Don't Jews need to be baptize and accept Christ?

[rcwitness]

This is essentially the state of “Invincible Ignorance” is it not?

I think so.

 

[Nelka]

I thought everyone had to accept Christ.

 

[rcwitness]

I thought everyone had to accept Christ.

I agree.

John 5

And the Father who sent me has himself borne witness to me. His voice you have never heard, his form you have never seen; and you do not have his word abiding in you, for you do not believe him whom he has sent. You search the scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness to me; yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.

 

[Ite_ad_Ioseph]

It seems the people commenting on this thread are divided into two camps: The “Jews need Christ” camp, wherein we refuse to talk about the statements that have come out saying otherwise, and the “Under the authority of the Church,we are bound to believe Jews are saved without Christ” camp, who reject “Cantate Domino” and other things from the Catholic past saying we need Christ.

 

[James248]

It seems the people commenting on this thread are divided into two camps: The “Jews need Christ” camp, wherein we refuse to talk about the statements that have come out saying otherwise, and the “Under the authority of the Church,we are bound to believe Jews are saved without Christ” camp, who reject “Cantate Domino” and other things from the Catholic past saying we need Christ.

The whole point of salvation is to believe in Christ and walk his way. Peter preached to the Jews exhorting them to repent. If those Jews needed baptism, how much more do the Jews of today?

 

[rcwitness]

The whole point of salvation is to believe in Christ and walk his way. Peter preached to the Jews exhorting them to repent. If those Jews needed baptism, how much more do the Jews of today?

Yep…

Matthew 3
Then went out to him Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.

But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sad′ducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit that befits repentance

The whole message of salvation was to the Jews first.

 

[PJM]

I feel like I read a few catholic documents recently, most important one called “the calling of God is irrevocable” (though it’s labeled non-magisterial) which says that the Jews are saved through the old covenant. I forget if this forum has a must-post-thing-being-talked-about policy; if so my mistake. But if so, this seems untrue to me.

It is Jesus HIMSELF who mandates BAPTISM, not an invention of the RCC

John.3: [5] Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.

Matt.28 :19 to 20 “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.”

Neither the “Church” nor even the Pope can overrule Jesus:thumbsup:

GBY

Patick

 

[rcwitness]

It is Jesus HIMSELF who mandates BAPTISM, not an invention of the RCC

John.3: [5] Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.

Matt.28 :19 to 20 “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.”

Neither the “Church” nor even the Pope can overrule Jesus:thumbsup:

GBY

Patick

Don’t we sound like Sola Scripturists?

Mark 16
And he said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to the whole creation. He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.

 

[TMC]

Church teaching doesn’t change. What was de fide at Florence is still binding now. And Pius XII quotes it in Mystici Corporis Christi, in 1943.

w2.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xii_enc_29061943_mystici-corporis-christi.html

It refers to :

If that is true, then the Church must have always taught that Jews could be saved, because that is what the Church teaches now.

But, of course, Church teaching does evolve over time as we grow in understanding.

 

[TMC]

They are not our spiritual ancestors necessarily, since they reject Christ and we love Christ, and God can raise up even stones to be children for Abraham.

That is one way to look at it, but it is not the Catholic viewpoint.

 

[TMC]

For anyone who is following this thread and is confused, I would urge you to read the Church’s actual teaching on the Jews. Here is a relatively recent, short and easy document on the Church’s teaching:

vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/chrstuni/relations-jews-docs/rc_pc_chrstuni_doc_20151210_ebraismo-nostra-aetate_en.html#5._The_universality_of_salvation_in_Jesus_Christ_and_God’s_unrevoked_covenant_with_Israel

Key Passage:

