That was the rebuke :) Neither Roman Catholic nor Eastern Orthodox hold to a works or merit based salvation, or a “tradition based” salvation (whatever that means). “Tradition” in both East and West is how the church maintains consensus, that is, patristic consensus, although the RC adds the magisterium as an additional layer. It is by tradition that both EO and RC reject and condemn Pelagianism (and semi-Pelagianism), which is what you’re accusing them of, but the Protestants without grounding in tradition have ongoing debates and schisms on exactly this topic (see Arminianism vs Calvinism). Ironically, in both RC and EO what you are accusing has been solved in the early church (works-based salvation was anathematized at the Council of Carthage in AD 418), predating the schism, and it’s only in Protestant traditions that this heresy resurfaced, and then false accusations made against the apostolic RC and EO traditions (even though you can only find actual works based salvation in Protestantism, such as modern Arminian traditions, Arminius himself never even went that far). When you start with false accusations (and no disrespect, but those were boomer-tier versions of theology) then it’s hard to get into the nuances of salvation, which varies between EO and RC, but varies even more so between Protestant denominations. Both RC and EO emphasize grace through faith, the RC publishes their official teaching in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC). From CCC 1996: Our justification comes from the grace of God. Grace is favor, the free and undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call to become children of God From CCC 2010: Since the initiative belongs to God in the order of grace, no one can merit the initial grace of forgiveness and justification At this point all faithful Christian traditions agree (including most Protestant traditions, but fewer and fewer of the mainline are holding to this, tragically). Where differences arise are very nuanced. For example, strict 5-point Calvinists will find legit disagreement with the RC view of merit as “participating in grace”, because it conflicts with their view of irresistible grace. The EO would reject that entire framing as a western presupposition amongst Calvinists and RC, and instead understand grace as the literal energy of God (see the essence/energy distinction), and caution against the western framing as man’s attempt to rationalize and systematize the mysteries of God, which were revealed in the person of Christ, who is both man and God. The person and life of Christ *is* the solution that divides the western mind. There are many important differences between RC and EO on the topic of salvation and especially sanctification/theosis (although they’re nuanced and not as contrary as most Internet apologists make them out to be), and what you’ll find is that most Protestant traditions align closer to RC than EO, but over time drift into outright heresy (dispensationalism, unitarianism, etc). Again, plenty to criticize in all of this, His church remains in schism due to our sins on these topics, but claiming RC and EO have a works or merit based salvation is not only false but a complete misrepresentation, both those apostolic traditions have explicit anathemas (from pre-schism church) against any kind of works based salvation. That heretical view was dead for over 1000 years till Arminius brought it back to life, which btw is what led to the articulation of the 5-points of Calvinism (the whole episode was a revolutionary/reactionary cycle that repeated the Pelagius/Augustine drama from the early church). tl;dr works-based salvation is anathema in both RC and EO, only Arminian Protestant tradition keep that heresy alive.