Got questions! can you help?

[asumini]

Ok… I think this is the right forum for this topic… my apologies if it isn’t.

In the “Meet and Greet” thread I mentioned that I was looking for some basic answers about Catholic belief, firsthand from real Catholics rather than just looking up answers and definitions in a book. Sorry if these questions seem really simple – I’m still learning, and I have a long way to go!

The first thing I’m wondering is: what do Catholics believe about the way salvation is obtained? Is salvation “by grace alone”, i.e., believe that Jesus died for your sins and you can’t do anything to earn salvation… or are certain works, living a good moral life, etc. necessary to be saved? Is it a combination of both faith and works or only one? And once you are saved, can you lose your salvation? I would appreciate any answers you can give.

 

[asumini]

I should add that this info is part of a research paper I’m writing, and any answers I receive here might be summarized and / or quoted in my paper, if that is alright. I won’t be needing to mention anyone by name in my writing… I just need your thoughts & responses

 

[beeliner]

I should add that this info is part of a research paper I’m writing, and any answers I receive here might be summarized and / or quoted in my paper, if that is alright. I won’t be needing to mention anyone by name in my writing… I just need your thoughts & responses

Catholic teaching, stripped to its bare bones is this (as I, a lifelong Catholic, understand it):

We receive God’s sanctifying grace by Baptism. Once received, it is lost only by SERIOUS sin. Once lost, it is recovered by confession, sincere contrition, and a firm purpose of amendment.

That’s about it. Of course, the various nuances can, and do, fill volumes.

Hope that helps, at least for starters.

 

[asumini]

Catholic teaching, stripped to its bare bones is this (as I, a lifelong Catholic, understand it):

We receive God’s sanctifying grace by Baptism. Once received, it is lost only by SERIOUS sin. Once lost, it is recovered by confession, sincere contrition, and a firm purpose of amendment.

That’s about it. Of course, the various nuances can, and do, fill volumes.

Hope that helps, at least for starters.

What is a SERIOUS sin? Like murder? Adultery?

 

[beeliner]

What is a SERIOUS sin? Like murder? Adultery?

Those would both certainly qualify. The requirements for serious (mortal, i.e. sanctity-destroying) sin:

Grievous offense

Sufficient reflection

Full consent of the will.

Granted that all three of these are to some extent subjective.

 

[coolduude]

These should help:

catholic.com/library/faith_tracts.asp

These were written by Catholics too, and they are written very relaxed (they sound natural).

Of course, the stuff from the Church Fathers can be confusing.

But this can help

Good luck!

 

[jmcrae]

Ok… I think this is the right forum for this topic… my apologies if it isn’t.

In the “Meet and Greet” thread I mentioned that I was looking for some basic answers about Catholic belief, firsthand from real Catholics rather than just looking up answers and definitions in a book. Sorry if these questions seem really simple – I’m still learning, and I have a long way to go!

The first thing I’m wondering is: what do Catholics believe about the way salvation is obtained? Is salvation “by grace alone”, i.e., believe that Jesus died for your sins and you can’t do anything to earn salvation.

We can’t do anything to “earn” salvation, but we can certainly “earn” Hell and damnation, by working against God’s grace in our lives, and by deliberately cooperating with sin, either directly, by doing bad things, or indirectly, by failing to do good things. Grace (which you can picture in your mind as being the blood and water that flow from the side of Christ during the Crucifixion) comes to us normally by means of the seven Sacraments, by means of the Church, and by means of faith in Christ. “Prevenient grace” is the grace that comes directly from God that inspires us to come into the Church and to make use of the Sacraments, first and foremost, Baptism, which comes before any of the other Sacraments. Once you are a member in good standing of the Church, you would then receive Confirmation, Holy Communion, and, if you sin, Reconciliation. When you reach the proper age, and find yourself disposed to do so, you would receive Marriage, or else Holy Orders (the priesthood) and if necessary, the Sacrament of the Sick. All of these Sacraments are the ordinary means by which Christ’s grace flows to us from His redemptive action on the Cross - there is nothing we can do to “earn” it, but at the same time, if we don’t make use of the Sacraments, we cut ourselves off from His grace, in most ordinary cases. (There are exceptions, but they are known only to God Himself.)

or are certain works, living a good moral life, etc. necessary to be saved?

I would say rather that these things are necessary in order to not be damned, since the opposite of living a moral life would be to live a sinful life - you are either doing good things, or bad things. Doing nothing (unless you are incapacitated) is a bad thing.

Is it a combination of both faith and works or only one?

It’s an entire culture and way of life.

And once you are saved, can you lose your salvation?

You can certainly lose your salvation, or rather, you can earn damnation, by leaving aside the Catholic lifestyle, and taking up a life of sinfulness. This often begins with one major “bad sin” that you then spend the rest of your life trying to justify to yourself, or else by means of a whole lot of very small sins that go unnoticed and unrepented, until they become habitual, and you move silently and slowly out of God’s orbit, and into the Devil’s orbit, without ever noticing that you had changed direction.

 

[Filioque]

I’ll take a stab at your question. Be mindful however that most Protestants are taught that the Catholic Church teaches something that it does not.

Our Salvation is throught Grace. That Grace to restore our souls to God was accomplished through the Incarnation of Jesus, his Passion, Death and Rising from the dead. This is the primary means of our salvation.

