Therefore I want you to know that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus be cursed,” and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.
You may take it’s
meaning literally. Do not get so caught up in the words that their real intent becomes twisted. Any believer who recites this verse out loud obviously
can say the words “Jesus be cursed.” Does he curse Jesus in doing so? No. And any non-Christian if he feels like it can recite the words “Jesus is Lord” and not mean it. It is Paul’s intent behind these words that gives them meaning. For anyone that says these things and means them, Paul’s words are true.
Also, I know the Catholic Church doesn’t have a formulaic salvation prayer, but that we should be in the state of grace when we die, and that out of baptism brings about the process of grace… which i don’t understand, because some unbaptized people seem to be following Jesus and repenting too. We can only come to faith by some sort actual grace, from what i understand.
The
Catechism of the Catholic Church is a reliable guide to understanding Catholic doctrine:
1257 The Lord himself affirms that Baptism is necessary for salvation. He also commands his disciples to proclaim the Gospel to all nations and to baptize them. Baptism is necessary for salvation for those to whom the Gospel has been proclaimed and who have had the possibility of asking for this sacrament. The Church does not know of any means other than Baptism that assures entry into eternal beatitude; this is why she takes care not to neglect the mission she has received from the Lord to see that all who can be baptized are “reborn of water and the Spirit.”
God has bound salvation to the sacrament of Baptism, but he himself is not bound by his sacraments.
1260 “Since Christ died for all, and since all men are in fact called to one and the same destiny, which is divine, we must hold that the Holy Spirit offers to all the possibility of being made partakers, in a way known to God, of the Paschal mystery.” Every man who is ignorant of the Gospel of Christ and of his Church, but seeks the truth and does the will of God in accordance with his understanding of it, can be saved. It may be supposed that such persons would have
desired Baptism explicitly if they had known its necessity.
1266 The Most Holy Trinity gives the baptized sanctifying grace, the grace of
justification:
- enabling them to believe in God, to hope in him, and to love him through the theological virtues;
- giving them the power to live and act under the prompting of the Holy Spirit through the gifts of the Holy Spirit;
- allowing them to grow in goodness through the moral virtues.
Thus the whole organism of the Christian’s supernatural life has its roots in Baptism.
152 One cannot believe in Jesus Christ without sharing in his Spirit. It is the Holy Spirit who reveals to men who Jesus is. For “no one can say “Jesus is Lord”, except by the Holy Spirit”, who “searches everything, even the depths of God. No one comprehends the thoughts of God, except the Spirit of God.” Only God knows God completely: we believe in the Holy Spirit because he is God.
The Church never ceases to proclaim her faith in one only God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Faith is a grace
153 When St. Peter confessed that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, Jesus declared to him that this revelation did not come “from flesh and blood”, but from “my Father who is in heaven”. Faith is a gift of God, a supernatural virtue infused by him. “Before this faith can be exercised, man must have the grace of God to move and assist him; he must have the interior helps of the Holy Spirit, who moves the heart and converts it to God, who opens the eyes of the mind and ‘makes it easy for all to accept and believe the truth.’”
