SPLIT: Does Invincible Ignorance Apply to Devout Protestants?

[Sirach2]

NewsTheMan,
It matters not what Ratzinger said, as Cardinal not vested with the Office of Peter - it matters only what Pope Paul VI promulgated. Here’s the final paragraphs from the closing of V-II. Beyond this, I have nothing more to add, for this sticking point has been debated to death on this forum.

At last all which regards the holy ecumenical council has, with the help of God, been accomplished and all the constitutions, decrees, declarations and votes have been approved by the deliberation of the synod and promulgated by us. Therefore we decided to close for all intents and purposes, with our apostolic authority, this same ecumenical council called by our predecessor, Pope John XXIII, which opened October 11, 1962, and which was continued by us after his death.

We decided moreover that all that has been established synodally is to be** religiously observed by all the faithful**, for the glory of God and the dignity of the Church and for the tranquillity and peace of all men. We have approved and established these things, decreeing that the present letters are and remain stable and valid, and are to have legal effectiveness, so that they be disseminated and obtain full and complete effect, and so that they may be fully convalidated by those whom they concern or may concern now and in the future; and so that, as it be judged and described,** all efforts contrary to these things by whomever or whatever authority, knowingly or in ignorance be invalid and worthless from now on. **

Given in Rome at St. Peter’s, under the [seal of the] ring of the fisherman, Dec. 8, on the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the year 1965, the third year of our pontificate.

 

[Pfaffenhoffen]

There is one way - Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ is God and hard to know, at least in this world.
Do you remember Philip who asked who the Father was and Jesus said that Philip was for such a long time with Jesus and did not know who the Father was.

Not simple, to know Jesus,in the world.

 

[SouthpawLink]

Sorry for taking this in the Eastern Orthodox direction. But here’s a Protestant example: Dr. James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family radio ministry, a great Christian, who received some prestigious award from the Vatican. Also, I seem to remember that the Reverend Billy Graham met one of the Popes (Blessed John Paul II?) and they established essentially a friendship and an alliance with each other. Such actions by the Catholic Church, i.e. honoring Dr. James Dobson and Rev. Billy Graham, only make sense in the light of an attitude that does not presume to judge these great Protestant Christians guilty of not becoming Catholics. The Vatican, and the Pope, apparently steared clear of such judgment, and left that part up to God.

This only illustrates how far Holy Mother Church has fallen: praising heretics who happen to get a few things right. No, we cannot judge the souls of others, but I wonder if Pope John Paul II saw fit to preach the necessity of these Protestants to join the Catholic Church for the sake of their eternal salvation? Probably not… after all, Protestants are more than welcome to receive Holy Communion without renouncing all of their errors not related to the Blessed Sacrament (cf. CIC, can. 844) and Vatican II boldly proclaimed them to be “members of the body of Christ” (Unitatis Redintegratio, n. 3). Someone should have given the memo to St. Robert Bellarmine, Pope Leo XIII, Pius XI and Bl. Pius XII about these “members” who don’t profess the one true faith nor are united to the Successor of St. Peter… in addition to baptism, those used to be the requirements for membership in the Catholic Church. Pope Benedict – as Fr. Ratzinger – did a fine job of ridding the Church of her “theological armor” (scholastic terminology) in order to paint heretics and schismatics, along with their false sects, in a positive light. Yay for false ecumenism!

 

[wondrousgnat]

Many have horrible misunderstandings of the teaching of the catholic church and I see that as invincible ignorance. And much of that misunderstandings come from Catholics themselves. Many of us don’t understand our own faith. Many are poorly catechized. We can get our info on the church teachings from Protestants, news stories, tv shows and comedies. Many cafeteria Catholics are spouting their views on the church and many others accept their viewpoints as church teaching (especially when coming from conservatives). I just finished a novel CROSS BONES by Kathy Reichs which distorted Catholic teaching and archeology.

And even for the knowledgeable Catholic defending the church can be a challenge. I can use more bible verses to defend Mary’s perpetual virginity than verses used by opponents. But those who have believed one thing for decades are not easily swayed n their beliefs. And I would never win an argument defending the Immaculate Conception.

