# Are We Saved by Faith Alone - Bishop Barron's Daily Sermon

An episode of [Daily Sermons With Bishop Robert Barron](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/6783446284), 6 Jul 2026, 14 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/72733576/are_we_saved_by_faith_alone_bishop_barron_s_sunday_sermon.mp3



## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: Peace be with you, they say, fools Russian where angels
[0:03] Speaker 1: fear to tread. Well, I'm in a Russian today to
[0:05] Speaker 1: some stormy waters. By looking at what really was the
[0:09] Speaker 1: central issue of the Protestant Reformation, the divide between Prostants
[0:14] Speaker 1: and Catholics around this issue of faith and works or
[0:19] Speaker 1: faith and the law. And it's prompted by our second reading.
[0:22] Speaker 1: I've not been focusing on Romans. We've been reading from
[0:26] Speaker 1: it the last several weeks. But it's Paul's greatest statement
[0:29] Speaker 1: of his theology. It's the first theologian of the Church,
[0:32] Speaker 1: Paul in his greatest statement of the Christian faith. And
[0:35] Speaker 1: it's toward the end of the letter. We're in Romes
[0:38] Speaker 1: chapter thirteen, and here's what he says. Brothers and sisters
[0:41] Speaker 1: owe nothing to anyone except to love one another. For
[0:45] Speaker 1: the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. Hm,
[0:52] Speaker 1: the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. Now
[0:57] Speaker 1: let's go back to the beginning of the Prosiant Reformation,
[0:59] Speaker 1: when Luther famously says what he discovered in Paul and
[1:03] Speaker 1: in texts like Romans and Galatians and Ephesians and others.
[1:07] Speaker 1: Is it seems that we're justified or saved, set right,
[1:12] Speaker 1: not by works of the law, but by faith. So
[1:15] Speaker 1: Luther says, by grace through faith, and he intensifies it
[1:18] Speaker 1: by saying, grazia sola, feed a sola. By grace alone,
[1:24] Speaker 1: by faith alone, we're saved and not by the works
[1:28] Speaker 1: of the law. So how come at the end of Romans,
[1:32] Speaker 1: the same Paul who said that towards the beginning of
[1:34] Speaker 1: Romans here talks about love as the fulfillment of the law. Well, again,
[1:41] Speaker 1: I'm waiting into these you know, stormy waters. We've been
[1:43] Speaker 1: debating this for five hundred years. I have no under
[1:47] Speaker 1: no illusion that in twelve minutes I'm going to solve
[1:49] Speaker 1: this problem. But let me say this now, speaking as
[1:52] Speaker 1: a Catholic theologian, Yes, we can find those texts in Paul. Indeed,
[1:56] Speaker 1: that seemed to indicate, you know, we're justified by by
[2:00] Speaker 1: faith and by grace alone, not by works. However, in
[2:03] Speaker 1: the same Saint Paul we find texts such as this one.
[2:05] Speaker 1: Today we find a text such as, if you have
[2:09] Speaker 1: faith enough to move the mountains but have not love,
[2:14] Speaker 1: you're nothing about you. To me, that doesn't sound like
[2:17] Speaker 1: I'm justified by faith alone. I mean, Paul sings the
[2:22] Speaker 1: praises of faith, but I have faith enough to move
[2:24] Speaker 1: the mountains, but have not love. I'm nothing. The same
[2:29] Speaker 1: Paul talks about working out our salvation with fear and trembling. Well,
[2:35] Speaker 1: you'd wonder, on purely Protestant grounds, if you've been justified
[2:38] Speaker 1: by grace through faith, you've accepted the Lord as your savior. Well,
[2:42] Speaker 1: what do you have to work out? And why would
[2:44] Speaker 1: you do so with fear and trembling. Wouldn't you have
[2:46] Speaker 1: complete utter confidence that you're saved? Think two of a
[2:50] Speaker 1: text like Matthew twenty five. Go outside of Saint Paul.
[2:53] Speaker 1: You know when the judge at the end of time
[2:56] Speaker 1: separates the sheep from the goats, the basis of the
[2:59] Speaker 1: separation is not oh, some had faith and others didn't. Rather,
[3:03] Speaker 1: whatsoever you did to the least of my brothers you
[3:06] Speaker 1: did to me. It seems as though something like love
[3:11] Speaker 1: is the criterion rather than faith. Now, my point here
[3:14] Speaker 1: is not to undermine those texts where Paul talks about
[3:18] Speaker 1: the primacy of faith, but it is to complicate the matter.
