Rome maintains nothing of the sort. Why do you guys have to keep making up nonsense like this?
The meritorious cause of our justification is the righteousness of Jesus Christ. I'm going to say that again, louder.
The meritorious cause of our justification is the RIGHTEOUSNESS OF JESUS CHRIST !
The effect of our justification is that that righteousness is truly communicated to us and inhabits our soul, it is not merely "imputed" to our "account" as some sort of legal fiction, as Luther wrongly taught.
Anyone who is seeking to be justified by his own "inherent righteousness" (what is that?) will be damned.
It's one thing to object to what Catholicism actually teaches, but to slander us with strawman garbage like this is really inexcusable.
I copied and pasted from the article. Those were not my words. I didn’t make anything up.
You mean like the Bible teaches?
What? Paul was wrong as well?
Paul teaches grace without merit and imputed righteousness without merit.
We can't do anything to earn, or merit, if you will, the righteousness God offers us as a free gift by grace through faith in Christ.
Gifts are NOT earned.
Colossians 2:13-14 And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, 14 by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.
Romans 4:1-25 What then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.”
Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due. And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness, just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from works: “Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered; blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin.”
Is this blessing then only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? For we say that faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness. How then was it counted to him? Was it before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised. He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. The purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised, so that righteousness would be counted to them as well, and to make him the father of the circumcised who are not merely circumcised but who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised.
For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith. For if it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression.
That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring—not only to the adherent of the law but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, as it is written, “I have made you the father of many nations”—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.
In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, “So shall your offspring be.” He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb. No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.
That is why his faith was “counted to him as righteousness.” But the words “it was counted to him” were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.
Your response: Rome maintains nothing of the sort. Why do you guys have to keep making up nonsense like this?
The truth.
THE COUNCIL OF TRENT
Session VI - Celebrated on the thirteenth day of January, 1547 under Pope Paul III
CHAPTER XVI
THE FRUITS OF JUSTIFICATION, THAT IS, THE MERIT OF GOOD WORKS, AND THE
NATURE OF THAT MERIT
“we must believe that nothing further is wanting to those justified to prevent them from being considered to have, by those very works which have been done in God, fully satisfied the divine law according to the state of this life and to have truly merited eternal life,”
Would you like to apologize to metmom?