1. From the Christian confession that there can be only one path to salvation, however, it does not in any way follow that the Jews are excluded from God’s salvation because they do not believe in Jesus Christ as the Messiah of Israel and the Son of God. Such a claim would find no support in the soteriological understanding of Saint Paul, who in the Letter to the Romans not only gives expression to his conviction that there can be no breach in the history of salvation, but that salvation comes from the Jews (cf. also Jn 4:22). God entrusted Israel with a unique mission, and He does not bring his mysterious plan of salvation for all peoples (cf. 1 Tim 2:4) to fulfilment without drawing into it his “first-born son” (Ex 4:22). From this it is self-evident that Paul in the Letter to the Romans definitively negates the question he himself has posed, whether God has repudiated his own people. Just as decisively he asserts: “For the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable” (Rom 11:29). That the Jews are participants in God’s salvation is theologically unquestionable, but how that can be possible without confessing Christ explicitly, is and remains an unfathomable divine mystery. It is therefore no accident that Paul’s soteriological reflections in Romans 9-11 on the irrevocable redemption of Israel against the background of the Christ-mystery culminate in a magnificent doxology: “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How inscrutable are his judgments and how unsearchable his ways” (Rom 11:33). Bernard of Clairvaux (De cons. III/I,3) says that for the Jews “a determined point in time has been fixed which cannot be anticipated”.

You can also read the source documents cited in that Vatican document, such as Lumen Gentium, Nostra aetate, and the catechism. All easily found on the Vatican website.

 

[Ite_ad_Ioseph]

For anyone who is following this thread and is confused, I would urge you to read the Church’s actual teaching on the Jews. Here is a relatively recent, short and easy document on the Church’s teaching:

vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/chrstuni/relations-jews-docs/rc_pc_chrstuni_doc_20151210_ebraismo-nostra-aetate_en.html#5._The_universality_of_salvation_in_Jesus_Christ_and_God’s_unrevoked_covenant_with_Israel

Key Passage:

You can also read the source documents cited in that Vatican document, such as Lumen Gentium, Nostra aetate, and the catechism. All easily found on the Vatican website.

First paragraph:
“The text is not a magisterial document or doctrinal teaching of the Catholic Church.”
Cantate Domino is greater than this document.

 

[ChineseCatholic]

First paragraph:
“The text is not a magisterial document or doctrinal teaching of the Catholic Church.”
Cantate Domino is greater than this document.

LOL - this conversation is literally going down a well-worn track.

Around this time, someone will go “Cantate Domino? Well I raise you a Nostra Aetate to your Cantate Domino…”

That article linked is a 50th Anniversary reflection on Nostra Aetate.

Nostra Aetate is the Church’s official teaching on Catholicism’s relationship to Non-Christian religions, proclaimed by Pope Paul VI in 1965 as part of Vatican 2.

1. As the sacred synod searches into the mystery of the Church, it remembers the bond that spiritually ties the people of the New Covenant to Abraham’s stock.

Thus the Church of Christ acknowledges that, according to God’s saving design, the beginnings of her faith and her election are found already among the Patriarchs, Moses and the prophets. She professes that all who believe in Christ-Abraham’s sons according to faith (6)-are included in the same Patriarch’s call, and likewise that the salvation of the Church is mysteriously foreshadowed by the chosen people’s exodus from the land of bondage. The Church, therefore, cannot forget that she received the revelation of the Old Testament through the people with whom God in His inexpressible mercy concluded the Ancient Covenant. Nor can she forget that she draws sustenance from the root of that well-cultivated olive tree onto which have been grafted the wild shoots, the Gentiles.(7) Indeed, the Church believes that by His cross Christ, Our Peace, reconciled Jews and Gentiles. making both one in Himself.(8)

The Church keeps ever in mind the words of the Apostle about his kinsmen: “theirs is the sonship and the glory and the covenants and the law and the worship and the promises; theirs are the fathers and from them is the Christ according to the flesh” (Rom. 9:4-5), the Son of the Virgin Mary. She also recalls that the Apostles, the Church’s main-stay and pillars, as well as most of the early disciples who proclaimed Christ’s Gospel to the world, sprang from the Jewish people.

As Holy Scripture testifies, Jerusalem did not recognize the time of her visitation,(9) nor did the Jews in large number, accept the Gospel; indeed not a few opposed its spreading.(10) Nevertheless, God holds the Jews most dear for the sake of their Fathers; He does not repent of the gifts He makes or of the calls He issues-such is the witness of the Apostle.(11) In company with the Prophets and the same Apostle, the Church awaits that day, known to God alone, on which all peoples will address the Lord in a single voice and “serve him shoulder to shoulder” (Soph. 3:9).(12)

Since the spiritual patrimony common to Christians and Jews is thus so great, this sacred synod wants to foster and recommend that mutual understanding and respect which is the fruit, above all, of biblical and theological studies as well as of fraternal dialogues.

