Sunday Evangelium - Totus2us

Fr Andrew: "A first lesson from this parable is that it is not only what we believe but also what we do that matters for our salvation. Now there has been some confusion over this point for the last 5 centuries, partly because of the teachings of Martin Luther, who started the Protestant movement. In his new doctrine, Luther claims that we are saved by our faith alone, regardless of our deeds, whether good or evil. Luther also accused the Catholic Church of teaching that we can merit our salvation by good works, like earning our way to heaven. Now what Luther taught was wrong, or at least incomplete, as today's Gospel shows. Neither the Bible or the Church has ever taught that we earn our salvation through good works; salvation is an unmerited grace. This grace is however like a divine seed that should generate the fruits of divine love, these fruits being actions in which we love in union with God. Without such things we have merely a dead faith. St Thomas Aquinas, for example, describes benignity, a fruit o