DOCTRINES OF THE PROTESTANT INNOVATORS

Victor R. Claveau, MJ

As soon as Luther and his innovating contemporaries had repudiated the ancient religion, they found themselves centers of applauding factions of materialists and skeptics. They were considered leaders of new religious parties and were expected to provide new and reformed articles of faith, even new creeds. They had no choice; substitutes were demanded in place of the old system-platforms upon which the turbulent and factious men of the period could stand with at least a little pretense to Christianity. In this emergency each innovator brought to the fore his inventive faculties, produced a novel creed, and then constituted himself the prophet, the Messiah, the principal object of his religion. The watchwords were -Lutheranism, Calvinism, Anabaptism, and the like, not Christianity. When the sacred writings opposed their newly conceived hypotheses they were either deliberately perverted or summarily rejected.

As might have been expected from such a policy, its legitimate results were speedily manifested in the introduction of an almost endless variety of theological hypotheses and creeds, and a very general prevalence of rationalism and atheism.

The religious revolutionists of the sixteenth century professed to be Reformers-to banish error, and to substitute in its place truth–torestore to the world a lost Church, lost doctrines, and lost ordinances, as they were first given to the apostles. We propose to describe briefly these newly discovered doctrines, so that the reader can judge whether they are of divine or of human origin. In additions we will present a brief synopsis of the Catholic Church’s teaching on these subjects.

Original Sin

Luther, Calvin, and their disciples maintained that through Adam’s fall his entire physical and spiritual being became perverted and corrupted in such a manner, that his whole nature, disposition, leanings, desires, and thoughts, were absolutely and totally evil. They believed that this sinful nature so thoroughly and completely pervaded his entire being and that his capacity for receiving good impressions and influences was utterly extinguished. The stains of sin were so thoroughly fixed within him that no sorrow or repentance could eradicate them and that this corrupt nature was and is passed down to his posterity.  They taught that no course of action on the part of any individual could exercise the slightest influence in rescuing him from eternal damnation. All free will, all spiritual powers, and all capacity for good, either in thought or deed, are utterly destroyed. “Man,” says Luther, “as he is born of his father and mother, together with his whole nature and essence, is not only a sinner, but sin itself.” Calvin thought that the image of God was utterly erased from the soul of man by the fall and that man has been so banished from the kingdom of God, that all in him, which bears reference to the blessed life of the Lord, is extinct.^[1]

“Therefore, after the heavenly image was obliterated in him, he was not the only one to suffer this punishment–that, in place of wisdom, virtue, holiness, truth, and justice, with which adornments he had been clad, there came forth the most filthy plagues, blindness, impotence, impurity, vanity, and injustice–but he also entangled and immersed his offspring in the same miseries.”^[2]

Melanchthon and Zwingli maintained that God deliberately and intentionally implanted original sin in Adam, and that He is not only the author of original sin, but of all the sins resulting from this superinduced sinful desire. In 1525, Melanchthon, in his commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, writes:

“That God wrought all things, evil as well as good; that He was the author of David’s adultery, and the treason of Judas, as well as of Paul’s conversion. …and that it is not in the power of man to abstain from wickedness.”[3]

In 1530, Zwingli, in his work on Providence, asserted:

“that God is the author, mover, and impeller to sin; that He also makes the sinner; that by the instrumentality of the creature He produces injustice and the like.”[4]

Calvin repeatedly says:

“that man, at the instigation of God, does what it is unlawful to do; by a mysterious divine inspiration, the heart of man turns to evil; man falls because the providence of God so ordains.”[5]

After Calvin’s death, his successor, and the leader of the sect, Theodore de Bèze, taught that God not only incites, impels, and urges to evil; but that the Almighty creates a certain number of souls as His instruments, with the intent of working evil through them. From this Puritan idea of original sin originated the dogma of “total depravity.”