True, the Jewish authorities and those who followed their lead pressed for the death of Christ;(13) still, what happened in His passion cannot be charged against all the Jews, without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today. Although the Church is the new people of God, the Jews should not be presented as rejected or accursed by God, as if this followed from the Holy Scriptures. All should see to it, then, that in catechetical work or in the preaching of the word of God they do not teach anything that does not conform to the truth of the Gospel and the spirit of Christ.
**
Furthermore, in her rejection of every persecution against any man, the Church, mindful of the patrimony she shares with the Jews and moved not by political reasons but by the Gospel’s spiritual love, decries hatred, persecutions, displays of anti-Semitism, directed against Jews at any time and by anyone.**

Besides, as the Church has always held and holds now, Christ underwent His passion and death freely, because of the sins of men and out of infinite love, in order that all may reach salvation. It is, therefore, the burden of the Church’s preaching to proclaim the cross of Christ as the sign of God’s all-embracing love and as the fountain from which every grace flows.

At this time, i’m literally waiting for the SSPX member or a sedevacantists to show up to decry the above.

Someone is going to warble like a bird about how the above conflicts with previous teachings of the Church.

Someone will warble back probably about continuing unfolding of understanding of God’s plan.

Some snarky cynic type will probably ask the Nostra Aetate protestors why they don’t stone their children since Deuteronomy has that listed as an option.

Some hyper-intelligent argumentative type will ask the provocative question Does Supercessionism lead to Anti-Semitism?

And this will probably cycle through between the folks who accept Vatican 2 vs. those Schismatic Traditionalists who don’t. (Key Point my fellow Brothers and Sisters, not all Traditionalists reject all aspects of Vatican 2. Don’t be afraid of the guy or gal who likes going to Latin Mass )

So yeah…sit back…relax… and have fun with the —> :slapfight:

 

[James248]

We are now under Grace instead of the Law.

 

[rcwitness]

LOL - this conversation is literally going down a well-worn track.

Around this time, someone will go “Cantate Domino? Well I raise you a Nostra Aetate to your Cantate Domino…”

That article linked is a 50th Anniversary reflection on Nostra Aetate.

Nostra Aetate is the Church’s official teaching on Catholicism’s relationship to Non-Christian religions, proclaimed by Pope Paul VI in 1965 as part of Vatican 2.

At this time, i’m literally waiting for the SSPX member or a sedevacantists to show up to decry the above.

Someone is going to warble like a bird about how the above conflicts with previous teachings of the Church.

Someone will warble back probably about continuing unfolding of understanding of God’s plan.

Some snarky cynic type will probably ask the Nostra Aetate protestors why they don’t stone their children since Deuteronomy has that listed as an option.

Some hyper-intelligent argumentative type will ask the provocative question Does Supercessionism lead to Anti-Semitism?

And this will probably cycle through between the folks who accept Vatican 2 vs. those Schismatic Traditionalists who don’t. (Key Point my fellow Brothers and Sisters, not all Traditionalists reject all aspects of Vatican 2. Don’t be afraid of the guy or gal who likes going to Latin Mass )

So yeah…sit back…relax… and have fun with the —> :slapfight:

This document seems to be addressing the Jewish people as a whole. What matters, is the individual who learns of the Gospel message Which came from the Jews by God. Jesus addresses the Jews many times about the danger of their personal disbelief.

Just because the Jews were given the Mosaic Law, the Prophets, and the Ark of the Covenant, doesn’t mean there is automatic Salvation to each Jew. I would suggest you read Scripture to keep your interpretation of Church documents accurate.

Read this passage carefully:

John 8
Again he said to them, “I go away, and you will seek me and die in your sin; where I am going, you cannot come.” Then said the Jews, “Will he kill himself, since he says, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?” He said to them, “You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world. I told you that you would die in your sins, for you will die in your sins unless you believe that I am he.” They said to him, “Who are you?” Jesus said to them, “Even what I have told you from the beginning. I have much to say about you and much to judge; but he who sent me is true, and I declare to the world what I have heard from him." They did not understand that he spoke to them of the Father. So Jesus said, “When you have lifted up the Son of man, then you will know that I am he, and that I do nothing on my own authority but speak thus as the Father taught me. And he who sent me is with me; he has not left me alone, for I always do what is pleasing to him.” ** As he spoke thus, many believed in him**.

