Vatican II, the Historical Church and Protestants

[CatherineofA]

From what I can gather, the current church doesn’t think being Protestant will damn someone’s soul. Was this the case prior to Vatican II? Why was the church in earlier centuries so against Protestantism and seeing them as going to Hell? If the church can’t be in error and the pope is infallible, how can the church have made changes? Did Vatican II in fact change this centuries old belief about non Catholics?

 

[Rolltide]

From what I can gather, the current church doesn’t think being Protestant will damn someone’s soul. Was this the case prior to Vatican II? Why was the church in earlier centuries so against Protestantism and seeing them as going to Hell? If the church can’t be in error and the pope is infallible, how can the church have made changes? Did Vatican II in fact change this centuries old belief about non Catholics?

There are a few misunderstandings in your statement that are probably leading to your confusion. First is the nature of the pope’s infallibility, and don’t worry, this is one of the most commonly misunderstood aspects of the Catholic Church. The pope is not infallible everywhere, all the time, about everything. If he was, then how would the corrupt popes of the Middle Ages be explained? The pope is only infallible when he speaks “ex cathedra”, meaning that he is speaking on behalf of the church to give a declaration about a specific doctrine which has been brought into question. To date, the pope has officially used this power only twice (defining the Immaculate Conception and the Assumption of Mary). Ecumenical Councils and the Magesterium of the Church also have versions of infallibility as well. Most doctrines are never defined, and as such, are still open to interpretation.

Second, the teaching about Protestants has never changed. Catholics believe that anyone can be saved, even non-Christians, but that the further away your beliefs are from Catholicism, the increasingly difficult it becomes.

Here is the quote from the Catechism:
“Outside the Church there is no salvation”

846 How are we to understand this affirmation, often repeated by the Church Fathers? Re-formulated positively, it means that all salvation comes from Christ the Head through the Church which is his Body:

Basing itself on Scripture and Tradition, the Council teaches that the Church, a pilgrim now on earth, is necessary for salvation: the one Christ is the mediator and the way of salvation; he is present to us in his body which is the Church. He himself explicitly asserted the necessity of faith and Baptism, and thereby affirmed at the same time the necessity of the Church which men enter through Baptism as through a door. Hence they could not be saved who, knowing that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ, would refuse either to enter it or to remain in it.

847 This affirmation is not aimed at those who, through no fault of their own, do not know Christ and his Church:

Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience - those too may achieve eternal salvation.

848 “Although in ways known to himself God can lead those who, through no fault of their own, are ignorant of the Gospel, to that faith without which it is impossible to please him, the Church still has the obligation and also the sacred right to evangelize all men.”

In short, if through no fault of your own you are not Catholic, and lived a good life that would have been in line with Catholic teachings, you could still get to heaven. But… without knowing what the prerequisites were, it would be harder to know what the moral way to live was, and so it would be much more difficult to be saved. If you are a good Protestant and don’t join Catholicism out of ignorance of the truth of its doctrine, then you still have a chance for salvation. If, however, you ARE Catholic and turn from Catholic teachings to become another denomination, or if you are Protestant and recognize the truth of the Catholic Church and refuse to join, then you would be doomed to hell because you are turning from the true teachings. This has always held true, but realize during the Protestant Reformation, most people HAD been Catholic, and were turning from the Catholic Church to other denominations. Today, the majority of Protestants are already Protestant.

Also note that the Catechism says that “There is no salvation outside of the Church”. It goes on to say that all salvation comes from Christ the Head through the Church which is his Body. In other words, anyone who is saved is saved because of the Catholic Church, whether they know it or not. Even if they weren’t Catholic, they were saved because their actions during their life matched and were in line with Catholic teaching, which has the guarantee of protection by the Holy Spirit.

 

[Rolltide]

Today, the majority of Protestants are already Protestant.

lol…I just realized this goes without saying. What I meant is that most Protestants are born into Protestant families, as opposed to the mass exodus from the Catholic Church in the 1500s.

 

[Liberian]

Catherine of A,

Rolltide has already given you an excellent answer. I would like to second it.

• Liberian

 

[CatherineofA]

Thanks for your explanation of papal infallability. I have heard it explained somewhat like this before and it is becoming a little clearer to me and I can see where the misunderstanding may have come into the picture.

I don’t think I completely see your explanation of how a non Catholic can be saved because they were ignorant of the true church. I think this conflicts with historical examples. Examples-Explorers and their views of natives in North America and seamen sailing in the Orient and Jews in the Inquisition and Muslims in the Crusades.