Catholic Church’s Teaching

It is a source of relief to return to the doctrine of the Catholic Church on original sin, after a review of the impious beliefs just described. While the Catholic Church does not profess to comprehend the rationale of God’s designs and works on earth, or to penetrate and explain all the mysteries connected with the creation of man and his intimate relations with the Creator and the creation, she does present us with a scriptural and a reasonable idea of original sin. The Church maintains that God is a Being of infinite love; and in placing Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, He endowed them with every capacity for perfect happiness. He gave them knowledge of good and evil, of right and wrong, and perfect freedom and power to act as they chose, to obey or disobey the instructions He had given them. That there might be no misunderstanding, He explained to them His wishes and restrictions regarding the forbidden fruit, and assured them of the penalty which would result from a violation of His command. Adam therefore perfectly understood his duty, possessed the free will and the power to do it, and was aware of the guilt and the penalty of disobedience. On the one hand, he saw his Creator who had endowed him with every earthly blessing, but had subjected him to a slight discipline in prohibiting the forbidden fruit. On the other hand, he saw Satan, listened to his lies, imbibed a spirit of rebellion, and deliberately violated the command of God. In this entire transaction Adam was a perfectly free agent, and acted with a complete knowledge of his obligations and duties, and of the dangers of a violation of them. Like so many of his posterity, the Adams who have lived since his day, he saw the straight an narrow road which leads to eternal life, and the broad road which leads to destruction, but he willfully traveled the latter.

At the fifth session of Council of Trent, the following decree concerning original sin was passed:

“If anyone does not confess that the first man, Adam, when he transgressed the commandment of God in paradise, immediately lost the holiness and justice in which he had been constituted, and through the offense of that prevarication incurred the wrath and indignation of God, and thus death with which God had previously threatened him, and, together with death, captivity under his power who thenceforth had the empire of death, that is to say, the devil, and that the entire Adam through that offense of prevarication was changed in body and soul for the worse, let him be anathema.”^[6]

All mankind inherited this sinful condition, and can only be justified before God, though the merits of Jesus Christ, the sole mediator between God and man. But as man is a free agent, and possesses all the requisite knowledge and power, he is able to fulfil such conditions as shall insure his salvation-both the power of God and his own voluntary acts cooperating in the accomplishment of the work.

Free will[7]

The question of free will ranks among the foremost philosophical problems of all time. The view adopted in response to it will determine a person’s position in regard to the most important issues that present themselves to the human mind. On the one hand, does a person possess genuine moral freedom, the power of true choice, and the real ability to determine the course of his thoughts and actions? Does he have the power to decide which motives shall dominate in his mind? Does a person have the power to modify and form his character? Or, on the other hand, are a person’s thoughts and actions and character all merely the inevitable outcome of circumstances? Are they all unavoidably predetermined in every detail along inflexible lines by events of the past, over which he himself has had no control? This is the real magnitude of the free will problem.

Reformers on Free Will

Luther maintained “that man is devoid of freedom; that every (pretended) free action is only apparent; that an irresistible divine necessity rules all things, and that every human act is at actually only an act of God.” “The human will,” said Luther, “is like a beast of burden. If God mounts it, it wishes and goes as God wills; if Satan mounts it, it wishes and goes as Satan wills; nor can it choose the rider it would prefer, or betake itself to him, but it is the riders who contend for the possession.”

Calvin, Melanchthon, and Zwingli all entertained the same views respecting free will. Armsdorf, one of Luther’s most eminent disciples, thus writes:

“By His will and speech, God works all things with all creatures. When God wills and speaks, stone and wood are carried, hewn and laid, how, when, and where He will. Thus, if God wills and speaks, man becomes converted, pious, and just. For, as stone and wood are, in the hand and power of God, so, in like manner, are the understanding and will of man in the hand and power of God; so that man can absolutely will and choose nothing, but what God wills and speaks, either in grace or in wrath.”[8]

This denial of free will and free-agency in man arose naturally and spontaneously from the peculiar views of the Reformers respecting original sin. If, by the fall, Adam lost all basic goodness, all spiritual similarity and affinity with God, and all capacity to be divinely influenced in consequence of his totally perverted and corrupt nature, the inference is that he also was deprived of free will and power to contribute anything to his own spiritual elevation and destiny. The reformers claimed that Adam was placed in this terrible position by God, independent of his own volition, without any power on his part to alter his fixed destiny. The act of disobedience was predetermined and prearranged before his creation, and that he was a passive and powerless instrument in the hands of God, a necessary link in the grand design of the creation. Another predestined link in the divine program, according to Calvin and his disciples, was the selection of a certain number of souls for salvation, and a certain number of souls for eternal condemnation. God makes these selections alone, independent of any efforts or works on the part of the person. To those whom He has elected for salvation, He gives faith, and by this gift alone they are justified, and assured of salvation. Even if they commit the worst of sins daily; while the condemned victims are already judged, sentenced, and held for eternal punishment, though they commit no sin, and act uprightly and justly in all things. In all spiritual matters, these innovating theologians deny the existence of everything like free will and individual influence. Like clouds which are blown about by the winds, men are regarded, as the powerless puppets and playthings of a preordained, predestined, and inexorable fate, powerless to change their destiny for good or evil, for heaven or hell.