 

[jmj1984]

I say it does.

Protestants who are raised by generations of Protestants are ignorant that the Catholic Church is a true church. To assert that anyone can go online and read about the Catholic Church and convert to the Church is the same as saying that any Catholic that stumbles upon a Mormon site, for example will suddenly convert to Mormonism.

The quote below expresses my feelings on the topic.

I am not saying this because I’m an ex Protestant. I can do as other Protestants have done and jump on the condemn all Protestants bandwagon.

That is not to say we are not to try to convert Protestants. I believe we should labor whether in prayer or through evangelical outreach to be God’s instruments in converting these souls.

I am posting this in the Traditional Catholics forum because Traditional Catholics tend to be very close-minded regarding this issue, and reject all Post-Vatican II documents on the topic as if they don’t exist.

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t agree with the gist of some more modern documents, but as Catholics, we need to look as everything as a whole and make a decision based on past and present teachings, which should complement each other.

What say you?

I would say that invincible ignorance is a personal standard, it depends on the events and encounters of each person and there is not one blanket standard to be applied to everyone. It is not enough to be merely exposed to the teaching of the catholic church one must also be exposed to the fruit of this teaching, to charity, to love, to patience and so forth. Considering how divided the church is today can we really state that no protestants are invincibly ignorant and that they are all stubborn and unrepetant sinners? I think it is obvious that we cannot.

I think we can however lay some ground rules;

1)A person who has grown up with considerable prejudice and misinformation regarding The Catholic Church and though he has the means to find out the truth does not bother to, cannot be invincibly ignorant. By this I mean not just that the person seeks to find out what people of his own creed or even others say about the catholic church says but actually what The Church says about itself. Failing to do this is a sin against Charity.
2)Likewise a person who has grown up with considerable prejudice and misinformation regarding The Church and meets good, holy catholics and still clings to his prejudices, cannot be invincibly ignorant.
3)A person who is merely content to regurtiate what he has been taught as a child and never bothers to seek God or explore his faith and thus never seeks out anything about the Catholic Church though he has the means, cannot be called invincibly ignorant. He has failed in his duty to educate himself about his faith and God.
4)A person who has received a good catholic education, at a time when they can reason i.e not merely when a child, cannot be called invincibly ignorant, as the principles of faith and the reasons behind them would have been explained and to resist the reasonable basis and apologetics for the faith is entirely unreasonable.
5)A person who is rabidly anti-catholic and content to stay so, cannot be called invincibly ignorant. Either he is ignorant of the catholic faith and thus commiting a sin against charity by being anti something he doesnt even know about or he is knowledgeable about the faith and is still against it, he cannot therefore be invincibly ignorant.

That leaves a great many of the protestants I know, including my parents and family potentially within the bounds of ‘invincible ignorance’ and I do not pretend that the ‘guidlines’ I have worked out in my mind are either perfect or exhaustive.

To address the issue of ‘why be catholic if…’ if it is important to address two things:

1)Just because someone can be saved as an apparent non-catholic does not mean they will be, if it is infinitely hard for us as Catholics who have the fullness and purity of the truth, recourse to the sacraments, the communion of saints and the leadership and protection of the pope how much is it harder is it for those who do not have these things? Consider if faithful graces lose or waste so many graces how many more graces are wasted, loss or even ignored by those who cannot or will not recognise them due to their deficient faith?

2)Consider Purgatory. Almost all of us will end up there but whilst Catholics have masses said for them and the help of the communion of saints in prayers, good works, fasting and such forth, what do protestants have? Besides which the sins committed due to their errors will have to be cleansed and this applies to all non-catholics, even orthodox. It cannot be doubted that the experience will be more difficult, even infinitely more difficult for them than us. Consider also the shock of realising you were wrong.

3)The measure of reward and glory is not equal in heaven. Catholics, even ‘bad ones’ will receive more glory and reward in heaven than those who are not catholic, it is only the cases of ‘very bad catholics’ and ‘very good non-catholics’ that the latter could possibly eclipse the former as regards glory and reward. This is because of the immense help of the communion of saints particularly of the glorious and immaculate Virgin Mary and St Joseph, her chaste spouse and the importance of knowing and bearing witness to the truth.

