The Church of good works

I live in a family of liberal Protestants at best. Liberal Protestants who assert that the whole thing of Christianity is about doing good works and that is what loving your neighbor means. I know salvation comes through prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. I am constantly criticized for praying and fasting. The only thing to my liberal Protestant family that seems to matter is the almsgiving. Exactly where is the faith? If love believes all things, there should be faith within one's good works. It's not existent it seems in their good works. It can definitely come out dry at times and hypocritical at others. Prayer is a necessary strength of energy for good works. Crazy Church Lady will wake up early in the morning in order to pray for all kids and godchildren. She has to since her six kids would interrupt her. But she makes a point of praying for all of us. Prayer is a necessary energy.

Cardinal Sarah, in his masterpiece work, The Power of Silence makes strong mention of this. He recites a story of St. Teresa of Calcutta and another priest. Mother Teresa, on meeting this young priest asks him how much he prays and upon hearing this, she tells him that he must pray even more even though this man says Mass every day. He answers the saint, "Mother, I expected from you...this question: What acts of charity do you do?" Mother Teresa exclaimed to him then, "Do you think that I could practice charity if I did not ask Jesus every day to fill my heart with his love? Do you think I could go through the streets looking for the poor if Jesus did not communicate the fire of his charity to my heart?" (47) It isn't an act of legalism to attend church when there is a service offered, vespers, complines, liturgy, etc. The West uses terms like vigil and Mass. It is an act of charity to fill the heart with the love of God. For only if the heart is filled with the love of God can someone enter into the perfection of charity towards their neighbor.

In a story of the Hieromonk Father Arseny, he talks about the love of one's neighbor. He quotes Jesus's statement on the first great command and the second. Love the Lord your God and the second like unto it is love your neighbor as yourself. "Deep faith in God and love for your brother are inseperable...if a man does good deeds, loves people, perhaps even gives his life for others but does not love God, does not believe in God, then, in spite of his goodness, he is spiritually dead because he does not want to know God....[I]n spite of all of their 'goodness' I could see something missing in their behavior, their character, their outlook on life: they had made a religion out of their own goodness, and for them that had replaced God." (A Cloud of Witnesses, 15)

There is a lot of bad theology out there that makes a mockery of Christianity turning it into nothing more than a religion of good works. Liberation theology is one of the monstrous heresies of the current moment and it exists in liberal Protestant and liberal Catholic theology to a sinister degree. But God seems to be missing from the final justification. Liberation theology insists that if we rid ourselves of sin, we can eliminate economic inequality. Notice the problem. There is nothing of the final eternal salvation of man. There is nothing of Christ's heavenly reign. There is nothing of God's creation anew of the Earth, or the resurrection. It is nothing more than a philosophy of good works. It starts with an orthodox moral premise and then it seeks to reduce the goal from one that is Divine to an earthly temporal status.

But the Christian faith calls us away from the satisfaction of earthly and temporal goods. It does not call us to seek out economic justice for the temporary. It calls us to seek out Divine justice for the eternal. It shows us that justice can be trampled out in a world of sinfulness and fallen human nature. It shows us that charity must always focus on a smaller scale first before it turns into a larger scale. One must show perfect charity toward themselves before they show perfect charity toward others. Love thy neighbor as thyself is the second command. You cannot love your neighbor as yourself if you have no love toward yourself. Crazy Church Lady's biggest act of love toward us and herself is her morning prayer routine. She draws strength from God and then pours out her heart toward all of us.

I have heard it said that Christians possess a love that is far deeper than secularists. This is true. I've witnessed it. Especially the more orthodox Christians are able to provide that love the most. I have seen it effortlessly on the Crazy Church Lady's face when she looks at me and then toward her children. "I love you" is written all over it. But we must start by loving our brothers. Ignatius Brianchaninov writes "[o]nly mature or perfect Christians can pray 'without wrath and doubting,'...with the purest love for one's neighbor and without the least resentment for him" (The Arena, ch. 25). Love for our neighbors is "indispensable, in order that we may acquire love for our enemies" (ch. 40). The ultimate Christian calling is in almsgiving. Not just in the giving away of possessions but death to the flesh. Citing Barsanuphius the Great, "Since Peter was not rich, what did he renounce and what was his claim? Surely he renounced his own natural desires?" (ch. 7)

Good works are important. But without God, good works become dead. There is a void I see when people go to charity events and don't believe in God. They are doing a good deed for certain. But the work seems entirely humanly. There is an added element to it when a St. Teresa of Calcutta heals the sick and opens hospitals for them in places where they haven't hospitals. There is God moving through her. There is a holy presence that fills the hollow void that would otherwise be there. People who worship good works get stuck on their own self-righteousness. They tend to be hotly condemning toward others. They lack a love and desire for beauty. They become obsessed with their own earthly deeds and only see the earthly goods. They become angry and mad at the world. But people who are filled with the love of God do good deeds out of their burning desire to bring themselves closer to God. They do them to bring others closer to God. They do them out of pure love and they love effortlessly.