The
Enigma of Good Works
Your
thoughts are not mine.
In the
parable today some workers go into the vineyard at early dawn, some at high noon
and still others in the late afternoon. At sunset they all line up for their
checks, and all receive the same pay (Mt 20: 1-16). Such an unfair employment practice makes you
cry foul. You’d think those who bore the
day’s burden and the heat should have received a lot more than those who
straggled in at the last moment. “Not
so,” says the word of God today, “my thoughts are not your thoughts, and your
ways are not my ways” (Is 55: 8). And your market economy which rewards one
hour’s work with five dollars and two hour’s work with ten dollars and three
hour’s work with fifteen dollars is not my economy.
In
another of Jesus’ parable a farm hand goes out at sunrise and bears the day’s
burden and the heat, plowing the fields and tending the sheep. At sunset he
returns to the farmhouse feeling good about his industriousness. But his master reminds him that he’s done no
more than his duty and is no more than an unprofitable servant (Lk 17: 7-10). Such
a negative employment attitude also makes you cry foul. The boss, you’d think, should
have given his faithful hired hand a pat on the back and poured him a rum and
coke before supper. Again, “Not so” says
the word of God, “my thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not my
ways.” And your quid pro quo economy is not my economy.
A good Lutheran (heir to
the theology of the Reformation) hears these parables as an attack on good
works. He hears them proclaiming that works don’t work! They didn't work for those
laborers who started at early dawn but at sunset got the very same pay as the
late stragglers. They didn’t work for the hired hand, who faithfully plowed the
master’s fields and tended his sheep all day long, but at sunset was told he’s
nothing more than an unprofitable servant. In another parable about the Pharisee
and tax collector who went up to the temple to pray, good works didn’t work for
the Pharisee. Standing before God with his arms full of his works, the Pharisee
loudly prays, “I thank you, God, that I am not greedy, dishonest or immoral
like everybody else. I thank you that I am not like this tax collector here. I
fast twice a week, and I tithe.” But the tax collector, standing before God
with his arms empty and his head bowed low to the ground where humility gets
its humus, quietly prays, “Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner.” Jesus says it
was the tax collector, not the Pharisee, who went home that night justified, set right, in the sight of God (Lk 18: 9-14).
The God who terrifies
Luther’s Reformation didn’t center primarily upon
the corruption of the sixteenth century Roman Church. It centered primarily on
the theological question of justification—the question about how man is set right
with God. Luther’s question was deeply personal. As a devout and scrupulous Augustinian
monk, he feverishly worked away at good works. He performed all the monastic observances.
He prayed and fasted, and then prayed and fasted even more. He scourged his
body, and then scourged his body even more.
He performed the religious pieties of his day--going on pilgrimages and
giving alms. It was no avail. At the end of the day, he felt that his good
works had not worked for him, either because he thought that they weren’t good
enough for God or that there weren’t enough of them to make God feel good about
him. Luther writes that period of his life terrified him with terrores
conscientiae -- with the terrors of conscience. Not only did his vices
terrify the poor man but now also his virtues. At the end of the day, Luther’s
God was a terrorist.
Many Catholics can resonate with the terrified Luther. Luther was terrified of his good works because he thought they weren’t good enough or there weren’t enough of them. On the other hand, Catholics were terrified of their bad works--their sins. They were terrified of God because they were divorced and remarried and were “living in sin.” Or they were terrified of God because they had entertained some sexual thought or had performed some sexual act and had not confessed it. Or they were terrified of God because they were practicing birth control and weren’t feeling sorry about it or confessing it. Or terrified of God because they were in a gay or lesbian relationship. Or terrified of God because they had eaten meat on Friday, never confessed it and went to Communion anyway. When some Catholics today refer to themselves as “recovering Catholics,” they are referring to the old days when their God was a terrorist. Some of those Catholics have so completely recovered that they aren’t Catholics anymore.
