J
- Status
C
chypmonk
Guest
I don’t know and it doesn’t much matter. it matters what the Church has authoritatively taught. St. Thomas was wrong on the Immaculate Conception so the birth thingy isn’t his forte.
If we allow all these theories, what are we to make of Jn 3:5? Our Lord made no exceptions. I find the doctrine of Limbo beautiful. It points not only to the justice of God but to his mercy and the great gift of ours being sacramentally baptized. Salvation is a gift. Those who advocated Limbo’s destruction seem to claim salvation as a right. And in a way Limbo is a type of salvation, just not the beatific vision. If these children would have gone to hell if they had lived I would think that Limbo would be a better lot.
God is not bound by his sacraments but he is bound by his word and can neither deceive nor be deceived, and he said in Jn3:5 “Amen, amen, I say to you unless a man is born again of water and the Holy Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” The Church has taught this to be taken literally as the Sacrament of Baptism. I am making an act of faith and trust in Jesus not deceiving us.
C
chypmonk
Guest
J
Jehannette
Guest
By your logic, there is no difference between an Eagle and a Triple Bogey:I don’t know and it doesn’t much matter. it matters what the Church has authoritatively taught. St. Thomas was wrong on the Immaculate Conception so the birth thingy isn’t his forte.
Saint Thomas was close enough, as the Church had not yet defined/settled the question.
T
thistle
Guest
A Catholic martyr is someone (already baptised) who will suffer or die rather than renounce their faith.
Baptism of Blood applies to a non-Catholic who dies for the Catholic faith and hence becomes a Catholic.
G
glarryb
Guest
I do not Need Aquinas to understand the old testament. I need to learn from the ones who wrote it down and passed it on.
G
gerry_clark
Guest
As I stated in a reply in another part of the Forum, universal salvation has been taught by the church since Origin.
There was no denominational sign on the Cross. It is not a Catholic, or Baptist or Lutheran or any other denominational Cross, it is a universal Cross.
The thought that there is no salvation outside Institutional Catholic Church was disclaimed at Vatican II. The Catachism teaches a universal longing to be reconciled with God. That
reconciliation is salvation. It is universal.
John’s Epistle teaches that God is love. The Catholic Catechism, paragraph 1970, teaches that the Law of the Gospel is “love one another”. So a Muslim, Buddhist or
Hindu acting in love is following the Law of the Gospel. These people are acting
according to the manner in which God has revealed Himself or Herself(remember Wisdom
in Scripture is always feminine and always the Divine) to them.
Salvation is a gift of God, not by some one or something, a man made organization, who jealously monitors to which collection basket a contribution is made. In fact Isaiah, 55:1, says no contribution to the collection basket is required!
Isaiah told the eccessiatistical members of the Second Temple, what Jesus told the
Pharasees and Saducces and what we, the laity must tell the Curia, proper worship
is defined in Isaiah 1:10-17, Salvation is a universal gift of God to those who worship
Him or Her properly.
There was no denominational sign on the Cross. It is not a Catholic, or Baptist or Lutheran or any other denominational Cross, it is a universal Cross.
The thought that there is no salvation outside Institutional Catholic Church was disclaimed at Vatican II. The Catachism teaches a universal longing to be reconciled with God. That
reconciliation is salvation. It is universal.
John’s Epistle teaches that God is love. The Catholic Catechism, paragraph 1970, teaches that the Law of the Gospel is “love one another”. So a Muslim, Buddhist or
Hindu acting in love is following the Law of the Gospel. These people are acting
according to the manner in which God has revealed Himself or Herself(remember Wisdom
in Scripture is always feminine and always the Divine) to them.
Salvation is a gift of God, not by some one or something, a man made organization, who jealously monitors to which collection basket a contribution is made. In fact Isaiah, 55:1, says no contribution to the collection basket is required!
Isaiah told the eccessiatistical members of the Second Temple, what Jesus told the
Pharasees and Saducces and what we, the laity must tell the Curia, proper worship
is defined in Isaiah 1:10-17, Salvation is a universal gift of God to those who worship
Him or Her properly.
J
Jehannette
Guest
This statement is just utterly false. The CCC states,
The CCC quotes the Council of Quiercy (paragraph 605):
M
Morgo
Guest
At Medjugorje, Mary said, “Most souls go to Purgatory, many go to Hell, and only a few go directly to Heaven.” So more than half of us go to Purgatory, and all of those eventually end up in Heaven. Half of the people on this planet are not Catholic - half aren’t even Christian. So yes, there must be salvation outside the church. You can find this quote on many websites. Here is one: medjugorjeusa.org/gregorian.htm. Hope that helps!
