Studies in Catholic Thought - Task 2 - Dominic McLachlan

Discuss how The Joy of the Gospel (Evangelli Gaudium) (2012, 273) frames a life of faith and good works.

The Joy of the Gospel is an Apostolic Exhortation by Pope Francis which focuses on the joy the Gospel brings to those who have submitted themselves to Christ and the joy they are able to bring to others. Traditional teaching is that good works are constitutively necessary to faith, as to be justified is to be infused with God’s grace. Where good works are any and all acts which are ordered towards God, a simple statement of hope is a good work. This is greatly reflected in paragraph 273 of the exhortation, which makes clear that the working individual is not to be separated from the rest of the person. For such an act inherently fractures the person. It is important because it is an error of modern western society, to teach the individual that work is something one does and one is simply meant to disassociate and then be themselves during leisure time. The problem then stares us in the face, that work ought to be a vocation, something which is a component to the whole person. We see that the paragraph takes a more literal view to works, where it is able to raise an important point as a consequence, whilst also making the deeper point that the works of the faithful are unable to be separated from the faithful, without ruining either.