Amazing Grace – How Catholics are Saved

Catholics are erroneously told by Protestants that we are saved by faith alone, words not found in the Bible. In reality, though, Catholics are saved by grace. This truth shouldn’t be any surprise to Protestants who sing the song “Amazing Grace,” since one of the lines in that song is “Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that SAVED a wretch like me.” Martin Luther, a rogue Catholic priest who invented a very new doctrine of “saved by faith alone,” added the word “alone” to Romans 3:28 to free himself from having to do good works as part of the salvation process. (Adding to scripture is forbidden by scripture itself in Proverbs 30:6: “Do not add to His words or He will reprove you, and you will be proved a liar.”) 

But in John 14:12. Jesus Himself said that we are to do good works.  St. James says in James 2:24: “You see that a man is justified by works and NOT by faith alone.” Matthew 25:31-46 tells us all that unless we do good works (feeding the hungry, visiting the sick, clothing the naked), we shall NOT enter heaven. 

Our obedience to Jesus in performing good works BY HIS GRACE and THROUGH HIS GRACE and WITH HIS GRACE is a very necessary component of the salvation process. Colossians 1:10 even says that our good works are the “fruit of our faith,” and as Jesus said, we MUST bear good fruit or we will be thrown into the fire.” Luther taught that salvation was a one-time event, and you were saved when you accepted Jesus Christ for the first time as your Lord. He erroneously taught that your past, present, and future sins were all forgiven, which is also not to be found anywhere in the Bible. He said that Christ’s righteousness was legally “imputed” to you, and even though you are not righteous, His righteousness “clothes” you so that you appear righteous. He actually used the term “We are like dunghills covered in snow!” None of this legal imputation theory is anywhere to be found in the Bible. Catholics are in a FAMILY covenant relationship with God our Father, not in a courtroom with Jesus ready to bang down the gavel and declare us righteous or guilty. That particular judgment comes after death, not while we are alive here on earth!

Luther once said this about salvation and our free will:

“He that will maintain that man’s free will is able to do or work anything in spiritual cases, be they never so small, denies Christ.”

Here he denies man’s free will in accepting Christ, which begs the question, “If we have no free will, then how can we be held accountable for our sins?”  Luther taught that God does everything in our salvation, and we play no part because we have no free will to accept God’s love. But love doesn’t work this way anywhere else, like in our families or romances. Why should it be any different when it comes to our Father and salvation? We are not robots after all. In fact, scripture says in Philemon 1:14: “but I preferred to do nothing without your consent in order that your goodness might not be by compulsion but of your own free will”

Luther has somehow managed to convince a lot of people that he is right and scripture is wrong. 

One of the big misunderstandings from the Reformation is the role that works play in our salvation. It seems that the  Reformers mistakenly equated the old Jewish works of the law (circumcision, kosher food, not touching corpses, etc.) with the very necessary good works.  St. Paul condemns “works of the law” (Romans 3:20, Jewish works), but never good works, which he commends us to do (Ephesians 2:10). Over and over again, St. Paul reiterates what the first Church Council in Jerusalem (Acts 15) settled: that circumcision is of no use to Christians regarding salvation. Jewish works of the law will not save you, but doing good works (the fruit of our faith, Colossians 1:10) in conjuction with our faith in Christ will. After all, if Christ is the vine, and we are the branches (John 15:5), then Christ acts through us by the power of HIS GRACE performing all of our good works, so we have no room whatsoever to boast about any of our good works.

What is Grace?

So what is grace anyway? The Catechism of the Catholic Church says :

1996 Our justification comes from the grace of God. Grace is favor, the free and undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call to become children of God, adoptive sons, partakers of the divine nature and of eternal life.

1997 Grace is a participation in the life of God. It introduces us into the intimacy of Trinitarian life: by Baptism the Christian participates in the grace of Christ, the Head of his Body. As an “adopted son” he can henceforth call God “Father,” in union with the only Son. He receives the life of the Spirit who breathes charity into him and who forms the Church.