[3:22] Speaker 1: Is to say, the witness of the New Testament is
[3:25] Speaker 1: richly complex. How would I get at it. I think
[3:30] Speaker 1: something like this were justified apart from the works of
[3:34] Speaker 1: the law. What if Paul mean by the law? When
[3:37] Speaker 1: Paul's a Jew, he's trained in the great Israelite tradition,
[3:40] Speaker 1: he was trained at the feet of Gamaliel. He would
[3:42] Speaker 1: have known all about the complexity of Jewish law. He
[3:47] Speaker 1: would have known all about temple worship, what a quintas
[3:51] Speaker 1: calls the ceremonial and juridical precepts of the law. Think
[3:56] Speaker 1: here of again, temple sacrifice of priests, of dietary laws,
[4:02] Speaker 1: and all of the particularities by which israel life is
[4:06] Speaker 1: defined in terms of clothing and diet and worship and
[4:09] Speaker 1: so on. None of that saves us, how come, not
[4:15] Speaker 1: because it's bad in itself, but because now it's been
[4:19] Speaker 1: caught up into Christ. All of that is now seen
[4:23] Speaker 1: as an anticipation of what happened through the cross of Jesus.
[4:28] Speaker 1: So we're not saved by those works of the law,
[4:31] Speaker 1: because Christ, in his dying and rising, has taken all
[4:35] Speaker 1: that up into himself. Read now the Letter to the
[4:38] Speaker 1: Hebrews for all the details on that point. So it
[4:41] Speaker 1: seems to me that's clear in Paul that he means
[4:43] Speaker 1: we're not saved by those works. But how about the
[4:47] Speaker 1: moral law of Israel. Well, Aquinas would speak for the
[4:51] Speaker 1: mainstream of the Catholic tradition and saying, even though those
[4:54] Speaker 1: other laws have been taken up into a higher synthesis,
[4:59] Speaker 1: the moral law taught to Israel remains, and it is
[5:05] Speaker 1: indeed relevant to our salvation. Now look at Paul again
[5:10] Speaker 1: here in thirteen, as he goes on the commandments, you
[5:13] Speaker 1: shall not commit adultery, you shall not kill, you shall
[5:16] Speaker 1: not steal, you shall not cove it. Whatever other commandment
[5:19] Speaker 1: there may be, are summed up in saying this, you
[5:22] Speaker 1: shall love your neighbor as yourself. Notice, please, he's not
[5:26] Speaker 1: talking about the ceremonial, dietary, juridical precepts of ancient Israel.
[5:32] Speaker 1: We know those are not relevant now to our salvation.
[5:36] Speaker 1: But he's talking indeed about the moral law, the moral
[5:40] Speaker 1: law which remains, It remains in place. What he's saying
[5:46] Speaker 1: here is all of that moral law is summed up
[5:49] Speaker 1: in the Great Commandment to love. Now, let's go back
[5:52] Speaker 1: to another paul In text that Catholic theology has insisted upon.
[5:57] Speaker 1: Paul in fact, never says that we are justified by
[6:01] Speaker 1: faith alone. In fact, you want to find the only
[6:04] Speaker 1: time that's mentioned in the New Testament is the Letter
[6:07] Speaker 1: of James, and it's explicitly condemned. What does Paul in
[6:12] Speaker 1: fact say? What matters? He says is faith expressing itself
[6:19] Speaker 1: in love. What matters is faith expressing itself in love.
[6:28] Speaker 1: It seems to me that's the best summary of the
[6:32] Speaker 1: complexity of Paul's position. Now let me let me put
[6:36] Speaker 1: some more meat on the bones. A Prosson might say, well, look,
[6:40] Speaker 1: aren't you defending some kind of Pelagianism here that we're
[6:43] Speaker 1: justified by our works, that's because of our heroic works
[6:47] Speaker 1: that we're saved. No, no, no, no, there's no salvation
[6:51] Speaker 1: apart from Christ. There's no salvation apart from his grace.
[6:55] Speaker 1: I can't earn my way into the love of Christ.
[7:00] Speaker 1: Rather that love expressed in the Cross and the Resurrection.
[7:06] Speaker 1: That grace is offered to me as a free gift.
[7:11] Speaker 1: It's only by moving into the space of that grace
[7:15] Speaker 1: that I can be saved. So no Catholic defends that
[7:18] Speaker 1: I can be justified apart from faith. No. No. The
[7:22] Speaker 1: Council of Trend says that faith is the beginning and
[7:26] Speaker 1: root of all justification. I can't be justified apart from Christ.
[7:33] Speaker 1: But now, once drawn into the power of Christ, I
[7:40] Speaker 1: have through faith opened the door invited Christ into my life.
[7:45] Speaker 1: Now his life is not extrinsic to me. And this
[7:48] Speaker 1: again would be a Catholic critique of some forms of Protestantism.
[7:52] Speaker 1: That justification remains extrinsic to me. It's a mere forensic
[7:57] Speaker 1: declaration of righteousness, not a real righteousness and imputed righteousness.
[8:03] Speaker 1: It's as though I'm saved. The Catholic tradition following I
[8:07] Speaker 1: think the complexity of Paul has insisted no, no justification.
