How can use Scripture to counter Protestant claims about justification?

How can use Scripture to counter Protestant claims about justification?

Full Question

The new Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that "justification includes the remission of sins, sanctification, and the renewal of the inner man" (CCC 2019) Protestants deny that the last two of these are part of justification. What Bible verses can I use to show they are?

Answered by:  Catholic Answers Staff

Look up Romans 6:7. All standard English translations render this verse as some variation on the statement "He who has died has been freed from sin." The topic here is one of sanctification, the making holy of the believer, or the freeing of him from sin.

What is significant about 6:7 is that when it says the one who has died has been freed from sin, the word for "freed" is actually the Greek word for "justified." What it literally said was "he who has died has been justified from sin," yet the context is so obviously sanctificational that all standard English translations of the Bible rendered "justified from sin" as "freed from sin." This shows that there is not a rigid wall between justification and sanctification in the apostle Paul's mind. The semantic ranges of the two terms overlap.