According to the Reformers, God alone possesses free will. He alone conceived and created the universe. He alone planned the laws, which preside over the kingdoms of nature. He alone foreknew all things which should transpire in the world and therefore that all things have been ordered and arranged by Divine Providence, in an immutable and inevitable manner, so that men are necessarily creatures of foreordained circumstances, without free agency, or power of changing their predestined conditions. Hence, they infer that God is the author of sin. Upon this first point, Luther expresses himself thus:

“God forms in us evil as well as good; and the great perfection of faith consists in believing that God is just, although He has predestined us, from the beginning of the world, to be damned. . . .The foreknowledge of God renders free will absolutely impossible” ….and “God was not less the cause of the treason of Judas Iscariot than of the conversion of St. Paul.”[9]

Wyclif, and his disciple, John Hus, entertained many of the opinions which were afterward adopted by Luther and his friends, although they were regarded by Melanchthon as men full of errors, deception, and trickery, and that their doctrines were calculated to lead men into all sorts of errors and excesses. Wyclif contended that all things occur from absolute necessity, and that God acts from necessity in all things. He taught that God rules over a world with fixed and immutable laws, necessities, and developments, and therefore, He is the author and approver of all sins, crimes, and calamities, as well as of all that is good and merciful. The Council of Constance was right in declaring that, according to this hypothesis, “God ought to obey the devil.”^[10] Wyclif, however, believed in the invocation of saints, in purgatory, in the veneration of images, and in many of the essential doctrines of the Church; but he denied the supremacy of the pope, and several of the disciplinary canons of the Church.  These facts are derived from his principal work, published in 1524, The Trialogue.

Catholic Church’s Teaching on Free Will

The Council of Trent declared against the Reformers: If any one says that man’s free will, moved and aroused by God, by assenting to God’s call and action, in no way co-operates toward disposing and preparing itself to obtain the grace of justification, that it cannot refuse its assent if it wishes, but that, as something inanimate, it does nothing whatever and is merely passive, let him be anathema.[11]

The belief in free will is an Article of Faith for Catholics. Holy Scripture stresses both the human factor of the freedom of the will, and the Divine factor of grace. The numerous admonishments to penance and to good works presuppose that grace does not nullify the freedom of the will.

The freedom of the will as against grace is expressly affirmed in Dt. 30:19: “I call on you this day, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse; therefore choose life, that you and your descendants may live.” And also in Sir. 31:10: “Who has had the power to transgress and did not transgress, and to do evil and did not do it?” The gospels reiterate the same view: “How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not!”[12] Also in the Acts of the Apostles: “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit.”[13] The cooperation of free will and grace is emphasized in 1 Cor. 15:10: “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God which is with me.” See also Phil. 2:12 and 2 Cor. 6:1.

Scripture makes the point that when we sin; we do so freely, we, not God, are responsible for our choices good or evil. The classic formulation of this truth is found in the book of Sirach.

Do not say, “Because of the Lord I left the right way”; for he will not do what he hates. Do not say, “It was he who led me astray”: for he has no need of a sinful man. The Lord hates all abominations; and they are not loved by those who fear him. It was he who created man in the beginning, and he left him in the power of his own inclination. If you will, you can keep the commandments, and to act faithfully is a matter of your own choice. He has placed before you fire and water; stretch out your hand for whichever you wish.

Before a man are life and death, and whichever he chooses will be given to him. For great is the wisdom of the Lord; he is mighty in power and sees everything; his eyes are on those who fear him, and he knows every deed of man. He has not commanded any one to be ungodly, and he has not given any one permission to sin.^[14]

Free will under the influence of grace is the necessary foundation for the meritoriousness of good works. The testimony of human consciousness also supports Catholic teaching.

Predestination

The following is Calvin’s definition of predestination:

“We call predestination God’s eternal decree, by which he compacted with himself what he willed to become of each man. For all are not created in equal condition; rather, eternal life is foreordained for some, eternal damnation for others. Therefore, as any man has been created to one or the other of these ends, we speak of him as predestined to life, or to death.”^[15]

Calvin declares that these predestined decrees of God are determined without any reference to the virtues or the vices of those he has elected for salvation, or condemned to eternal punishment. The Reformers maintained that God is the author of all things, good and bad, and that whatsoever comes to pass is from a necessity incident to the original, design, and creation of the universe.