[8:12] Speaker 1: Now through my cooperation works its way into the whole
[8:18] Speaker 1: of my life. Again, the Council of Trend says, justification
[8:24] Speaker 1: that begins through faith increases through one's cooperation with grace.
[8:34] Speaker 1: Paul says, it's no longer I who live, It's Christ
[8:39] Speaker 1: who lives in me. Now see that's the whole picture,
[8:42] Speaker 1: right there, everybody, that's the whole picture. It's no longer
[8:46] Speaker 1: I this old self, you know, predicated upon self protection
[8:51] Speaker 1: and upon hatred and upon violence, and that old self
[8:56] Speaker 1: has been put away by grace, accepted in faith. It's
[9:01] Speaker 1: no longer I who live, but Christ, who truly lives
[9:06] Speaker 1: in me. What does that look like love? It looks
[9:14] Speaker 1: like love. It expresses itself as love. The commandments don't
[9:21] Speaker 1: commit adultery, don't kill, don't steal, don't come it. All
[9:24] Speaker 1: of it is summed up by saying you shall love
[9:26] Speaker 1: your neighbor as yourself. Okay, you say, well, all right,
[9:32] Speaker 1: aren't we back to Pallagianism? Like it's by love that
[9:35] Speaker 1: we're saved. Love. And you know, if you follow me,
[9:41] Speaker 1: I've taught this for years. Love is not a feeling.
[9:47] Speaker 1: It's not just a benevolence, not just a sentiment. To
[9:53] Speaker 1: love is to will the good of the other as other.
[10:00] Speaker 1: Can you do that apart from grace? I think the
[10:04] Speaker 1: answer is no. You know, go back to the ancient
[10:08] Speaker 1: moral philosophers. They talk about, you know, decency and magnanimity
[10:12] Speaker 1: and generosity, that sort of thing. But willing the good
[10:18] Speaker 1: of the other as other, this ecstatic moving outside of
[10:24] Speaker 1: the confines of one's ego, Yes, even to the point
[10:29] Speaker 1: of death. You don't find that in the ancient moral philosophers.
[10:36] Speaker 1: What makes real love possible? Grace? It's only when I,
[10:45] Speaker 1: through faith, opened the door to Christ and allow him
[10:50] Speaker 1: to begin living in me. That I begin to live
[10:54] Speaker 1: according to his mind. Remember, Paul says, made that same
[10:58] Speaker 1: mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus. I
[11:00] Speaker 1: begin to will with his will. I begin to move
[11:05] Speaker 1: and act and react according to him. This is not
[11:08] Speaker 1: just Christ as moral exemplar. It's Christ living in me.
[11:13] Speaker 1: This has happened not by my accomplishment, but by grace
[11:16] Speaker 1: accepted in faith to that degree Luther's right. But this
[11:22] Speaker 1: is not a mere imputed or forensic righteousness, a merely
[11:26] Speaker 1: declared righteousness. But rather it has taken root in me,
[11:31] Speaker 1: and through my cooperation, expresses itself as something entirely new
[11:38] Speaker 1: and strange. It expresses itself as love. You know, I
[11:43] Speaker 1: often go back to the great example of Maximilian Kolbe
[11:46] Speaker 1: when I think about this Colbet, as you know, who
[11:49] Speaker 1: gave his life for a man he barely knew he
[11:54] Speaker 1: was a fellow inmate in the in the prison at Auschwitz.
[11:58] Speaker 1: But at the moment of truth, Colbet said, take me
[12:00] Speaker 1: in his place. I mean, how do you explain that?
[12:04] Speaker 1: Always being very generous, I mean doesn't come close to
[12:07] Speaker 1: explaining it. I would say, you explained it by saying
[12:11] Speaker 1: it was no longer no longer Colby who lived, but
[12:15] Speaker 1: Christ who was living in him. Colbert had accepted Christ
[12:21] Speaker 1: and his grace through faith. Yep, that's the door of
[12:25] Speaker 1: the spiritual life as acquaintances, but then allowing that Christ
[12:30] Speaker 1: to come to full flower in him. It looked like
[12:35] Speaker 1: love willing the good of the other. So how are
[12:40] Speaker 1: we saved by faith? Yeah, accepting the grace of Christ. Absolutely.
[12:47] Speaker 1: Without that we can't be saved. But that's the door,
[12:51] Speaker 1: that's the beginning, that's the root. This faith, now having
[12:55] Speaker 1: taken root, expresses itself in this startling love. It sees
[13:03] Speaker 1: to me everybody that's the Catholic position. And as far
[13:06] Speaker 1: as I can tell, honors the richness and complexity of
[13:11] Speaker 1: a teaching we find in Paul. Take a look during
[13:14] Speaker 1: these summer weeks, read through Paul to the Romans, and
[13:19] Speaker 1: perhaps with this very issue in mind, and notice the
[13:23] Speaker 1: rich complexity of his thought. And God bless you.

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