In order to partake in this Grace we must ordinarily participate in it by doing what Jesus commanded. He commanded to His Apostles that they preach the Good News, and baptize the nations even to the ends of the world. Both implicit in some of His parables, and explicitly when He commanded those He established as His representatives when He established His Church, As such Catholics reject the idea that all you have to do is “Claim Jesus and His Cross” or “Accept Jesus” and you are eternally “Saved” but as supported by a careful reading of the New Testament where St. Paul and other writers use Salvation in the tense of an ongoing process, as well as a past and future event(s) we have to break down salvation into the primary act, (Jesus) how it is applied (our obedience to God and cooperation with His grace, both by spiritual and moral growth, as well as following His commands to be baptized, and to be subject to our lawful authories, both civil and religious) . The third meaning found in the scriptures is when our Salvation is fully accomplished, and we see God face to face in heaven.

Any works we do that are not united to God’s will, and are done in the Caritas, or love of God, while we are living in accordance to His will are meaningless (spiritually) only when we accomplish any works in union with God’s grace and will, with all humilty can those works be seen as accomplishing anything that causes a spiritual growth. The primary reason is that these works are united with the greatest of works, that of Jesus on the Cross.

So yes Catholics believe that God’s grace, freely given accomplishes our Salvation, (or initiates it) and we in union with God’s will have the obligation to continue in God’s love.

I started by writing that this is the ordinary means. Most Catholics would also include that God will judge those who have never heard the Truth, or those who are so prejudiced against the Truths that Jesus gave to the Apostles and handed on to us through His Church are judged by God based on what they knew during their lives. This is not relativism which equates the false teachings they follow as equal to the truth, but rather relates to how the soul of the person understands God.

 

[asumini]

Can someone belong to another religion… like be a Protestant Christian and still go to heaven? I mean is Catholicism compatible with other faiths in that way, or not?

What roles do Jesus and / or Mary play in our salvation?

 

[jmcrae]

Can someone belong to another religion… like be a Protestant Christian and still go to heaven? I mean is Catholicism compatible with other faiths in that way, or not?

All who are saved, are saved by means of the Catholic Church, but not all who are saved are necessarily active members of the Church. For example, a non-Catholic teenager who committed suicide was saved by means of his Catholic grandmother praying the Divine Mercy Chaplet for his soul - so although the boy was not a Catholic, he was saved by means of the Church, because of his grandmother.

What roles do Jesus and / or Mary play in our salvation?

Mary was the one who made it possible for Jesus to become a man, by accepting the Angel’s to bear Him in her womb, share her flesh with Him by giving him a body from her DNA, and raising Him to manhood. She was the one who inspired His first miracle, which was the changing of the water into wine, at the wedding of Cana (see John 5).

When Jesus was dying on the Cross, He gave Mary to us to be our mother (thus making us to be His brothers and sisters, and adopted into the family of God the Father), when He said, “Beloved, behold your mother.”

Jesus established the Church, appointed the Apostles to be its first leaders, appointed Peter to be the chief shepherd (which today we call “Pope”) and gave them all of His teachings, along with the Sacraments. He became the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, when He died on the Cross on that Friday afternoon, just at the same moment that the Passover lamb was being sacrificed in the Temple.

He then descended to the dead to convert the souls of those who had died before, and then on the Sunday morning, He rose again bodily from the dead, which caused the gates of Heaven then to be opened to the human race, and human beings began at that moment to start going to Heaven.

That’s kind of the short version - for the long version, you want to read the Gospels.

 

[asumini]

Hmm. Can a person have complete assurance of salvation at any time? Or is it presumptuous to say that you can be absolutely sure you are on your way to heaven?

 

[Filioque]

One of the problems with those who claim absolute assurance of salvation is that aside from being non-scriptural, they fall into one of two major camps. The first make salvation based on their own act of “accepting Jesus” His work on the cross becomes dependent on our act. Or those who deny free will and state that those elect are absolutly predestined by God, and those damned cannot be, even if externally they appear to be saved, be part of the elect.

A second problem with such Absolute Assurity, even if we recognize it as a minority Protestant opinion, is that not having any moral or dogmatic authority, each Protestant who claims the position of any of the various founders of the Protestant Theology can change it to suit their situation.

 

[jmcrae]

Hmm. Can a person have complete assurance of salvation at any time?

Yes, and in fact I have it right now, because I just got back from Confession a couple of hours ago.

Or is it presumptuous to say that you can be absolutely sure you are on your way to heaven?

You can always know how well you are doing at any given moment. What you can’t do is predict what your state of mind is going to be twenty years from now, or forty years from now. Lots of people lose their faith for a wide variety of reasons - even people who seem like they have it all together. We can’t presume that we’re going to remain in a state of grace for the rest of our lives, or that we’re going to take the necessary steps to remedy our situation, if we find that we aren’t.

A lot of people are kind of “counting on” a death-bed conversion, but the less time you spend with God in this life, the less likely it is that you will think of calling a priest when it comes to your time to go.

 

[bpbasilphx]

\The first thing I’m wondering is: what do Catholics believe about the way salvation is obtained?\

The first thing is for Protestants, especially pop-evangelicals, to understand is what they mean by “being saved” is not what the Bible means by it.