The absolute predestination of the innovators is nothing, more or less than Islamic fatalism under another name. Muhammad maintain that God foreknew, foreordained, and prearranged whatever should transpire from the commencement of the world to its end; and that man is, only a reorganized constituent of the universe, whose career and destiny had been irrevocably fixed before the creation of the world. So little faith have these fatalists that any personal efforts can alter or modify the fixed decrees of the Almighty, that in numerous instances, they have refused to take ordinary measures to shield themselves from impending dangers. If it is fated that some tragedy is to befall them, they regard all efforts or works on their parts as useless. Yet, if the decree has gone forth that they are to be rescued from harm, the inevitable result will be accomplished whether they desire it or not, or whether they exert themselves or not. These are the doctrines of modern predestinationists. The hypothesis of Luther and his co-innovators, upon this subject, both theoretically and practically, is identical with that of Islam. The fundamental principle of the Reformers was that without any human cooperation, the Holy Spirit penetrates into the soul of the true Christian, and man is with respect to all religious feeling, thought, and will, perfectly passive.

If the doctrines of the predestinationists are true, and all the thoughts, actions, and destinies of men are governed and directed by the will and power of God alone-men being deprived of all collaboration-of what use are the Bible, human creeds, theological discussions, and sects? If God has predestined the lives of all, independently of their own wills and efforts, how presumptuous are all human attempts to interfere in these fixed and immutable arrangements of God! How impious of mortals to manufacture confessions of faith, to quarrel and preach on doctrinal points, and to incite nations to hostility, strife, and bloodshed, when God alone has irrevocably ordered and permanently arranged all things from the beginning to the end! Will it be urged that the Infinite Fountain of love and mercy has deliberately designed and predestined these conflicting tenets of the Reformers, and the consequent contentions, wars, and misery with which they have since afflicted the nations of the earth? We do not envy those who dare impute to God such apparent injustice and wanton cruelty, rather than to acknowledge their own inability to comprehend the mysteries with which he has surrounded the works of his hands.

These peculiar views of original sin, free will, and predestination, developed as a logical sequence the dogma of Election or Predestination to eternal life-one of Calvin’s five theological principles.

Church’s Teaching on Predestination

According to St. Thomas Aquinas: “Predestination is a plan existing in the mind of God according to which some people are to be saved; and that Reprobation is the allowing of some to be lost. Contrasting the two he remarks that Predestination includes the will to grant grace and eternal glory, while Reprobation includes the will to permit a person to fall into fault and to punish him for that fault.”^[16]

God knows from all eternity whether or not an individual will be saved, and from eternity he has decreed those graces by which a person is saved, including the grace of final perseverance. God wills all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth; this is explicit in 1 Tim. 2:4. Deny this and you deny the love of God. But man is free whether he does good or evil. God does not positively predestine anybody to hell or to sin (which is the teaching of Predestinarianism). He has foreseen the wickedness of the damned and has regretfully foreordained their punishment, but none the less, he has a real will for their salvation and he offers them the grace of conversion, which they freely reject. Since God knows whether an individual will be saved or not, there is objective certainty about the fact. But man can never (except by a rare private revelation) be subjectively certain of his predestination, though he should have a very sure hope in God’s mercy.

Justification by Faith Alone

To those who have adopted the hypotheses of the Reformers respecting original sin, free will, predestination, and the inefficacy of good works as cooperative means of salvation, the following pertinent questions must be asked. Who are to be saved? How is salvation to be secured? Who can be assured of salvation? We take the liberty of presenting briefly a few of the arguments and inferences of the Reformers touching these points.

Since the fall of Adam every human being became totally depraved, and incapable of receiving any good impression, or of performing any meritorious act. Luther, Calvin, and other heretics of their era, inferred that no man is a free agent. Who then are to be saved? According to the Reformers, only those whom God has foreordained and predestined to this end before the foundation of the world. While at the same time, the judgment of eternal condemnation was rendered against the remainder. How, then, can man be assured of salvation? The Reformers assert that this may be known by the actual possession of faith, which God forcibly implants within him, whether he desires it or not, or whether he performs good works or not. When this faith once takes possession of him, he is justified and sanctified, he must be saved, with or without sin, with or without good works. The very fact that he believes renders it certain that he is one of the elect.