J
Jehannette
Guest
Private revelation, but even if it is true, the Council of Florence defined that there is no salvation outside the Catholic Church:
rtforum.org/lt/index.html
(See #149 & #150.)
G
gerry_clark
Guest
JEANETTE,
The Church’s motivation is to protect its collection baskets, not to protect the souls of the faithful.
All of your quotes are self serving. You are a great spokesperson for the 21st century Pharisees of the Roman Curia
The Church’s motivation is to protect its collection baskets, not to protect the souls of the faithful.
All of your quotes are self serving. You are a great spokesperson for the 21st century Pharisees of the Roman Curia
N
Nabooru
Guest
The fact is no one outside of God knows what happens to those who do not place their faith in Jesus Christ. IMO whatever happens to them should be left to nothing more than a cautious speculation. In that, we can ponder and wonder on it, but their fate should never be written as dogma. That includes both positive and negative assumptions and hopes. Positive ones give a sense of relaxation of evangelism. “Oh, I’m sure he’s going to heaven anyway.” Negative ones create self-righteousness. “Thank you, God, for making me your elect, rather than all the other awful, sinful, damned people out there.”
If you ask me, no church can write anything on the fate of the unbaptized and those who repudiated Christian faith other than, “I don’t know.” It’s our business to know the sure mechanism of salvation, not to guess at what the loopholes are. The fate of the unbeliever is between themselves and God. Personally, I find Limbo to be the most attractive and reasonable - but that’s just me. I’m not going to demand that any churh makes it a fundamental doctrine.
So, those outside of the flock should be seen as resting in an uncertain state, and it is our duty as Christians to bring them to a certain one. When someone asks you for directions, if you say, “Oh, just keep driving any old road you see, I’m sure you’ll get there,” you’re an ***. If you say, “I’m not going to bother because you’ll never get there anyway,” you’re a jerk. If you say, “Here’s the way to get there,” you’re an honest soul.
If you ask me, no church can write anything on the fate of the unbaptized and those who repudiated Christian faith other than, “I don’t know.” It’s our business to know the sure mechanism of salvation, not to guess at what the loopholes are. The fate of the unbeliever is between themselves and God. Personally, I find Limbo to be the most attractive and reasonable - but that’s just me. I’m not going to demand that any churh makes it a fundamental doctrine.
So, those outside of the flock should be seen as resting in an uncertain state, and it is our duty as Christians to bring them to a certain one. When someone asks you for directions, if you say, “Oh, just keep driving any old road you see, I’m sure you’ll get there,” you’re an ***. If you say, “I’m not going to bother because you’ll never get there anyway,” you’re a jerk. If you say, “Here’s the way to get there,” you’re an honest soul.
T
thistle
Guest
Medjugorie is a fraud. Three Bishops Commissions have extensively investigated and declared there is no evidence of any supernatural happenings there. However, this is off topic so we should not get the thread closed.
Anyway as Jehannette has correctly stated the official Church teaching, from the Church established by Christ and given authority in matters of faith and morals, is that there is NO salvation outside the Catholic Church. Catholics may not deny or reject this teaching.
Any Catholic denying this teaching commits heresy.
T
tokharian
Guest
There is a big, BIG problem in terms of encouraging Roman Catholics to not recognize people as Christians if they are not members of the Roman Catholic Church. So what if some Pope or other Roman Catholic theologian says there is no salvation outside of Roman Catholicism? To us outside, that just looks like somebody trying to protect a franchise.
It’s perfectly ok to believe that Roman Catholicism is a valid form of Christianity (which I do). It’s perfectly ok to believe that Roman Catholicism is the best, or a superior, expression of Christianity, and to advocate that people should join that church body. The Roman Catholic brand of Christianity has an impressive history of preserving education, encouraging many forms, of art, and establishing charitable institutions for many centuries, has done a lot of good, and has a lot to be proud of.
But to us outside, it seems obvious that the Roman Catholic variety of Christianity has accumulated a lot of unrelated cultural accretions along the way. Its practices, ceremonies, and organization reek of medieval Europe. Not that there is anything wrong with this: it’s understandable. This doesn’t make it bad or unchristian, but merely complicated. And much of the Reformation (and the American Restoration movement that gave rise to to Mormonism and all of its offshoots) was merely a desire to uncomplicate and simplify, but to retain the essentials.
Many of us were raised not to pray to Mary or to a Saint. Many of us were raised not to pray in the way one prays the Rosary. Many of us would not be comfortable in a regular confession situation. We certainly see the value in owning up to it when we do wrong, but for normal stuff we don’t feel the need to go tell the priest about it. At the same time, we understand that the people who do these things have good motives and valid reasons for doing them, and none of this makes them wrong or unchristian.