You see that there becomes a split with the Jews. Those who believe in Him, and those who do not. And what does He say about those who do not? He was confronting them about His divinity with the Father! Then He prophesied about His crucifixion… and that they would know then He was one with the Father. After knowledge, becomes the fork in the road. Two paths.

 

[ChineseCatholic]

Just because the Jews were given the Mosaic Law, the Prophets, and the Ark of the Covenant, doesn’t mean there is automatic Salvation to each Jew. I would suggest you read Scripture to keep your interpretation of Church documents accurate.

.

Who implied automatic salvation? Remember - I’m merely upholding invincible ignorance , and not just for the Jews alone.

But what I am essentially mocking is the track of this conversation - because I’ve seen it so many times in real life and online. The only variation I ever really see is when we get either a full on religious relativist or SSPX exclusivist holding the extreme ends of the spectrum of this conversation.

 

[steido01]

For anyone who is following this thread and is confused, I would urge you to read the Church’s actual teaching on the Jews. Here is a relatively recent, short and easy document on the Church’s teaching…

That’s all well and good, I suppose. The Scriptural evidence is there. Then it comes down to identifying who, exactly, is a Jew according to St. Paul? Are all those who claim Jewish ancestry today ‘Jews’ in the sense Paul was writing? Or was Paul (and by extension, your magisterial document) speaking of a different group in a possibly different time?

Let’s consider historical fact. It is plain that today’s Rabbinic Judaism is not at all the Levitical “Temple Judaism” of Jesus’s time, in neither ritual nor belief. For one thing, there’s no Temple. Just a cursory reading of the Old Testament and inter-Testamental writings demonstrates what a difference this makes: there are no sacrifices, no scapegoats, no substantial enforcement of Levitical laws or their associated punishments, the Resurrection has been outright ignored or re-imagined (to be fair, this was already happening in Jesus’s time), there are no prophets, no continued revelation from God. Even the most Orthodox Jew of today would acknowledge these departures from Temple Judaism (and perhaps lament them).

So why did things change? This Jesus fellow lit a long-ready fuse in the Roman province of Judea. When the Temple was destroyed by the Romans 70 years after his death, Jews who hadn’t followed Him had to figure out how to worship without it (Christian Jews were already worshiping anywhere). What we call Judaism today is the intellectual consequence of one Jewish sect, the Pharisees, winning out over the Zealots (exterminated by Rome because they kept fighting), Essenes (hard to continue when you don’t believe in making babies), Sadducees (mostly Hellenized anyway), and others (including quasi-Jewish groups like the Samaritans, who are practically extinct today). The Pharisees were the only group that had viable ideas – they didn’t homogenize into the dominant Roman culture, yet didn’t embrace a foolish suicidal war against it, either. Over time, their ideas have changed greatly. So if we’re basing Jewishness on a continuation of unbroken belief, then there will be very few Jews around today.

And so many then focus on heritage and lineage. But this is mathematically problematic. During and after the Fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD, Roman soldiers would enslave and rape Jews – it was often impossible to know who one’s father was, and so somewhere along the line, Jews implemented a matrilinear line of descent rather than a patrilinear one like in the Bible. The Jewish people have been so unfairly persecuted by the terrors of war, forced migrations, the Holocaust and other tragedies, that the sad truth is most Jews can’t trace their lineages back more than a few generations (I know; I’ve tried. I’m of Jewish descent. My grandparents converted to Christianity on the boat to America, I have Jewish family members, my menorah goes up for Hanukkah, and those of you who I’ve personally befriended know my surname to be more than a little Jewish). Add in the fact that many who call themselves Jews today are converts to today’s ‘new’ faith, and there’s barely any substantial lineage to speak of. Modern Judaism is almost more of a social thing, especially for more liberal Reformed Jews.