This doctrine of justification by faith originated with Luther, and was afterward adopted by Calvin, Melanchthon, Zwingli, and their followers. One of the canons of the Synod of Dort (Netherlands, 1574) declared, “that God gives true and vivid faith to all those whom He desires to rescue from damnation, and to those alone; that this faith is a gift of God; and that all of the elect are assured of their election by certain infallible tests.” In illustration of Luther’s tenacity with regard to the doctrine of justification by faith alone without works, D’Aubigne, quotes the following observation of Luther:

“I see that the devil is continually attacking this fundamental article by means of his doctors, and that in this respect he can never cease or take any repose. Well, then, I, Doctor Martin Luther, unworthy herald of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, confess this article, that faith alone without works justifies before God, all the cardinals, with the priests, bishops, monks, and nuns; in spite of kings, princes, and nobles; and in spite of all the world, and of the devils themselves; and that, if they endeavor to fight against this truth, they will draw the fires of hell upon their heads. This is the true and holy gospel, and the declaration of me, Doctor Luther, according to the teaching of the Holy Ghost….. I say it once again, should all the world and all the devils tear each other to pieces and burst with rage, that it is not the less true.”[17]

Luther was so tenacious of this dogma that he deliberately mistranslated and perverted parts of the Bible, and rejected other parts, in order that his own theological platform might be sustained. Whenever the declarations of the apostles clashed with the theological tenets of Luther or Calvin, they impiously rejected these apostolic teachings and substituted their own in their stead.  These modern apostles were especially hostile to Saints Paul and Peter.

Most Protestants claim that all who are selected for salvation are endowed from above, not only with faith and an intuitive knowledge that they are among the elect, but with irresistible tendencies to perform good works. The condemned are cursed with inherent and perpetual unbelief, and a continual and helpless impelling force to do evil.

Even during the lives of the Reformers every form of infidelity, immorality, and vice, made rapid progress. Luther repeatedly admitted this. Such was the legitimate and inevitable result of throwing off the beneficial restraints of the ancient Church, and opening, a door to private interpretation of Scripture, and to the intellectual and moral idiosyncrasies and inclinations of individuals.

The Reformers could not have conceived of a more efficient mode of making proselytes to their novel religions than through predestination, the inefficacy of good works, and justification by faith. They shifted all responsibility from the creature to the Creator. They taught that everything which has transpired or will transpire from the beginning to the end of the world, were accomplished facts with the Almighty before the creation. Therefore, all cooperative efforts on the part of mortals in the accomplishment of regeneration, justification, and sanctification, are not only useless, but wicked intervention with the exclusive right of God. This last idea been pushed by several of the Reformers so far that they actually sanctioned the commission of sin in order that grace might abound, and that God might receive all the glory of the work of regeneration and salvation. We cite a few extracts from the writings of the Reformers upon the subject.  “Luther maintained that no works could possibly be pure and acceptable to the Deity; that even the best work is a venial sin; that every so-called good work-that is to say, every act of a believer-is, when considered in itself, a mortal sin, though, by reason of faith, it is remitted to him. Melanchthon not only expressed full concurrence in this doctrine of his master, but also carried it out to an extreme, by asserting that all our works, all our endeavors, are nothing but sin.  Calvin corroborated the assertions of both.”[18] In 1559, Van Amsdorf, the intimate friend and disciple of Luther, published an elaborate work, entitled The Proposition of N. Van Amsdorf, in which he attempted to show that good works were even hurtful to salvation. “Now thou seest,” says Luther, “how rich is the Christian or the baptized man; for, though be will, he cannot lose his salvation, however great his sins may be, unless he refuses to believe.”[19] 

Sin boldly. This exhortation of Luther to commit sin, this unjustifiable teaching of its absolute necessity, and his bold assurance of the impunity with which the vilest sins may continually be committed, provided that they are accompanied by faith in Lutheranism, was a direct appeal to the carnal desires of mankind. Under the deceptive pretext of liberating the world from the bigotry’s, abuses, and restraints of the Church, these men established a reign of intellectual and moral depravity, which has filled the world with irreligion and immorality, and shaken the very foundations of Christianity itself. The human mind is prone to adopt those sentiments, which afford the greatest scope to the indulgence of passion and pleasure. To gratify these indulgences, it is constantly seeking for plausible novelties and philosophies. The fatalistic doctrines of the Reformers furnished a stand-point for this weak side of human nature.