My ancestry is Northern European. Before the coming of Christianity, my ancestors left unwanted babies outdoors to die. They settled legal issues by combat, raided other people’s settlements, and took, held, and sold slaves. Today, the northern European countries, especially Scandinavia, are paragons of law, order, civil rights, and quality of life. Something got to them. But the first form of Christianity that came north was Arminian. Still, the power of the Christian message was overwhelming.
It is not an attack on Roman Catholism to say that there are different ways to be Christian. If I were promoting Catholicism, there’s better things to focus on. I would remind people that for centuries, the Church in Europe kept the lights on. For a long, dark time it was the average man’s only source of learning about history and his only source of comfort and consolation. Many sons and daughters of poor and rich alike found meaningful, altruistic careers in the Church. In a cold, harsh time many were distracted from greed and competition by its teachings and found instead ways to help one another.
If there are other, valid forms of Christianity, that’s no threat to what is real and true about the Roman Catholic Church.
It’s perfectly ok to believe that Roman Catholicism is a valid form of Christianity (which I do). It’s perfectly ok to believe that Roman Catholicism is the best, or a superior, expression of Christianity, and to advocate that people should join that church body. The Roman Catholic brand of Christianity has an impressive history of preserving education, encouraging many forms, of art, and establishing charitable institutions for many centuries, has done a lot of good, and has a lot to be proud of.
But to us outside, it seems obvious that the Roman Catholic variety of Christianity has accumulated a lot of unrelated cultural accretions along the way. Its practices, ceremonies, and organization reek of medieval Europe. Not that there is anything wrong with this: it’s understandable. This doesn’t make it bad or unchristian, but merely complicated. And much of the Reformation (and the American Restoration movement that gave rise to to Mormonism and all of its offshoots) was merely a desire to uncomplicate and simplify, but to retain the essentials.
Many of us were raised not to pray to Mary or to a Saint. Many of us were raised not to pray in the way one prays the Rosary. Many of us would not be comfortable in a regular confession situation. We certainly see the value in owning up to it when we do wrong, but for normal stuff we don’t feel the need to go tell the priest about it. At the same time, we understand that the people who do these things have good motives and valid reasons for doing them, and none of this makes them wrong or unchristian.
My ancestry is Northern European. Before the coming of Christianity, my ancestors left unwanted babies outdoors to die. They settled legal issues by combat, raided other people’s settlements, and took, held, and sold slaves. Today, the northern European countries, especially Scandinavia, are paragons of law, order, civil rights, and quality of life. Something got to them. But the first form of Christianity that came north was Arminian. Still, the power of the Christian message was overwhelming.
It is not an attack on Roman Catholism to say that there are different ways to be Christian. If I were promoting Catholicism, there’s better things to focus on. I would remind people that for centuries, the Church in Europe kept the lights on. For a long, dark time it was the average man’s only source of learning about history and his only source of comfort and consolation. Many sons and daughters of poor and rich alike found meaningful, altruistic careers in the Church. In a cold, harsh time many were distracted from greed and competition by its teachings and found instead ways to help one another.
If there are other, valid forms of Christianity, that’s no threat to what is real and true about the Roman Catholic Church.
J
Jehannette
Guest
Here’s the syllogism:
Major Premise: There is no salvation apart from Jesus Christ and His Mystical Body.
Minor Premise: The “Mystical Body of Christ and the Roman Catholic Church are one and the same thing.” (Humani Generis, 27)
Conclusion: There is no salvation outside the Catholic Church.
Major Premise: There is no salvation apart from Jesus Christ and His Mystical Body.
Minor Premise: The “Mystical Body of Christ and the Roman Catholic Church are one and the same thing.” (Humani Generis, 27)
Conclusion: There is no salvation outside the Catholic Church.
T
tokharian
Guest
And the source of Humani Generis is … a Pope. Figures he would hold that opinion. I don’t blame him for that, nor for trying to advance his organization. That’s his job, after all. And, Thomas Monson will say you need to be LDS.
C
chypmonk
Guest
The Catholic Church recognizes the baptized not in communion as Christians. But your position can’t be true because you are saying truth doesn’t matter. All those Christians outside the Church hold contradictory doctrines to each other. So if all of them are “right” then Truth has no value. Jesus is the Truth, thus you are saying in a round about way that He has no value . I know that isn’t your intention. But in fact if you really examine it this is what you hold.