Religion is eternally tempted to make a terrorist out of
God. Recently a Baptist minister in
Not by works but
by faith
The terrified Luther
solved his personal problem by discovering the amazing good news that we are
not saved by works. What a burden that lifted from him! He made his wonderful discovery
reading
If it’s not works that save us, what does? Luther finds his answer
again in
Catholics, for whom good works are always very important, find it
a bit difficult to resonate with such theological thought which seems imbedded
into today’s parable. But for the
terrified Luther salvation not through works but through faith alone was an
amazing discovery. It was a pearl of
great price for him. It lifted a heavy burden from his shoulders; it freed him
from his terror and opened the very gates of heaven for him. With two words he
chiseled his blessed discovery into the cornerstone of his Reformation: Sola Fide--By Faith Alone. To this day
you can read that inscription on the cornerstones of old Reformation churches.
That amazing discovery of Luther and the Reformers, who were heavily burdened by the pious works of the day, couldn’t contain itself but it burst forth into a mighty hymn: Amazing Grace. With that hymn the Reformation sang itself into existence. Amazing Grace! It saves a poor wretch like me whose works are useless. Amazing Grace! What I couldn’t do for myself Christ did for me. Even we Catholics love that great Protestant hymn, though when we sing it, we aren’t aware of all the Reformation overtones and feelings behind it.
There’s something about this discussion that’s not academic. It helps us Catholics to understand what Protestants, and especially Lutherans, are always talking about, and what they always feel strongly about. It helps us to understand and be sensitive to the differences between the two of us.
Works do work
The parable of the laborers in the vineyard who
worked all day long but received the same pay as the late stragglers, the
parable of the farm hand who worked all day long but then is told he’s nothing
more than an unprofitable servant, and the parable of the Pharisee who stood up
to pray in the temple with his arms full of his works but didn’t go home that
night justified, set right, with God--they all prove that the Protestants and especially
the Lutherans are right: it’s gospel truth that works don’t work.
Jesus says they work
But it is also gospel truth that works do work. And
so the Catholics also are right. Works do work because Jesus says they do. “I
was hungry and you gave me to eat. I was thirsty and you gave me to drink. I
was naked and you clothed me. I was sick and you took care of me. I was in
prison and you visited me. Come you blessed of my father and take possession of
the kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of creation” (Mt 25:31-40).
They worked for the Good Samaritan
Works do work. They work in the parable of the Good
Samaritan. One day a man was going from
That good work did, indeed, work for the dying man.
It hurried him off to the nearest inn where the Samaritan dug deep into his
pocket to pay for the man’s care and cure. What’s more, that good work worked
even for the Good Samaritan himself. Though
the meeting in
They worked for Mother Theresa
Works do work. They worked
for another Good Samaritan--Mother Theresa. As a young nun in
Her
works worked for that poor man as it did for countless other abandoned human
beings whom she carried off to her home for the dying. There she kissed them all and
sent them off to eternity healed of their terrible self-image, believing,
perhaps for the first time, that they were human beings worth loving. Mother
Theresa’s good works worked even for her. They made that Roman Catholic nun
patron saint of Hindu India. They also set a song singing in her heart, and they
wrote the notes of that song all over her wrinkled face.
Conclusion
Their works follow them
Good works are working at
this very moment for all those countless victims from whom Hurricane Katrina
has taken everything, and for whom countless Good Samaritans are opening their wallets,
their homes and their hearts. The Book of Revelation says, “Opera illorum
sequuntur illos.” “Their works follow them” (
[1] In Judaism it’s the Law
that abounds. That’s a whole corpus of major laws and minor prescriptions
regulating the smallest details of daily life. What makes Yahweh happy is a
faithful Jew who observes them. In Islam it’s also the Law that abounds. That, too, is a whole corpus of Muslim laws
called shari’ah. What makes Allah happy is a faithful Muslim who observes them.
Both Judaism and Islam are closer to each other than they are to Christianity.
In Christianity it‘s not the Law that abounds but Grace.