Faith Q&A › Catechism › 3. Faith That Works Through Love

Can a believer deviate and fall?

The answer

St. Clement of Alexandria says, “A true gnostic [one who truly knows God … chooses faith or rejects it, with his full freedom.”⁸³ And St. Augustine says, “Wretched, then, must be any people that is divorced from this God … The City of God, however, has a peace of its own, namely, peace with God in this world by faith and in the world to come by vision.”⁸⁴

Fr. Tadros Yacoub Malaty

Notes

⁸³ St. Clement of Alexandria, The Stromata, or Miscellanies 3.9.

⁸⁴ St. Augustine of Hippo, City of God 19:26, 27 (FOTC 24:245–246).

Fr. Tadros Yacoub Malaty, Catechism of the Coptic Orthodox Church, Volume 1, Books 1–3. First English Edition, 2023. Published by St. George Coptic Orthodox Church, Sporting, Alexandria, and Queen St. Mary & Prince Tadros Coptic Orthodox Church, South Brunswick, NJ. Copyright © 2023. Translation and Editing: Youth of the Coptic Orthodox Church in the USA, Canada, Europe, Australia, Arabian Gulf, and Egypt.