Who can contemplate these reformed ideas of God and his New Law without a sense of repugnance? Who can seriously believe that a Being of infinite love and mercy would foreordain and predestine a single one of his helpless creatures to eternal damnation? Were such an atrocious doctrine asserted of Satan himself, it would scarcely receive acceptance. But notwithstanding these supposed predetermined and irrevocable decrees of God, many of the innovators had the inconsistency to urge people to believe, with the assurance that belief would produce faith. When faith was attained, they could be certain that they were among the elect! The dangers of this fallacy will be apparent to all who examine the positive declarations and commands of Christ respecting those things which are essential to salvation, like baptism, penance, and obedience to the Commandments. Many minds are so gullible and easily molded that only moderate efforts are required to superinduce faith in any idea or hypothesis which may be presented, however absurd and indefensible. Faith is one of the most common and easily-developed elements of the human mind. From childhood, onward, it is continually seeking for objects to cling to-for hypotheses, theories, philosophies, and creeds, as means of convenience, consolation, or happiness. Many new creeds have developed in the past 500 years. Some of these creeds involve gross perversions of the Scriptures and impious ideas respecting the goodness and mercy of God. It is then maintained that belief and adherence to this or that creed is the sole condition of salvation. There are many thousands of these human creeds, all false, and all harmful in their tendencies; yet, they all have their followers, firm in faith, and thorough and consistent in practice. Each founder coins a religion from his own mind, flanked here and there by isolated and often corrupted passages from the Scriptures, and then solicits faith in this human invention as the only condition of eternal happiness in the world to come. Each one professes to possess certain infallible marks, by which the divine origin and truthfulness of his religion is apparent, and each one can point out fatal objections to the religions of his neighbors. The Calvinist, who believes that God has condemned a certain number of his creatures to everlasting punishment, denounces the creed of the Universalist, which asserts that all mankind are saved. The Trinitarian entertains a horror of the creed of the Unitarian. The believer in justification by faith alone regards all cooperative works of men, for the purpose of securing salvation, as useless and insulting to the Deity. Lutherans, Calvinists, Anabaptists, Methodists, Unitarians, Quakers, Anglicans, Universalists, Seventh Day Adventists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormons, Spiritualists, and all of the sects, have perfect faith in their own peculiar interpretations of the Bible, and in their own peculiar religions. Will faith save them all? One individual interprets the Scriptures in such a manner as to make God the author and creator of sin, and the eternal antagonist of a certain number of helpless victims of his wrath. Will faith in such a doctrine secure salvation? Another denies the divinity of Jesus Christ, and regards him only as a created creature. Will such a faith save him? Another declares that there is no hell, no eternal punishment, and no devil. Will faith in this creed rescue the honest believer from the penalties attached to a neglect or violation of the positive laws and commands of God? Some reject portions of the Holy Scriptures, and accuse the inspired apostles of errors and schismatic teachings because their precepts clash with their own individual and rationalistic hypotheses. Will ever so strong a faith in such private interpretations of the word of God justify and sanctify? Others, deriving their inspiration from the Bible, teach that it is right to commit sin, in order that grace may abound. Will faith in such an interpretation lead to heaven? Many have faith in the utter impotency of mortals in all matters pertaining to their spiritual welfare, and place the responsibility of all good and bad deeds upon the Almighty. Will such faith carry one safely to the haven of bliss?

Some absolute predestinationists assert that good works always follow true faith; and that this combination of faith and works is a sure indication of the real Christian. This argument fails when we remember that there are moral, benevolent, and charitable men who lead blameless lives who are to be found among those who deny the divinity of Christ, the necessity of baptism, the existence of a future state of punishment, and many of the sacred writings. These men have the strongest faith in their own dogmas, worship God in sincerity, and do unto others as they would be done. Good works accompany their faith. Are they also among the elect? Are they also justified by faith? Faith in some kind of religion is an instinctive want of the human mind and, in most instances, consistent and appropriate works accompany this faith. The faith that Christians have in the Bible is no less strong than the faith the Muslim’s have in the Koran; nor do Christians obey the precepts of their religion with any more faithfulness than do the Muslims. The same is true of the Hindu, the Brahmin, the Buddhist, and the Indian who worships the Great Spirit. Christians who have rejected the divinely-founded and divinely-endowed Church of Christ, and adopted the novel inventions of men, are often perfectly sincere and earnest in their religious convictions. They have firm faith in some creed, live and practice in accordance with it, and are fruitful in good works. But among the thousand contradictory and conflicting sects, who can decide which is true and which false? Among the innumerable Reformed churches, with different articles of faith, different modes of worship, and different ideas respecting the duties of man, how can we find the one Church, one fold, and one Shepherd which Jesus founded, with one Lord, one faith, and one baptism? Can we detect it in any one of the numerous reformed confessions of faith? Can we find any special morality and virtue pertaining to some one of the sects? Can we see a resemblance between the members of some reformed church and the holy apostles? Can we find any infallible marks, which indicate that a divine theological Phoenix, which had slumbered profoundly for fifteen centuries, has again risen from the ashes of the past, at the bidding of a German monk? Or shall we discover it, by seeking that Church which has existed and been visible from the days of Christ to the present moment. The Catholic Church is universal, its doctrines are unvarying, and its priests and missionaries, ever since the time of the apostles, have visited all of the nations of the earth to preach and teach the word of God. Devout men and women who have braved every danger and hardship, and in almost countless instances have suffered martyrdom in the cause of Christ?

