I visit this group quite a bit-

[rug]

15. Well, as far as the OP is concerned, the best I can do is point you here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_consistency_of_the_Bible

Personally, I have no taste for parsing Scripture. Acknowledging that it has been parsed, picked and probed for over two thousand years, I am content to defer to the scholarship that exists.

When I encounter something that doesn't make sense, I look up what they have said about it. I have yet to encounter something that hasn't been encountered before. If what I find does not make sense, I keep looking. I almost always find the answer. That's one reason I remain Catholic, they've been at it a very long time.

That said, living the religion is to me the greater part of it.

BTW, Catholic doctrine does not hold that salvation can be obtained by acts alone. No one can earn it. But it does teach this:

James 2:14-26

14 What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? 15 If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? 17 Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.

18 But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without your[a] works, and I will show you my faith by my works. 19 You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe—and tremble! 20 But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is dead?[c] 21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered Isaac his son on the altar? 22 Do you see that faith was working together with his works, and by works faith was made perfect? 23 And the Scripture was fulfilled which says, “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.”[d] And he was called the friend of God. 24 You see then that a man is justified by works, and not by faith only.

25 Likewise, was not Rahab the harlot also justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out another way?

26 For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.