Although the Catechism is clear that “no one can merit the initial grace of forgiveness and justification at the beginning of conversion,”32 it nevertheless offers a different judgment in terms of what takes place afterward in the outworking of Christian discipleship, as is evident in the following claim: “Moved by the Holy Spirit and by charity, we can then merit for ourselves and for others the graces needed for our sanctification, for the increase of grace and charity, and for the attainment of eternal life.”33 Since it is difficult to remove from the meaning of the term “merit” the sense of obligation that comes out of a recognition of owing someone something, it therefore is best to forgo the use of this problematic term, especially in consideration of relations with the Most High, coram Deo. Indeed, not even those who are redeemed, who are steeped in sanctifying graces, ever put God in their debt.
A Traditional Source for Rome’s View?
Before we examine the Council of Trent, revealing the broad similarity between its doctrinal conclusions and the theology of justification just displayed in the official documents of the Roman Catholic Church today and demonstrating a basic continuity, it is helpful to consider the earlier historic attempt at Regensburg to overcome the important theological divide on justification between Roman Catholic and Protestant leaders.
The Colloquy of Regensburg, which met in 1541 and is also known by historians as the Colloquy of Ratisbon, was an early effort to work out the theological differences between Roman Catholics and Protestants in a way that would lead to a resolution, especially in terms of the doctrine of justification. The Roman side was represented by Johann Eck and others under the careful oversight of Cardinal Gasparo Contarini; the Reformers were led by Martin Bucer, Johann Pistorius the Elder, and Philip Melanchthon. The colloquy came to the helpful recognition that conversion is a broad term and therefore embraces both an inherent righteousness, stressed by Roman Catholics, and an imputed righteousness, championed by the Reformers. In the course of its labors, the colloquy eventually produced a joint document that could have become the instrument for a better and more peaceful theological future. However, it was not to be. The Roman Catholic theologians and bishops who had not participated in this colloquy but who were present at Trent thought that the reality of imparted, inherent grace in justification needed a far better and more able expression than what Regensburg had offered. To be sure, “the two key points of the Regensburg article—the insufficiency of our inherent righteousness and the consequent need for imputed righteousness upon which to rely,” as Anthony Lane has stated, “were clearly rejected by the Tridentine fathers.”34 Here, then, was yet another opportunity lost.
The Council of Trent
With the collapse of the efforts at Regensburg, the Roman Catholic Church, through the authority of Pope Paul III, eventually called the Council of Trent into session in 1545, and this body met in an on-and-off fashion through 1563. Caught up in the polemics of the period, in its opposition to the doctrinal initiatives and clarifications of the Protestant Reformers, Trent issued judgments and decrees that are clearly marked by an oppositional flavor, and many of these statements are still in effect today. In the wake of these initial observations (above), what is especially noteworthy is that the formal doctrinal teaching of the Roman Catholic Church, expressed more recently in Vatican II documents and in the Catechism, is in basic harmony—especially on the matter of justification—with many of the decrees propounded at Trent four centuries earlier.
Something of the reactionary flavor of the council, in the face of Protestant initiatives, can be seen in Trent’s various condemnations laced throughout its doctrinal record. Canon 33, for example, fulminates: “If any one saith, that, by the Catholic doctrine touching Justification, by this holy Synod set forth in this present decree, the glory of God, or the merits of our Lord Jesus Christ are in any way derogated from, and not rather that the truth of our faith, and the glory in fine of God and of Jesus Christ are rendered [more] illustrious: let him be anathema.”35 In fact, the word “anathema” occurs more than one hundred times in the pronouncements of the Council of Trent. Regardless of content, such usage surely bespeaks a theological posture and tone.
Trent: The Confusion of Justification with Sanctification
The decrees of this northern Italian conference suggest to some, at least, a confidence in diligent theological judgment. Yet upon closer examination, when specific arguments are addressed, it appears that such confidence arises not from careful and decisive theological reflection, as if the “last word” had now been spoken, but from that old ecclesiastical and well-worn argument emerging once more: “The magisterium has spoken.”
