Merit (Christianity)

In Christian theology, merit (Latin: meritum) accrues when a believer's good work incurs "a future reward from a graceful God". The role of human merit in Christian life has been a point of dispute between Catholics and Protestants.

Both Catholics and Lutherans affirm the common Christian belief that a person's justification is not determined by that person's merit: "By grace alone, in faith in Christ's saving work and not because of any merit on our part, we are accepted by God and receive the Holy Spirit, who renews our hearts while equipping and calling us to good works".

The Catholic Church further teaches that "When Catholics affirm the 'meritorious' character of good works, they wish to say that, according to the biblical witness, a reward in heaven is promised to these works. Their intention is to emphasize the responsibility of persons for their actions, not to contest the character of those works as gifts, or far less to deny that justification always remains the unmerited gift of grace". The idea of merit underpins many obvious Catholic doctrines: prayers for the dead, indulgences, the Church's treasury of merit, and the intercession of saints.

The Lutheran Churches teach "that although justification and eternal life go along with faith, nevertheless, good works merit other bodily and spiritual rewards and degrees of reward."

Reformed doctrine has not developed a positive theology of human merit, except for the merit of Christ that humans receive through divine grace, and also generally dismisses the idea that charitable good works by Christians have any intrinsic merit.

In Catholic theology, merit is a property of a good work which entitles the doer to receive a reward: it is a salutary act (i.e., "Human action that is performed under the influence of grace and that positively leads a person to a heavenly destiny") to which God, in whose service the work is done, in consequence of his infallible promise may give a reward (prœmium, merces). It is treasure "laid up in heaven". Just as God is just to punish demerits, he is just to reward merits.

The Church has a figurative communal Treasury of Merit. Merit is transferable: it increases by sharing it: a person with merit who prays or acts effectively with that merit increases their own merit and transfers merit to the person prayer for or interacted with. This transferability is part of the Catholic doctrine of the Communion of Saints, which entails that salvation is more than an individual fiduciary arrangement but has communal involvement. It also underlies the doctrines of indulgences, prayers for the dead and the intercession of saints.

Prayer need not be made by someone who has merited any reward to be effective, nor is there any aspect of extortion or transaction: God also hears anyone "who prays appeals solely to the goodness, love, and liberality of God for the fulfilment of his desires, without throwing the weight of his own merits into the scale..." (known theologically as the "effect of impetration" effectus impetratorius)