To sum up, grace is a free gift from God and a share of His divine nature, which first comes to us in the Holy Sacrament of Baptism. Why is this needed? Because we have to overcome our human nature and become like Christ to enter heaven. Receiving grace upon grace is how we do that. The Holy Catholic Church dispenses tons of grace every day, through the sacraments – Baptism, Confirmation, Eucharist, Confession, Marriage, Holy Orders, and the Anointing of the Sick – all for free. We have a lifetime to accept God’s free gift of grace; and the more we freely accept, the more like Jesus we become, which is the ultimate goal of life. We should all strive to like the Blessed Virgin Mary, who, like Eve, was created full of grace.  If we become full of grace by the time we lie on our deathbed, then it’s straight to heaven we go, with no purgatorial cleansing required.

Of course, God can and does dispense grace outside of the sacraments, but for Catholics, the sacraments are the primary way to receive grace.

Becoming Receptive to Grace

For sure, sin blocks the amount of grace we receive. Imagine having a giant umbrella over us during a torrential downpour.  Even though the grace from God is infinite, our weak human nature and our tendency to sin act just like that umbrella blocking the rain from reaching us. This is why the Sacrament of Reconciliation (Confession was first instituted by Jesus in John 20:21ff) is so important. St. Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:18 that he, like all priests, has the ministry of reconciliation. Venial sin partially blocks God’s grace from us, while mortal sins TOTALLY block God’s free gift of grace from our hearts. So go to Confession often, especially if you are addicted to porn, alcohol, or drugs. The more you go to confession and receive God’s grace there, the less power these evils will have over your free will to sin or not. You will also be able to receive Holy Communion with a clean heart and a clean soul, which makes the Eucharist that much more powerful in our lives. St. Paul tells us how important this is in 1 Corinthians 11:27-32.

Sacramentals, like praying the Rosary daily, wearing Mary’s scapular and miraculous medals, relics, etc., all predispose us to be able to accept more grace. By the grace of God, our hearts and our minds are then softened to be more receptive to the idea of attaining grace as often as possible.

Studying the Bible is also another excellent way to prepare to receive grace. There is nothing quite like reading the Bible and discovering a Bible verse that you really never noticed before but which now speaks EXACTLY to your struggle. Don’t let a day go by without reading some scripture. It will change your life for the better, guaranteed.

Going to Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is a great way to get some face time in with Jesus. He’s waiting there for you, either in the tabernacle or exposed on the altar for you to adore. As a matter of fact, the more you stare at the flesh of Jesus in the Eucharist, the less power the naked flesh of pornography will have over you.  Saying the Rosary in front of the Eucharist during Adoration is a great way to be with Jesus and Mary too, as she is always there adoring her Son as well.

Meditation on the Passion of Jesus is a most excellent way to prepare yourself for Holy Mass and the Eucharist. Sometimes that big crucifix behind the altar becomes so familiar to us that we tend to ignore all of the suffering that Christ went through to pay for OUR sins.  The crucifix is there to be a reminder to us that, like St. Paul says, “We preach Christ crucified” (1 Corinthians 1:23). A great way to think about His suffering is to always unite our own suffering (small as it is in comparison) with His suffering. In fact, this is what Colossians 1:24 is all about:

24: “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church,”

St. Paul is saying here that the only thing lacking in Christ’s sufferings is our own suffering united to His! Remember that there is no time in heaven; it’s all eternity. Therefore, all is present to Him throughout time. What that means is that when we meditate on His Passion NOW, he knew that from the cross THEN, and it gave Him great comfort in His sorrow.  

Being grateful to God for all that he is done for us should be at the forefront of our prayers. Too many times we take our blessings from God for granted and fail to even thank Him for our lives, our families, our country, etc. Thanking God for His previous graces bestowed on you is a sure-fire way to ensure that even more grace will be forthcoming.

Performing good works as Jesus commanded us to to in the Sermon on the Mount is another great way to receive grace. Jesus Himself says in Matthew 10:42 that performing so simple of a good work as giving a cup of cold water to a disciple will be rewarded:

And whoever gives to one of these little ones even a cup of cold water because he is a disciple, truly, I say to you, he shall not lose his reward.” 

If possible, go to daily Mass to receive Jesus in the Eucharist. It’s like getting a blood transfusion from heaven, because His sacred blood after Holy Communion is now flowing through your arteries, heart, and veins. After all, 1 Corinthians 6:17  says: 

“But he who is united to the Lord becomes one spirit with him.”

The Eucharist is how Jesus gives us His glory as well: 

John 17:22: “The glory which thou hast given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one.“

The Catholic view of salvation is much more than just “What must I do to be saved?”  Rather, salvation is total 100% union with Jesus Christ for all time! And what could possibly be better than that!