I also don’t think I completely understand your point about how more modern Protestants are excused for their ignorance and how earlier Protestants knew better and were in rebellion. Therefore, they are not given the benefit of the doubt. If this is the case, when did people begin to be excused in widespread numbers? When were people no longer as responsible as they had been?

Do you happen to know if there is a book or site on what actually happened in Vatican II? The basic changes in black and white? Why are there some Catholics who reject Vatican II? Are they considered sinning and doomed? What makes them different from other Catholics in their beliefs?

How was the Counter Reformation different than before that event in time? Why did it happen? A response to Reformation accusations?

 

[Liberian]

Catherine,

Let’s see … a non-Catholic can be saved because being ignorant of the existence of the Church he is not held responsible for being an overt member of the Church (see Romans 2:14-15). I’m not sure what you mean about “explorers and their views of natives in North America and seamen sailing in the Orient and Jews in the Inquisition and Muslims in the Crusades.” For one thing, the Inquisition was directed at people who claimed to be Christian. In general, while it is possible for somebody outside the Catholic Church to be saved, it is a whole lot easier for the person to be saved if he is inside the Catholic Church.

Modern Protestants have been catechized from birth with the idea that Catholicism is wrong. The original Protestants had not been. I have no idea when people began to be “excused in large numbers,” if it happened at all.

There is a book called “The Documents of Vatican II.” It contains the official pronouncements of the council. You can also get them, I am sure, from the Vatican web site. The council itself changed a lot less than most people would like to think; a lot of people in the sixties took “the spirit of Vatican II” and ran with it into places that the council fathers never dreamed of. That is why Pope Benedict, when he was Cardinal Ratzinger, spoke of the necessity for a “reform of the reform.”

Some Catholics reject Vatican II; I cannot speak with assurance for their reasons (I don’t read minds) but probably it has a lot to do with the abuses that occurred “in the spirit of Vatican II.” Are they sinning? Yes. Are they doomed? I don’t know; it’s not my place to judge. What makes them different from other Catholics is that they reject the authority of a properly-constituted ecumenical council.

The Counter-Reformation happened because there were some things in the Church that needed to be changed and the Church changed them. It was in large part, I am sure, a response to the Reformation (hence its name), but to answer this question fully would take a complete history book.

• Liberian

 

[Rolltide]

Thanks for your explanation of papal infallability. I have heard it explained somewhat like this before and it is becoming a little clearer to me and I can see where the misunderstanding may have come into the picture.

I don’t think I completely see your explanation of how a non Catholic can be saved because they were ignorant of the true church. I think this conflicts with historical examples. Examples-Explorers and their views of natives in North America and seamen sailing in the Orient and Jews in the Inquisition and Muslims in the Crusades.

I also don’t think I completely understand your point about how more modern Protestants are excused for their ignorance and how earlier Protestants knew better and were in rebellion. Therefore, they are not given the benefit of the doubt. If this is the case, when did people begin to be excused in widespread numbers? When were people no longer as responsible as they had been?

Do you happen to know if there is a book or site on what actually happened in Vatican II? The basic changes in black and white? Why are there some Catholics who reject Vatican II? Are they considered sinning and doomed? What makes them different from other Catholics in their beliefs?

How was the Counter Reformation different than before that event in time? Why did it happen? A response to Reformation accusations?

Ok, let me take the modern Protestant question first. What I was getting at is that during the Reformation, the original Protestants began their lives as Catholics. Luther was a Catholic priest for many years, and then broke with the church. Because he knowingly broke from the church, thus rejecting it, the implication is that he is doomed to hell, although ultimately, the Church leaves a tiny bit of wiggle room as we do not know the state of his conscience when he died. The church never definitively passes judgement on whether anyone is in hell or not. It simply tells you what types of things would get you there. In any case, all of the original Protestants and their followers of that era were born Catholics, and split to form the other denominations. Thus, these were all people that rejected the Catholic Church. It would only affect first-generation Protestants. If you were born into a Protestant family today, you were never Catholic to begin with, and so haven’t formally rejected it yet. (Same for any other religion, or the Native Americans.) Your ignorance of the Catholic Church isn’t counted against you. For these people, it would depend on how well they tried to live out their faith, and how close that reflected Catholic teaching.

