The false implications of Riser that it doesn’t really matter whether we follow Christ into His Church or not is totally against Christ’s commands and exhortations – being part way is not sufficient when His Church is recognized as having the fullness of truth.
catholicity.com/commentary/shea/00059.html
Can Non-Catholics Be Saved?
by Mark Shea - October 24, 2009
‘For he that is not against us is for us" (Mk 9:38–40)
‘Jesus’ point is that, in following Him, both the man casting out demons and the apostles – whether the man or the apostles realized it or not – were brought into some kind of union with one another through Him. It didn’t matter whether the apostles or the man were conscious of it. Their mutual obedience to Him put them in relationship to each other, just as the right alignment of spokes to a hub necessarily put the spokes in right alignment to one another. The fact is, it is His Spirit, not we, who is the principle of unity holding His Body together and drawing its members into ever more perfect union with each other. But that does not mean (as I had long believed as an Evangelical) that unity with the Body of Christ doesn’t matter so long as one is “spiritual.” For to be brought into union with the Body of Christ at all is to be brought into the order that Christ has established for that Body, since
‘His gifts were that some should be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ (Eph 4:11–13).
Or, to put it into the simplest form, if A=B, then B=A. That is, if one is a Christian at all, one is, as
Lumen Gentium says, in some kind of union with the Church, the Body of Christ. This is why the Church teaches and has always taught that “outside the Church, there is no salvation.” For the Church is the company of the saved. To talk about salvation “outside the Church” is like talking about swimming outside the water. It is the logical consequence of Jesus’ statement, “He who is not with me is against me” (Mt 12:30).
‘It therefore follows that to be subject to the gospel to any degree is to be in union, to that degree, with the office of Peter, since the office of Peter was created by Christ for one purpose only: to help bring people into subjection to Christ. It is therefore impossible to accept Christ without accepting the authority of Peter’s office to some degree or other.’