Hoonbaba said:
Can someone explain this to me?
Sirach 3:30 says:
Water extinguishes a blazing fire: so almsgiving atones for sin.
Tobit 4:10 also says:
Because that alms do deliver from death, and suffereth not to come into darkness.
Doesn't all this go against the Church's teaching about salvation via grace?
it sounds like a worked-based salvation... (?)
Almsgiving "saves" only in the secondary or subjective sense, like the works mentioned by St. James in James 2. Almsgiving can also be the product of a contrite and repentant heart, which is a response to God's saving grace.
We are saved solely by God's grace (Ephesians 2:8), but we appropriate that grace, we take it in and receive it, through the things God has prescribed for us to do and receive, like baptism and the Holy Eucharist.
James 5: 20 says,
"He must know that he who causeth a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins."
Can we really
save anyone or cover anyone's "multitude of sins"?
Only in the secondary sense by preaching the Gospel to them.
In the same sort of way, almsgiving can be said to "save" us.
Oh, btw, we mean the same sort of thing when we say the Virgin Mary "saved us" or can save us through her prayers.
Only God is the primary source and cause of salvation.
Edit: I wanted to add something to this post, which occurs to me as important.
Jesus said that we cannot be forgiven our sins unless we forgive others who have sinned against us (Matt. 6:14-15).
Does that mean it is our forgiving others that saves us?
No! Jesus Christ saved us by His life, His death on the Cross, and His resurrection.
But He Himself has said that we cannot appropriate the forgiveness He obtained for us unless we do our part and forgive others.
Not "works-based" salvation, but certainly there are things that are required of us.