Regarding the historical examples, I have a lot of knowledge about the Native American problem, since I am a professor of Latin American history. Hernan Cortez once commented, “We come to the New World for three reasons: God, gold, and glory”. In practice, the conquistadores were far more interested in the gold and glory than God. Their first major encounter with a major New World civilization was the Aztecs, and their human sacrifice utterly revolted them. The Spanish (along with every other European power) treated natives terribly, but disease was ultimately the major killer. The Spanish government was terribly concerned about the Christianization of Native Americans and their fair treatment, and instituted many laws to protect them. Many Catholic priests and monks came into great conflict with the conquistadores over these abuses. Sadly, they were difficult to enforce with the government 10,000 miles away. You can even see the horrible perversions of religion that the conquistadores arranged in the “Requirement”.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Requerimiento
This statement was intended to be read to the natives when they were first encountered. It explained that no action could be taken against them until they were fully versed in the Catholic faith and that they were always protected unless they rejected the Catholic Church. Conquistadores would purposely read the text in Spanish or Latin and not translate it as directed (or even read it miles away and claim it wasn’t their fault that natives had poor hearing!), and then, upon receiving no response by the natives, took this to mean that they rejected the Church, were doomed to hell, and could be exploited since it didn’t matter anymore anyway. Now, this was just the first effort. When it was clear to Charles V that these abuses were occurring, stronger methods were undertaken.

I suggest studying the history of the Spanish priest Bartolome de las Casas, the “Defender of the Indians” to see what lengths the government went through to try and protect natives from exploitation. The Academy Award winning movie “The Mission” deals with similar issues in 18th century Brazil. This movie will give you a really good idea of what priests were up against with regard to exploitation.

 

[Rolltide]

continued from above…

Jews were a special case in that they had already accepted the Old Testament, but had rejected the Messiah. Most of them in Spain were forced to convert or leave the country. Many left. This was an abuse, along with others against the Jews, that Pope John Paul II officially apologized for a few years back.

With regard to the Crusades, remember that this started off not as a religious war, but as a call for help from the Byzantine Emperor who was under attack by Seljuk Turks on his eastern border. The pope decided to help for several reasons. He didn’t wish a Christian kingdom to fall to Muslims, he thought this assistance could foster a reconciliation between Catholics and the Orthodox, he did it to try and win souls back from the Muslims, and he also did it to get rid of “problem princes” within Europe. There were so many petty lords in Europe by this time that they began to fight each other for little bits of territory, causing near anarchy in some places. If they went to the Holy Land to fight, and won, they could conquer Christian kingdoms and rule them there, meaning they wouldn’t come back, and problem solved. If they lost, they’d be dead, problem solved. Clearly, that wasn’t what the pope was hoping for, but he did realize that it would help peace in Europe nonetheless. In any case, this was a political war with overtly religious overtones, since the kingdoms fighting were theocracies.

 

[Rolltide]

Do you happen to know if there is a book or site on what actually happened in Vatican II? The basic changes in black and white? Why are there some Catholics who reject Vatican II? Are they considered sinning and doomed? What makes them different from other Catholics in their beliefs?

How was the Counter Reformation different than before that event in time? Why did it happen? A response to Reformation accusations?

Again, let me take the Counter Reformation, or the Catholic Reformation first. It is important to note that the Catholic Church was very aware of the corruption going on within the church, and it probably would have happened regardless to whether the Reformation had occurred or not. In fact, this was not the first time that it had had to deal with corruption. Try looking up the Cluny Reform Movement of the Catholic Church, dating from around the year 900 in France up through about 1100. This was a very successful internal reform movement that cleaned up many problems within the church. (Ironically, it also partially led to the celibacy of priests, as married priests were sometimes corrupt and used the money from the collection plate to pay for their families and a high lifestyle.) The Counter Reformation addressed most of the abuses with regard to corrupt priests, simony, the outright sale of indulgences, and so on. It did not, however, change one iota of doctrine. This was done purposely to reaffirm that the Catholic Church was correct, and that reform could occur without breaking from the church. A little reported fact about the Reformation is that as a result of the Counter Reformation, over 50% of those that originally broke from the Church in Europe eventually reverted back.

Now, Vatican II is an interesting question, but again, it didn’t change as much as people think. If you ask ten Catholics about Vatican II, you’re likely to get ten different answers. It didn’t really address doctrine, but what it did do is reform the rituals of the Liturgy. Here’s a link to some of it’s history and a summary of what it did.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vatican_II