All Things Anglican by Throup (Review)

Hello. My name is Daniel Conway and I am an educated active layman in a sister denomination, the Reformed Church. The issue you raise has one of two dimensions, or perhaps both. The common issues are whether the sacraments are required in addition to faith or whether good works are required in addition to faith or both. Christ used some very strong language about the table, saying essentially that if an individual did not take part in the table he had no part in him, essentially requiring that some one who has entered in into a saving faith will find a way to take the table in some for or the other, or, if you prefer, that Christ in some way will get the elements to him. I prefer the second formulation, as it meets the requirement of the sacrament without violating the regis that it is by Christ’s work and wholey through it that we are saved. Baptism is similar. One way or the other it will happen in the life of the believer. If through their volition then fine, that too is an act of Christ in the believer’s life, or commonly through an act of the parent or church guardian. Now, my particular branch of the faith does not strictly require water baptism, though they view it as a serious lacta in the life of a saint. They hold that the baptism it foreshes, the baptism by the Holy Spirit, which will come to the believer, is adequate.
Now we enter the realm of the necessity of works in the life of a believer. There have been some very hot conflicts over this issue. Stating the reformed position, we hold with Paul that the works of Christ were alone completely devoid of any shred of evil intent and are completely imputed to the believer at the point of entering a faith and are completely sufficient to impart the Christ nature to the supplicant, and that to claim that works on the part of the believer in any way contribute the the believer’s Christian nature is not just a gross error, but an insult to the work of Christ. This position is ANATHEMA to the Roman Catholic, who holds that scripture teaches that faith and works are a necessity in the life of the believer, as James alone seems to clearly teach, and that if a syncretent neglects this aspect of their belief disciplines long enough, their faith can actually die. I would respectfully disagree with this position and even acknowledge that self proclaimed Christian’s without works kill not just their own faiths but that of those around them, but the Roman Catholic church takes the notions of good works done outside (not above, I understand) of Christ to a ridiculously extrabiblical extreme. Essentailly, they claim that the merits accrued by there extrajesuic works are the property of the church, and there’s to apply to the plight of a mendicent member at the Church’s discretion, with all the potential for abuse implied. I claim and my church traditionally has that this is a wildly abberrent doctrine, one which many Roman Catholic believers are not even aware of.
Ok, Ok, says the more moderate Catholic, were working on that bit. We have reformed in the past, let’s just leave it at that. But we STILL hold that a true believer must re-enforce his faith with works. I (and my church) hold that the Roman Catholic doctrine has it backwards. The good works that a believer produces are an inevitable outworking of God working in that believers life. The believer’s original nature has no more original motive in the matter than a millwork has before water begins to flow over it. Pish posh and wriggle words says the Catholic, what does it matter if the outworking is the same. This touches an element of the reformed believer’s faith that is at the very heart of our cul. GOD GETS ALL THE GLORY, from the point of our conversion to our ressurrection at the renewal of all things. If you hold that you are earning part of your redeeming merit through your works in addition to the works imputed to you by Christ’s merit then you will have to be forgiven this it some point in your walk, and when God does, that will be an manifestation of his Grace and a Glory to him too.