Indeed, the doctrinal teaching of Trent on justification is marked by the same theological missteps and confusions as detailed above, especially in terms of the Catechism. Thus Trent declared that justification is “not only a remission of sins but also the sanctification and renewal of the inward man,”36 once more confounding the forensic and relational with the ontological. Even more troubling, Trent goes on to declare that the holiness of the new birth, or what some call initial sanctification, is the very basis upon which one is justified: “In that new birth there is bestowed upon them, through the merit of His passion, the grace by which they are made just.”37 In such a view an infusion of grace, in the form of charity, is poured into the heart, making the believer just. Trent declared, “In the said justification of the impious, . . . the charity of God is poured forth, by the Holy Spirit, in the hearts of those that are justified, and . . . [the one who is justified] receives, in the said justification, together with the remission of sins, all these [gifts] infused at once, faith, hope, and charity.”38
As Karla Wübbenhorst points out, “Augustine and the Catholic conciliar documents that enshrine this thought, know nothing of the cherished Reformed distinction between justification and sanctification.”39 Thus the mouth of sanctification is so broad and wide that it nearly consumes the distinct reality of what is entailed in justification. Though in many respects he appreciated the doctrinal contributions of Augustine, Calvin nevertheless insisted upon a clear distinction between these two very different works of grace. To illustrate, we may consult his Commentary on Romans, where he reasons as follows: “They think that these two things well agree,—that man is justified by faith through the grace of Christ,—and that he is yet justified by the works, which proceed from spiritual regeneration; for God gratuitously renews us, and we also receive his gift by faith. But Paul takes up a very different principle,—that the consciences of men will never be tranquillized until they recumb on the mercy of God alone.”40 Such an observation has led Wübbenhorst to conclude: “Calvin [became] convinced that this was a distinction worth contending for.”41 It was at the very heart of the utterly gracious good news of the gospel.42 In fact, the doctrine of justification must be rightly distinguished, according to the Genevan Reformer, precisely because it is the “main hinge”43 or “the principal ground on which religion must be supported.”44 As a consequence of this, “it requires greater care and attention.”45
Trent: Imputation and Impartation?
Since Trent readily mixed the distinct works of justification and regeneration, thereby making holiness in some sense the heart or very substance of what justification means, it consequently left little room for the imputation or reckoning-as-righteousness that is such an important part of the apostle Paul’s teaching on justification, especially in the prominent passages of Romans 4:3–5; Galatians 3:6; and James 2:23, as noted earlier. In fact, Trent specifically denies that faith imputed for righteousness (Rom. 4:5b) is the very substance, on one level, of justification. Instead, it insists on the impartation and infusion of love as necessary to the basic meaning of justification. For example, canon 11 states: “If any one saith, that men are justified, either by the sole imputation of the justice of Christ, or by the sole remission of sins, to the exclusion of the grace and the charity which is poured forth in their hearts by the Holy Ghost, and is inherent in them; or even that the grace, whereby we are justified, is only the favor of God: let him be anathema.”46
In light of such reasoning, what has happened to the Pauline notion that faith is credited for righteousness? Here as elsewhere in Roman Catholic materials, both ancient and modern, the Pauline understanding of imputation has been washed out in a theology that is admittedly uneasy about considering any justification of the sinner apart from the ontological reality of holiness. Justification conceived forensically and relationally is simply not enough; it must be “infused” with holiness and love to bear its proper sense. However, this substantival, reified conception of grace, more particularly the notion of gratia infusa and gratia habitualis (infused grace and habitual grace),47 so important to the Roman Catholic view here, has “no basis in Scripture,”48 according to some. Indeed, in crafting its position Trent interweaved streams of earlier scholastic theology to offer a “consistent metonymical understanding of . . . [justification]” and thereby confused, once again, an effect for a cause.49 Perhaps even more damaging to Trent’s scholastic view is the recognition that the term “forensic” does not mean “as if he were righteous,”50 as Kittel once again observes, “since the sovereign sentence of God is genuinely pronounced.”51
Trent: Synergism (Cooperant Grace)
In the eyes of Trent, justification is received on the basis of prior human cooperation, a working together with God that is deemed absolutely necessary for the reception of forgiveness. That is clear from the language of the sixth session of the council, which concluded: “So they, who by sins were alienated from God, may be disposed through his quickening and assisting grace, to convert themselves to their own justification, by freely assenting to and co-operating with that said grace.”52 Even understood in its best sense and in a most charitable way, such language is obviously unguarded, given all that has to be factored into any such pronouncement. It therefore calls for greater and more careful theological articulation.
