With all due respect to PF, I think he missed the point.
Like the Council of Trent, PF sets out to compare Martin Luther's doctrine of faith alone with St. Paul's Doctrine of faith apart from works of the law. Unlike Trent, however, he then compares Martin Luther's doctrine of faith alone with St. Paul's doctrine of justification by faith, hope and charity (probably because it agrees with St. James' justification by faith and works).
I know, I know. You're asking, "And that is wrong, why?"
It is because Martin Luther's error does not lie in that he used the terminology, "faith alone" when talking about St. Paul's doctrine of justification. It is because he denied the validity of the doctrine of justification by faith and works. They are both correct. We can look through the annals of Catholic history and find many Catholic Fathers who used the terminology "faith alone" in terms of justification, long before Martin Luther. But none of them denied justification by faith and works. This is where, in my opinion, PF missed the point. Do you see?
Let me try to explain a different way.
St. Paul’s teaching is precisely the teaching of the Catholic Church which is so beautifully expounded in the documents of the Council of Trent.
Lets go back.
1. The Council of Trent was gathered, in part, to respond to Luther’s errors. One of those errors was the doctrine of justification by faith alone. I think everyone here would agree with me on this point, right?
2. Luther’s doctrine of faith alone is based primarily upon a misunderstanding of St. Paul’s teaching that we are justified by faith without the deeds of the law (Rom 3:28). That is, in fact, why he added the word “alone” to that verse. I think the Catholics here would agree with me on that point also, right?
Notice that the Council did not respond by juxtaposing St. James teaching of justification by faith and works against St. Paul’s teaching. No. Its almost as though they forgot all about it. But they didn’t. They merely ignored it, initially. They realized that St. Paul was not here reiterating St. Jame’s teaching, which is also a valid teaching. The Council focused upon justification which occurs in Baptism (Trent 6, Ch. IV).
Why?
Because they realized that St. Paul was not talking about justification by faith and works, but about justification that occurs in the Sacraments. The washing of regeneration of the Holy Spirit. Here is the teaching of the Catechism on the Sacraments:
740 These “mighty works of God,” offered to believers in the sacraments of the Church, bear their fruit in the new life in Christ, according to the Spirit. (This will be the topic of Part Three.)
1127 Celebrated worthily in faith, the sacraments confer the grace that they signify. They are efficacious because in them Christ himself is at work: it is he who baptizes, he who acts in his sacraments in order to communicate the grace that each sacrament signifies. The Father always hears the prayer of his Son’s Church which, in the epiclesis of each sacrament, expresses her faith in the power of the Spirit. As fire transforms into itself everything it touches, so the Holy Spirit transforms into the divine life whatever is subjected to his power.
This is why later, the Council also says:
CHAPTER VII
IN WHAT THE JUSTIFICATION OF THE SINNER CONSISTS, AND WHAT ARE ITS CAUSES
This disposition or preparation is followed by justification itself, which is not only a remission of sins but also the sanctification and renewal of the inward man through the voluntary reception of the grace and gifts whereby an unjust man becomes just and from being an enemy becomes a friend, that he may be an heir according to hope of life everlasting.[30]
The causes of this justification are:
the final cause is the glory of God and of Christ and life everlasting; the efficient cause is the merciful God who washes and sanctifies[31] gratuitously, signing and anointing with the holy Spirit of promise, who is the pledge of our inheritance,[32] the meritorious cause is His most beloved only begotten, our Lord Jesus Christ, who, when we were enemies,[33] for the exceeding charity wherewith he loved us,[34] merited for us justification by His most holy passion on the wood of the cross and made satisfaction for us to God the Father, the instrumental cause is the sacrament of baptism, which is the sacrament of faith,[35] without which no man was ever justified finally, the single formal cause is the justice of God, not that by which He Himself is just, but that by which He makes us just, ….
Luther’s sin was not in saying, “faith alone”. Many Catholics before him used that terminology, but they used it correctly. Realizing that we are justified by God in the Sacraments. Not by any work in our part.
Luther’s error was confusing the justification which occurs in the Sacraments by faith apart from works, with the forensic justification by faith and works to which we will all be subject when we stand before the Judgment seat of Christ. He concluded, in error, that the new dispensation of Jesus Christ, by grace, eliminated the need to keep the Commandments in order to be just in the eyes of God. I know its a bit more complicated than that, but that is the way I summarize it.
However, that is not what St. Paul meant as we can see, since he teaches that only they who do the law will be justified (Rom 2:13). He understands that God only sheds His mercy upon the righteous (Ex 20:6; Tit 3:5; Rev 22:12-15).
To summarize.
St. Paul is right. In the Sacraments, we are not justified by our works, in the Sacraments. This is what, in my opinion, St. Paul meant, the faithful man is justified by the mercy of God in the washing of regeneration which is the Sacrament of Baptism (Titus 3:5; Trent VI, Ch. VIII).
Martin Luther is wrong. We are justified by faith and works, when we meet our Maker at the Judgment Seat of Christ (Rev 22:12-15; St. James 2:24; Trent VI, Chapter X).
