[Executive summary]Clement of Rome in 1 Clement teaches a soteriology where initial salvation is by faith alone (sola fide) and is a two-step formula of repenting (which is synonymous with believing) and calling upon God for salvation. Ongoing salvation has to be maintained by works.This explains how he says we...
Introduction Few questions in patristic theology are as contested, or as consequential, as the relationship John Chrysostom draws between faith and works in the appropriation of salvation. Modern interpreters tend to read him through one of two lenses. The first, favored by contemporary Eastern Orthodox writers, treats his more process-oriented...
There is an idea in Roman Catholicism and modern Orthodoxy that the thief on the cross was saved by faith alone, but it was extraordinary. It was an edge case; it happened one time, but it was purely an exemption.But, I have to thank Brother Don Nesbitt, the Lord's bloodhound...
Thank you to Brother Don Nesbitt, the Lord's bloodhound for sounding the alarm about Breaker.The Lord's bloodhound's youtube is @w46try7.The Thief on the Cross has been used by Christians since its beginning."conscience. The work he has wrought and his holiness of life avail nothing. They merely push him deeper into...
A common move in contemporary apologetics is to grant that John Chrysostom uses the phrase faith alone, sometimes affirmatively and sometimes critically, and to conclude from the critical instances that his affirmative use of the phrase must be read in a sense compatible with the Council of Trent. One proponent...
The claim that John Chrysostom denied justification by faith alone is common enough to need a direct answer, and the answer requires first being precise about what is being denied. The Catholic Catechism distinguishes justification, the beginning of salvation, from salvation in its completed sense, and holds that justification requires...