Justification by faith! Faith in what? In the personal inspiration, private Scriptural interpretation, and the creed and religion of some individual reformer? Faith in Lutheranism, or Calvinism, or Anabaptism, or Quakers, or some other sect? Faith that God is God, and that Luther, or Calvin, or Smith, or Russell is his prophet? Faith not in the one original Church, but in one which was brought into existence by one of the German, or Anglican, or Swiss innovators of the sixteenth century or Americans in the nineteenth? Faith in the belief that Christ’s mission was a failure, that his Church was non-existent or invisible for fifteen hundred years? Faith in the belief that millions of human beings perished in ignorance and sin in consequence of the non-fulfillment of the Word of God through the apostles and their successors, until Luther, Calvin, Smith, or Russell or some other so-called reformer brought light out of darkness in the form of Lutheranism, Calvinism, Mormonism or the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society? Faith that Christ is the Son of God, and that the innovators of these latter days are his only true prophets and interpreters? Faith that a simple, naked, mental act, without works, without obedience to the sole practical duty of man toward his Maker, himself, and his fellow-men is all that is necessary?

Those who adopt the fatalistic doctrines of the Reformers do not require a Bible, a confession of faith, or even a moral code, since they believe that it is the decree of God that all things, good or evil, must come to pass in precise accordance with his predestined will, without regard to the numerous practical commandments contained in Sacred Scripture. The Holy Scriptures assert that faith without works is dead;[20] and the kind of works which are requisite are accurately prescribed in the sacred commandments and ordinances. Faith is, indeed, one of the fundamental elements of Christianity, but its significance must not be limited to a simple mental act. The entire tenor of the Sacred Writings teaches us that by the word faith, Christ included not only a belief in all his teachings, but a practical performance of them. The definition, which he gave of “love of God,” is applicable to faith. In what consists the love of God? “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments.”[21] In like manner faith consists in a belief in Christ and his mission, and in obedience to the commandments.

The teaching of the doctrine of justification by faith alone, has been a most fruitful source of evil. A few of its legitimate consequences have been, a practical repudiation of the laws and commandments of the Scriptures and of all personal responsibilities and duties in spiritual matters, a paralyzation of all personal effort and cooperation in the great work of redemption and salvation, and an alarming tendency to rationalism and religious skepticism. Keep in mind that the only occurrence in Scripture that contains the phrase “faith alone” is repudiation of that concept. “You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone.”[22]    

No one can examine critically and impartially the innovations of the Reformers without arriving at the conclusion that their tendencies are anti-Christian. The Gospel teaches that God is a Being of infinite love and mercy: the innovators regard him as a malignant demon, who has deliberately created a certain number of helpless creatures for the express purpose of tormenting them forever! Christ taught the necessity of faith in and actual obedience to all his commandments and ordinances, as conditions of salvation. The innovators ignore good works and rely on faith alone as the sole duty of the Christian. The Bible teaches that man is a free agent, and that be must personally exert himself and actively cooperate with the blessed influences of the Holy Spirit if he would serve God acceptably, and secure his eternal welfare. The reformers regarded man as a passive instrument in the hands of the Supreme Architect, and that any attempt at personal interference, effort, or cooperation in the work of regeneration and sanctification, are wicked and reproachable.

