In the end, it’s a “Pass” or “Fail” system. Jesus, the Judge, has said He would make a determination on each person… each soul.
Only Jesus, the Judge, can look into the soul and heart of each person and decide: Pass or Fail.
However, one other can look into the soul and heart of each person and decide: Pass or Fail. And that is the person himself or herself.
The Church teaches that the fullness of faith is found only in the Catholic Church. If a person has rejected the Catholic Church for some fatuous reason: sexually corrupt priests, for example, then when that person reaches his or her judgment, well, I don’t know what Jesus, the Judge, will decide… but it is possible that the Judge will grimace, shake His head, clench His lips and teeth and say, “Sorry, Charlie.” And down you go.
On the other hand, what if that same person was observed just prior to death, to be minding his own business, walking down the street, and sees, for example, a young girl being abducted into a van. The person drops his (or her) bundles and chases after the van… jumps on the back bumper… hangs on with fingertips to the door hinge… and calls and yells for the police. Say, the police arrive and rescue the girl and arrest the kidnappers. BUT, in the course of the event the person on the back bumper falls and strikes the pavement, and is killed instantly.
Then, what does Jesus the Judge decide?
[That was an actual case, by the way… the person’s father said that he believed the person’s only and sole reason for existence was to be available to effect that rescue. I heard his words when the father was being interviewed.]
Jesus, the Teacher/Judge, also spoke of a Wedding Feast, in which everyone was invited, but one had no wedding garment and was therefore thrown out into the night to be eaten by the wild animals and there would be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
And if we are Catholics, and we believe that the fullness of faith is found in the Catholic Church, and we do nothing to spread the word, the faith … then where are WE?
Without hearing the fullness of faith, how will non-Catholics or “apostate Catholics” recognize what they may be missing and, as sheep among the rocky cliffs, be rescued?
How will WE be judged?
Fulton J. Sheen, the famous radio and television preacher, and priest and bishop and archbishop, said he expected that in heaven there would be three surprises. That there would be people there that he NEVER expected to see there. That there would be people absent who he had been absolutely certain WOULD be there, but weren’t. And, third, he would be surprised that he was there.
So, why would such a famous priest believe that he might not be there? What did he see inside his own heart?
Do you mean that only those Jews who were looking forward to Christ were saved? I’m not so sure they had to know what we know about the Messiah in the OT as we do. That would be asking too much of them or anyone living before the Incarnation. But, we do know the righteous were saved because their righteousness was credited to them as acts of faith, as St. Paul tells us.