Beyond this ongoing fault, Trent has the same emphasis on human freedom coram Deo as does the Catechism, as if the issue of liberty were not a problem at all in this very special context. The key difference, however, is that in this earlier setting, due to the contrarian nature of so many of Trent’s judgments, an anathema was attached to any view that differed from that of the magisterium: “If any one saith, that man’s free-will moved and excited by God, by assenting to God exciting and calling, nowise co-operates towards disposing and preparing itself for obtaining the grace of Justification; . . . let him be anathema.”53 However, the question that plagued Luther, the erstwhile Augustinian monk, still troubles sinners even today: “Have I done enough?” This larger theological issue, then, is far more complicated than the council allowed, in terms of both its soteriological and psychological dimensions. Its proper assessment, therefore, should have entailed both theological nuance and greater care, especially in terms of the supernatural, uncanny, and numinous graces under review. Moreover, Rome even in the sixteenth century had something of a theological partner on this issue of liberty (at least conceived as a prevenient restoration in the face of the debilitating effects of original sin) in Anglicanism. However, the polemical nature of this period and the constant falling back to a particular ecclesiology would not allow for precisely such a dialogue.
Trent: Sola Fide?
It is clear from a consideration of the scholarship now available through the publication of the Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture series that the early church fathers heartily affirmed the teaching of sola fide. As Thomas Oden has pointed out, such a doctrinal expression was not a Protestant innovation: “The major Reformers’ appeals to sola scriptura, sola gratia, and sola fide are found abundantly in the patristic interpreters of scripture.”54 To illustrate this basic truth, we can point to Origen in the third century, who in his commentary on Romans 3:28 states: “It remains for us who are trying to affirm everything the apostle says, and to do so in the proper order, to inquire who is justified by faith alone, apart from works.”55 Ambrosiaster reasoned as follows: “How then can the Jews think that they have been justified by the works of the law in the same way as Abraham, when they see that Abraham was not justified by the works of the law but by faith alone? Therefore there is no need of the law when the ungodly is justified before God by faith alone.”56 What then was Trent’s assessment of this early church teaching that was carefully expressed and reappropriated by the Reformers of the sixteenth century? Canon 9 of the sixth session reveals its judgment, yet again marked by polemics and anathema: “If anyone says that the sinner is justified by faith alone, meaning that nothing else is required to cooperate in order to obtain the grace of justification, and that it is not in any way necessary that he be prepared and disposed by the action of his own will, let him be anathema.”57 Bear in mind also that here Rome’s claim to speak for the universal church, in a purported ecumenical council, belies the ongoing significance not only of Protestantism but also of Eastern Orthodoxy.