All the baptized become attached to the Church by a valid baptism. This may not always result in membership but it can. If the person being Baptized puts up no obstacle to the Faith of the Catholics, they are Catholics, eg. a infant Lutheran child appears to be Baptized into the political structure of Lutheranism but in fact the Sacrament is one and it is the gate that one becomes a member of the one true Church as long as there is no obstacle to grace.
T
tokharian
Guest
But it’s the nature of human beings to hold different opinions, at different times, and under different circumstances. People think all sorts of thoughts and change their minds a lot. That’s true within a Catholic congregation too - if you could read everyone’s mind, you’d find all sorts of thoughts and opinions.
What I’m saying is that Jesus is the only constant in Christianity. Not whether we are organized in parishes or house churches or whatever. Everyone has added “extra stuff” that is often hard to prove. People understand Jesus and Christianity from the standpoint of their own limitations: of intellect, personality, place, time, and culture.
I see no evidence that Christians in the first century of the church prayed the Rosary, abstained from meat on Friday, or wore religious scapulars. I’m not saying that any of these practices are bad, for they are all devotional practices done with spiritual intent. They also didn’t have their own personal Bibles, and if they had been able to, they would probably not have contained exactly the same canon of scriptures that ours do today. In fact, the first Christians were practicing Jews, who abstained from pork and practiced almost universal marriage for able-bodied adults.
I was taught that the word “catholic” means universal. When Protestants recite the Apostles Creed they often retain the phrase “the holy catholic Church.”
What I’m saying is that Jesus is the only constant in Christianity. Not whether we are organized in parishes or house churches or whatever. Everyone has added “extra stuff” that is often hard to prove. People understand Jesus and Christianity from the standpoint of their own limitations: of intellect, personality, place, time, and culture.
I see no evidence that Christians in the first century of the church prayed the Rosary, abstained from meat on Friday, or wore religious scapulars. I’m not saying that any of these practices are bad, for they are all devotional practices done with spiritual intent. They also didn’t have their own personal Bibles, and if they had been able to, they would probably not have contained exactly the same canon of scriptures that ours do today. In fact, the first Christians were practicing Jews, who abstained from pork and practiced almost universal marriage for able-bodied adults.
I was taught that the word “catholic” means universal. When Protestants recite the Apostles Creed they often retain the phrase “the holy catholic Church.”
G
gerry_clark
Guest
The Roman Catholic Church recognizes one Baptism. As long as the Baptism was done
with water and in the name of the Trinity, the Catholic Church recognizes the Baptism.
The Mystical Body of Christ is made up of Jesus’ church, which includes the Catholic Chruch and all of the divisions that were caused by the abuses of power andf authority
by the humans who, primarily for their own worldly gain, were respnsible for such divisions.
If we believe in an all compassionate and all loving God, then we have to recognize that He
would not abandon one whom He created simply because they were taught to pay their temple tax to a Buddist Temple rather than a Hebrew Temple or a Christian Church. We
refer to these people who follow God as being members of the Communion of Saints.
We recognize Ghandi, a Hindu, as a 20th century prophet. We recognize Martin Luther
King Jr., a Baptist as a 20th century prophet. If these men were the voice of God how
can they be denied salvation. God will not deny them salvation.God does not care if
the Magisterium’s collection basket was enriched by their work. God’s glory was en-
riched by their work. They brought many more people to God than many of the Mag-
isterium. They have met the criteria of universal salvation.
with water and in the name of the Trinity, the Catholic Church recognizes the Baptism.
The Mystical Body of Christ is made up of Jesus’ church, which includes the Catholic Chruch and all of the divisions that were caused by the abuses of power andf authority
by the humans who, primarily for their own worldly gain, were respnsible for such divisions.
If we believe in an all compassionate and all loving God, then we have to recognize that He
would not abandon one whom He created simply because they were taught to pay their temple tax to a Buddist Temple rather than a Hebrew Temple or a Christian Church. We
refer to these people who follow God as being members of the Communion of Saints.
We recognize Ghandi, a Hindu, as a 20th century prophet. We recognize Martin Luther
King Jr., a Baptist as a 20th century prophet. If these men were the voice of God how
can they be denied salvation. God will not deny them salvation.God does not care if
the Magisterium’s collection basket was enriched by their work. God’s glory was en-
riched by their work. They brought many more people to God than many of the Mag-
isterium. They have met the criteria of universal salvation.
J
Jehannette
Guest
Gerry,
What you are proposing is heterodox:
What you are proposing is heterodox:
If I cannot say with “absolutely certainty” that I am going to Heaven, how could I make such a claim about another human being, especially, one whom I have never met? And, with respect to the individuals whom you mentioned, would you please supply a Magisterial reference with respect to the Catholic Church’s “claims” about them which you allege.
- Status