Works and Deathbed Conversions

I've used My Imitation of Christ, by Thomas à Kempis, as a devotional for some time. It is striking for its call to Christian self-denial and (what I understand to be) asceticism.

There was a time when, early in my learning about the Catholic claims to Truth, I thought I could convince a Catholic brother that his beliefs were contrary to the clear teaching of Scripture. If I say nothing else about those days, I have to say that it was an excellent time of learning about our Faith. What a treasure to engage with a brother when both are deeply committed to searching out the truth, and living it too! I felt exposed, somewhat disconcerted, and very alive and aware of Christ's Lordship. I perceived how small I was, and how big the Church and Christianity are.

At some point in this series of exchanges the gears shifted. Instead of feeling that I could victoriously pour the truth of Scripture over my brother's head, I wound up on my heels, on the defensive. To date, I have not been able to recover. I've forgotten many of the things that led me to that point, but I can still isolate a few. One was an awareness that if contraception was indeed immoral, the Protestant faith had much explaining to do. Another was this devotional by Thomas à Kempis.

With that long-winded narrative out of the way, let me come to my (somewhat non sequitur) point. In Ch. 23, Thomas says speaking of death, "How sad that you do not spend the time in which you might purchase everlasting life in a better way. The time will come when you will want just one day, just one hour in which to make amends, and do you know whether you will obtain it? See, then, dearly beloved, the great danger from which you can free yourself and the great fear from which you can be saved, if only you will always be wary and mindful of death." How fascinating, this familiar idea that with just one hour one could make amends for their sins.

The well-known Catholic priest, Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. wrote in his book Life Everlasting, "Deathbed conversion, however difficult, is still possible. Even when we see no sign of contrition, we can still not affirm that, at the last moment, just before the separation of soul from body, the soul is definitively obstinate. A sinner may be converted at that last minute in such fashion that God alone can know it."

And to my simple point. The Catholic Church maintains the validity of deathbed conversions. Does not this belief, all on its own, defeat the oft-rendered critique that Catholics believe in salvation by works? I think it does. If some measure of works was necessary to merit salvation, then the infirm sinner lying in a sickly state in his final hours has irreparably lost the chance to perform those works and cannot be saved. So while the Catholic view on salvation is distinct from the Protestant formulation of sola Fide, it requires no more than letting go of obstinacy (presumably in faith). Sola non Petina. No works required.