Trent: Merit
Though the Protestant Reformers such as Martin Luther carefully argued for an abundance of good works in an active life of Christian discipleship, as evidenced in his Treatise on Good Works,58 he nevertheless cautioned that the whole matter of good works must be understood properly and in a way that does not devolve upon the issue of merit. In his Lectures on Galatians, for instance, Luther exclaimed: “With Paul, therefore, we totally deny the ‘merit of congruity’ and the ‘merit of condignity.’ . . . For God has never given anyone grace and eternal life for the merit of congruity or the merit of condignity.”59 The Council of Trent, however, was of an entirely different mind on this specific issue. For example, canon 26 of the sixth session of the council declares: “If anyone says that the just ought not for the good works done in God to expect and hope for an eternal reward from God through His mercy and the merit of Jesus Christ, . . . let him be anathema.”60 Interestingly enough, “The authority with which Thomas [Aquinas] was invested [on this and other issues],” as McGrath observes, “may be judged from the fact that he was cited more than any theologian—other than Augustine—during the course of the Tridentine debate on justification.”61
Not content with this pronouncement on works, the council continued to insist upon mixing the theologically dubious notion of “merit” with such labors, thereby undermining, at least in some sense, the grace-infused nature of these charitable acts, a nature that surely bespeaks their gifted source, the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit within. Indeed, in contending that such works also merit eternal life, the council departed from some of the dimensions of the graciousness of the gospel. Canon 32, for instance, opines: “If any one saith, that the good works of one that is justified are in such manner the gifts of God, that they are not also the good merits of him that is justified, . . . [that person] does not truly merit increase of grace, eternal life, and the attainment of that eternal life; . . . let him be anathema.”62
Just as it is now evident that the Council of Trent shines through the teachings of Vatican II as well as the Catechism, so too does it inform, interestingly enough, many of the theological judgments expressed in a more recent document, the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification. We will explore this work in considerable detail in the following chapter.
1. For more on the growth of evangelicalism in Latin America, see Henri Paul Pierre Gooren, “The Pentecostalization of Religion and Society in Latin America,” Exchange 39, no. 4 (2010): 355–76.
2. Oden, The Justification Reader (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002).
3. E.g., Robert Preus, a Lutheran scholar, writes: “The article of justification—or the article of Christ (solus Christus), or of faith in Christ, or of Christian righteousness—was soon called the articulus stantis et cadentis ecclesiae by all Lutheran teachers.” Preus, Justification and Rome (St. Louis: Concordia, 2006), 18.
4. Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd ed. (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1994), par. 818. See also Unitatis Redintegratio: Decree on Ecumenism, sec. 3, in The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents, vol. 1 of Vatican II, ed. Austin Flannery (Northport, NY: Costello, 1998), 455.
5. McGrath, Iustitia Dei: A History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 284.
6. When I ask Roman Catholics, “Are you justified and born of God?” the reply I invariably receive is “Yes! I was justified and born of God in baptism.”
7. Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, vol. 3, The Evangelical Protestant Creeds, with Translations (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1983), 96.
8. Gerhard Kittel and Gerhard Friedrich, eds., trans. Geoffrey W. Bromiley, Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, 10 vols. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964–76), 2:206.
9. Ibid.
10. Catechism, par. 1991 (emphasis added).
11. Ibid., par. 1989 (emphasis added).
12. Clement of Alexandria, Who Is the Rich Man That Shall Be Saved?, in Fathers of the Second Century: Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, and Clement of Alexandria (entire), trans. William Wilson, ANF 2:591–604. See also Oden, Justification Reader, 92.
13. Needham, “Justification in the Early Church Fathers,” in Justification in Perspective: Historical Developments and Contemporary Challenges, ed. Bruce L. McCormack (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006), 36.
14. Oden, Justification Reader, 91–94.
15. Martin Luther, Lectures on Galatians, 1535, Chapters 1–4, LW 26:129.
16. Bock and Del Rosario, “The Table Briefing: Seven Key Differences between Protestant and Catholic Doctrine,” Bibliotheca Sacra 171, no. 683 (July–September 2014): 355. See also David P. Scaer, “Joint Lutheran/Roman Catholic Declaration on Justification: A Response,” Concordia Theological Quarterly 62, no. 2 (April 1998): 89.
17. McGrath, Iustitia Dei, 190.
18. Sproul, The Evangelical Doctrine of Justification (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1995), 97–98 (emphasis original).
19. In the opening paragraph of his sermon “The New Birth,” John Wesley writes, “If any doctrines within the whole compass of Christianity may be properly termed fundamental they are doubtless these two—the doctrine of justification, and that of the new birth: the former relating to that great work which God does for us, in forgiving our sins; the latter to the great work which God does in us, in renewing our fallen nature.” Kenneth J. Collins and Jason Vickers, eds., The Sermons of John Wesley: A Collection for the Christian Journey (Nashville: Abingdon, 2013), 157 (emphasis original).