So, yes, God keeps his promises and the Jews have a special place in his plan of salvation. But that’s about as much as can be said.

Assurance of salvation can be found only in Christ. Those who believe and are baptized will be saved; those who do not believe will not be saved.

 

[TMC]

First paragraph:
“The text is not a magisterial document or doctrinal teaching of the Catholic Church.”
Cantate Domino is greater than this document.

The document does not change the teaching of the Church, but it does reflect the teaching of the Church. Are you suggesting that you understand the Church’s teaching better than the Vatican and the Pope? Regardless, Lumen Gentium, Nostra Aetate and the catechism are magisterial and doctrinal documents, and they reflect the same teachings.

 

[TMC]

That’s all well and good, I suppose. The Scriptural evidence is there. Then it comes down to identifying who, exactly, is a Jew according to St. Paul? Are all those who claim Jewish ancestry today ‘Jews’ in the sense Paul was writing? Or was Paul speaking of a different group in a different time?

Let’s consider historical fact. It is plain that today’s Rabbinic Judaism is not at all the Levitical “Temple Judaism” of Jesus’s time, in neither ritual nor belief. For one thing, there’s no Temple. Just a cursory reading of the Old Testament and inter-Testamental writings demonstrates what a difference this makes: there are no sacrifices, no scapegoats, no substantial enforcement of Levitical laws or their associated punishments, the Resurrection has been outright ignored or re-imagined (to be fair, this was already happening in Jesus’s time), there are no prophets, no continued revelation from God. Even the most Orthodox Jew of today would acknowledge these departures from Temple Judaism (and perhaps lament them).

So why did things change? This Jesus fellow lit a long-ready fuse in the Roman province of Judea. When the Temple was destroyed by the Romans 70 years after his death, Jews who hadn’t followed Him had to figure out how to worship without it (Christian Jews were already worshiping anywhere). What we call Judaism today is the intellectual consequence of one Jewish sect, the Pharisees, winning out over the Zealots (exterminated by Rome because they kept fighting), Essenes (hard to continue when you don’t believe in making babies), Sadducees (mostly Hellenized anyway), and others (including quasi-Jewish groups like the Samaritans, who are practically extinct today). The Pharisees were the only group that had viable ideas – they didn’t homogenize into the dominant Roman culture, yet didn’t embrace a foolish suicidal war against it, either. Over time, their ideas have changed greatly. So if we’re basing Jewishness on a continuation of unbroken belief, then there will be very few Jews around today.

And so many then focus on heritage and lineage. But this is mathematically problematic. During and after the Fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD, Roman soldiers would enslave and rape Jews – it was often impossible to know who one’s father was, and so somewhere along the line, Jews implemented a matrilinear line of descent rather than a patrilinear one like in the Bible. The Jewish people have been so unfairly persecuted by the terrors of war, forced migrations, the Holocaust and other tragedies, that the sad truth is most Jews can’t trace their lineages back more than a few generations (I know; I’ve tried. I’m of Jewish descent. My grandparents converted to Christianity on the boat to America, I have Jewish family members, my menorah goes up for Hanukkah, and those of you who I’ve personally befriended know my surname to be more than a little Jewish). Add in the fact that many who call themselves Jews today are converts to today’s ‘new’ faith, and there’s barely any substantial lineage to speak of. Modern Judaism is almost more of a social thing, especially for more liberal Reformed Jews.

So, yes, God keeps his promises and the Jews have a special place in his plan of salvation. But that’s about as much as can be said.

Assurance of salvation can be found only in Christ. Those who believe and are baptized will be saved; those who do not believe will not be saved.

I hope you are not advancing the baseless and anti-Semitic argument that today’s Jews are not “real” Jews and therefore cannot be saved.

Certainly all Christians believe that Christ is the path to Salvation. That said, the Church also teaches that formal conversion to Christianity in this life is not, strictly speaking, a requirement for salvation. No person’s salvation is assured, Jew or Gentile. Christians believe that following Christ is the more sure path. But the Church teaches that other paths, however less certain, can also lead to salvation.

 

[steido01]

I hope you are not advancing the baseless and **anti-Semitic **argument that today’s Jews are not “real” Jews and therefore cannot be saved.

Are you kidding? Did you read who I am?