In short invincible ignorance does not undermine the importance of being catholic nor does it mean that most protestants will get to heaven or even necessarilly that they can.

 

[adstrinity]

1. I’ve not read most of this thread, I didn’t even read most of the OP, and it went on from there what I didn’t read.
2. THERE IS NO SALVATION OUTSIDE THE CATHOLIC CHURCH (Which, I don’t think anybody here is arguing).
3. My priest told a story from the pulpit of one of St. Padre Pio’s spritual children, I think. She was a convert and St. Padre Pio was her Spiritual Guide. Her mom was a Protestant (and the first time her mom met St. Padre Pio, he kicked her dog), but, they eventually became…aquaintainces.

Well, mom dies.

The daughter is apprehensive but approaches the saint to ask if her mom is removed from God forever.

St. Padre Pio says no; she believed in good faith what she did as a Protestant. To reiterate: This person spoke with Padre Pio, so, obviously she must have known about Catholicism, and yet, St. Padre Pio assued the daughter that the mother was in Heaven.

Here’s the thing, when the saintly daughter died, and everybody asked if SHE was in Heaven, St. Padre Pio said no…she needed to be in Purgatory for a while.

 

[A_Catholic]

1. I’ve not read most of this thread, I didn’t even read most of the OP, and it went on from there what I didn’t read.
2. THERE IS NO SALVATION OUTSIDE THE CATHOLIC CHURCH (Which, I don’t think anybody here is arguing).
3. My priest told a story from the pulpit of one of St. Padre Pio’s spritual children, I think. She was a convert and St. Padre Pio was her Spiritual Guide. Her mom was a Protestant (and the first time her mom met St. Padre Pio, he kicked her dog), but, they eventually became…aquaintainces.

Well, mom dies.

The daughter is apprehensive but approaches the saint to ask if her mom is removed from God forever.

St. Padre Pio says no; she believed in good faith what she did as a Protestant. To reiterate: This person spoke with Padre Pio, so, obviously she must have known about Catholicism, and yet, St. Padre Pio assued the daughter that the mother was in Heaven.

Here’s the thing, when the saintly daughter died, and everybody asked if SHE was in Heaven, St. Padre Pio said no…she needed to be in Purgatory for a while.

I think this shows that we cannot judge any individual. God alone knows the heart. We as individual Catholics don’t know everything, and we are judged according to what we know and how well we practice it, as is everyone else in the world. As Catholics, we are actually judged much more harshly than those outside the Church, because “to whom much is given, much is expected.” A cleric or religious is judged more harshly than a lay Catholic. God probably holds the Pope most responsible of all. That is why we must pray for our Holy Father constantly.

But because this particular Protestant woman did receive salvation, that does not support the claim of “invincible ignorance” across the board for all Protestants. Many mainline and liberal Protestants support artificial birth control, abortion and homosexuality. The Catholic Church teaches these are part of the natural law, which is law that each person, regardless of their belief, innately knows to be true. Invincible ignorance can never be applied when it comes to natural law, unless the person is also mentally incompetent. If your reasoning faculties are functional, you can never claim invincible ignorance of natural law.

 

[Swiss_Guy]

Jesus Christ is God and hard to know, at least in this world.
Do you remember Philip who asked who the Father was and Jesus said that Philip was for such a long time with Jesus and did not know who the Father was.

Not simple, to know Jesus,in the world.

True, but Christ still is the way. I’m not saying that you can’t be saved if you aren’t Christian. It’s kind of like “no salvation outside the Church” doesn’t mean you have to be visibly apart of the Catholic Church and be a good Catholic in order to be saved. Because we don’t know who will be saved.

 

[Ahimsa]

I’m not sure Protestant Christians really are starving, after all, they pray for our Father to provide their daily bread the same as we do…

of course, it may not be as sumptuous as our banquet

They’re on a diet.

 

[Swiss_Guy]

They’re on a diet.