20. Ibid.
21. John Telford, The Letters of the Rev. John Wesley, 8 vols. (London: Epworth, 1931), 3:372 (emphasis original).
22. Kittel and Friedrich, Theological Dictionary, 2:203.
23. Gerald Bray, Romans, rev. ed., Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: NT 6 (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1998), 108.
24. Kittel and Friedrich, Theological Dictionary, 2:207.
25. Gerhard Kittel notes that “Paul takes over a sacred Jewish word when he speaks of righteousness, but he turns it against the legal conception of Judaism.” Kittel and Friedrich, Theological Dictionary, 2:202.
26. Catechism, par. 2002 (emphasis added).
27. Martin Luther, Career of the Reformer III, LW 33:234.
28. Schaff, Creeds of Christendom, 3:494.
29. Catechism, par. 1996 (emphasis original, except that we have italicized to respond).
30. Ted A. Campbell, ed., The Works of John Wesley, vol. 27, Letters III: 1756–1765 (Nashville: Abingdon, 2015), 427.
31. For more on the faculties of prevenient grace that are sovereignly restored, see Kenneth J. Collins, The Theology of John Wesley: Holy Love and the Shape of Grace (Nashville: Abingdon, 2007), 77–82.
32. Catechism, par. 2010 (emphasis original).
33. Ibid. (emphasis original).
34. Lane, “A Tale of Two Imperial Cities: Justification at Regensburg and Trent,” in Justification in Perspective: Historical Developments and Contemporary Challenges, ed. Bruce L. McCormack (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006), 134.
35. Schaff, Creeds of Christendom, vol. 2, The Greek and Latin Creeds, with Translations (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1983), 118.
36. Ibid., 94 (emphasis added).
37. Ibid., 91.
38. Ibid., 96.
39. Wübbenhorst, “Calvin’s Doctrine of Justification: Variations on a Lutheran Theme,” in McCormack, Justification in Perspective, 109.
40. John Calvin, Commentary on the Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Romans, trans. and ed. John Owen (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2010), 135.
41. Wübbenhorst, “Calvin’s Doctrine of Justification,” 109.
42. The Finnish school of interpretation in Luther studies has maintained that the German Reformer’s understanding of justification was quite broad and in fact embraced the Eastern Orthodox notion of theosis (Greek theōsis). However, we find this reading of Luther’s works somewhat problematic, especially since it is overly dependent on his early writings. That is, it cannot embrace Luther’s mature understanding of this crucial matter. For more on this topic, see Carl Trueman, “Simul Peccator et Justus: Martin Luther and Justification,” in McCormack, Justification in Perspective, 73–97.
43. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, ed. John T. McNeill, trans. Ford Lewis Battles, 2 vols., Library of Christian Classics 20–21 (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1960), 3.11.1 (1:726).
44. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, trans. Henry Beveridge (Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 1845), 2:302. We have quoted two different translations of Calvin’s Institutes to show the differences.
45. Ibid.
46. Schaff, Creeds of Christendom, 2:112–13.
47. Preus, Justification and Rome, 54.
48. Ibid.
49. Ibid., 46.
50. Kittel and Friedrich, Theological Dictionary, 2:202.
51. Ibid. (emphasis added).
52. Schaff, Creeds of Christendom, 2:92 (emphasis added).
53. Ibid., 111.
54. Oden, Justification Reader, 162.
55. Bray, Romans, 100.
56. Ibid., 108 (emphasis added).
57. H. J. Schroeder, Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent (Rockford, IL: TAN Books, 1978), Kindle edition, locations 1327–29.
58. Luther, Treatise on Good Works, trans. Scott H. Hendrix (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2012).
59. Martin Luther, Lectures on Galatians, 1535, Chapters 1–4, LW 26:125–26.
60. Schaff, Creeds of Christendom, 2:116.
61. McGrath, Iustitia Dei, 251.
62. Schaff, Creeds of Christendom, 2:118.