It would be difficult to read a single chapter of the New Testament without finding inspired beliefs in direct opposition to these reformed teachings. While we concede that isolated passages may be distorted and made use of to bolster up an absurd hypothesis or a ungodly theological novelty, the great fact nevertheless remains that the New Law was given us expressly as a rule of religious faith and a practical working code. The entire spirit of the gospel teaches the absolute necessity of both faith and works. “So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.”[23] “For he will render to every man according to his works.”[24] “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”[25] “Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his and come forth, those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgement.”[26] “For truly, I say to you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink, because you bear the name of Christ, will by no means lose his reward.”[27] In this instance Christ not only required faith in him and in his divine mission, but he demanded the act of giving the water.  When the young man came to Christ and asked him what be should do to have eternal life, Jesus answered him, “If you will enter life, keep the commandments.”[28] In this instance the Savior recognized the free will of the young man, and the necessity of performing good works by keeping the commandments. This obedience to the commandments, coupled with faith, were all that our Savior absolutely required; and when the young man informed him that be had kept all of these things from his youth up, and again inquired what he yet lacked. Jesus said to him: “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven: and come, follow Me.”[29]

In both of these examples, works are demanded-in the first instance, certain definite works, in order to secure salvation; and still other works, more difficult and self-denying, in order to achieve the holiest degree of excellence-perfection. “For we must all appear before the judgement seat of Christ, so that each one may receive good or evil, according to what he has done in the body.”[30] The perfect Christian will occupy a higher place in heaven than he who simply obeys the commandments. In their doctrinal innovations, Luther and his contemporary Reformers violated at every point the spirit and intent of the Sacred Writings. In their efforts to sustain the hypothesis that faith, in its abstract sense, alone saves, they did not hesitate to corrupt, pervert, and distort the plain teachings of Christ and the apostles.

We most earnestly invite the renewed attention of Protestants to this important subject. We appeal to them cast aside their preconceived notions and prejudices and seriously contemplate the compassionate interpretation, which the Church has handed down from the apostles upon this subject. Contrast this view with the innovations of the Reformers. We implore them to remember that this, as well as all of the other doctrines of the Church, is of divine origin. No Catholic has ever dared to affix his name to these sacred truths, with a view of achieving notoriety or of gratifying an ungodly ambition. No individual has ever presumed to come within the sacred enclosure of the Church, and set up his private opinions against her divinely-endowed and divinely-protected truths. The innovators never attempted to enter in at the door to present their complaints, but climbed up on the outer walls of the great fortress of Christianity and delivered their impotent blows against this impregnable bastion of truth. This fortress of Christianity still stands immutable and affords protection, hope, and consolation to more than one billion of true believers.

No one can scrutinize the doctrines of the Reformers concerning original sin, free will, and predestination, without conceding that they lead directly and necessarily to fatalism.^[31] The natural results of such beliefs are either bigotry and intolerance, or rationalism, atheism, or a general indifference to all matters pertaining to spiritual life.

1. ^[1] See John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1960) Vol. 1., Book II, Chap. 1, 7., pp. 249-250.
2. ^[1] Institutes, Vol. 1, Book II, Chaps.1, 5., p. 246.
3. [1] E. E. Marcy, Christianity and its Conflicts, (New York: D. Appleton and Company) 1867, p. 267.
4. [1] Ibid.
5. [1] Ibid.
6. ^[1] Schroeder, Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, p. 21.
7. [1] The faculty of choosing the means in view of an end to be attained.
8. [1] Marcy, p. 269.
9. [1] Ibid. pp. 270-271.
10. ^[1] Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, Vol. I, Nicaea I to Lateran V, Norman P. Tanner, S.J., ed. (Washington: Georgetown University Press, 1990), p. 411.
11. [1] Schroeder, Sixth Session, Can. 4.
12. [1] Luke 13:34;  Matt. 23:37.
13. [1] Acts 7:51.
14. ^[1] Sirach 15:11-20.
15. ^[1] Institutes, Vol. 2, p. 926.
16. ^[1] Summa Theologica, I, Q. 23, a. I, 2,3.
17. [1] Marcy, p. 274.
18. [1] Ibid. p. 277.
19. [1] Ibid.
20. [1] James 2:26.
21. [1] 1 John 5:2.
22. [1] James 2:24.
23. [1] James 2:17.
24. [1] Romans 2:6.
25. [1] Matt. 5:16.
26. [1] John 5:28-29.
27. [1] Mark 9:41
28. [1] Matt. 19:17.
29. [1] Matt. 19:21.
30. [1] 1 Cor. 5:10.
31. ^[1] A doctrine that holds that events are fixed in advance for all time in such a manner that human beings are powerless to change them.