First of all he was confessing his sin, secondly, he referred to Jesus as "Lord." His faith was not alive because he "rebuked" the other, it was because he placed it in the "Lord." And besides, "Faith" does not save, "Grace" does. Only God's Grace!
Where do you see a confession here? He admits he is guilty of a crime, whereas Jesus is not. Are you calling that confession? And yes, he does refer to Jesus as Lord - that is what I said. He rebuked the other thief because he recognized Jesus as Lord - they are two sides of the same coin. Remember that whole "Not every one that saith to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven: but he that doth the will of my Father who is in heaven, he shall enter into the kingdom of heaven"? You must do things to enter Heaven.
And are you not Protestant? Doesn't Faith alone lead to Justification, which leads to salvation in your worldview? I'm confused by your ""Faith" does not save" comment. I agree with you about Grace though, as does the Church.
James taught "works" because he was the head of a Jewish church that still observed the Torah. By "works" he meant Torah observance, which is rejected by the vast majority of all chr*stians.
Unfortunately, liturgical chr*stians invoke Paul to condemn the Torah and James to validate the works of the "new law" (masses, prayers, rosaries, observances, etc.). The whole enterprise is hypocritical from beginning to end.
But the Protestants don't get off either. The purpose of the Torah is not "salvation" at all, so Paul's diatribes against the Torah as being "useless for salvation" are meaningless. The Torah is the reason the universe was created, not a stop-gap to predict the messiah or to undo Adam's sin.