He Has Reason To Boast

"Let us consider Abraham, our father in the flesh.  What has he found?  If Abraham attained righteousness because of his deeds, he could be proud.  But he cannot be this before GOD; because Scripture says: Abraham believed GOD, who took it into account, and held him to be a just man.

Now, when someone does a work, salary is not given as a favor, but as a debt that is paid.  Here, on the contrary, someone who has no deeds to show, but believes in HIM, who makes sinners righteous before HIM: such faith is taken into account, and that person is held as righteous.  David congratulates, in this way, those who become righteous, by the favor of GOD, and not by their actions: Blessed are those whose sins are forgiven and whose offenses are forgotten, blessed the one, whose sin GOD does not take into account!" - Romans 4:1-8 

(Paul then asks his Jewish brothers to go back to the sources of revelation.  Long before the law was given to Moses, there was the faith of Abraham.  That means that faith is both more fundamental and more universal.  The law, instead, is a form of religion proper to the Jews and of value only for a period of their history.  He asks: "How did Abraham become the friend of GOD and why he is taken as the model of believers?  Was it because he believed in GOD's promises, or because he had received the rite of circumcision?"  It is like asking a Christian today: "What is important, to believe in CHRIST, or to be baptized?"

The answer is clear; we become the friends of GOD by believing in HIS promises.  The rite of baptism ratifies with a divine seal the gift of GOD and our commitment to HIM.

Therefore, baptism and the other sacraments are the "signs" of faith and have no value without faith.  Baptism is the beginning of our living for GOD in the Christian community.  Communion has no meaning unless we live in unity and share the fullness of the life of the Church.

Worthy of notice is the fact that Christian people are now less concerned with rites and devotions that were so important to past generations.  At the same time renewal movements give more stress to essentials: our faith and surrender to GOD.)

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