Outside the Catholic Church there is no salvation??

There is considerable confusion about the Catholic teaching of salvation. I found this on the internet. It was written by a former Presbyterian who became Catholic as an adult. It should be easy to understand he explains the docterine very well. .........

The phrase (in Latin, "Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus" or "Outside the Church there is no salvation") is a very ancient one, going back to the very early days of Christianity. It was originally meant to affirm the necessity of baptism and Christian faith at a time when

(a) A number of Christians were being tempted under torture to renounce their faith and deny Christ. (He's talking about the Roman Empire and Nero's persecution of Christians, throwing them to lions and such.) (b) Large groups of Christians were being led into "pseudo-Christian" cult-type groups, which were actually just a front for pagan philosophy and religion. (Such as the cult of Mithras which I think was practiced around the time after Jesus died.)

In response, bishops repeated that, if a person were to be aware of the meaning of Christ and then freely deny him or reject him, they had essentially turned away from God and the salvation he offers.

As Christians, we believe that we are saved only through Jesus. As St. Peter reminds his audience in Acts 4:12: "There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved." In most cases, this means that we believe baptism in water, in the name of the Trinity, is the fundamental requirement for salvation.

However, even from the beginning, the great Christian writer and teacher St. Augustine said that the salvation imparted through baptism can also be imparted through other means: specifically, through the "baptism of blood" (a non-Christian who dies defending Christian beliefs or holy places) and "the baptism of desire" (a non-Christian who has expressed a firm desire to become a Christian, and who shows all the signs of living a Christian life, but who dies before baptism). In both of those cases, the Church has always recognized that the Holy Spirit leads people to God in ways which we cannot always explain or document.

God is able to save anyone he chooses. We trust that he often does this is ways that are not obvious to us, within the hearts of individuals who are sincerely seeking the truth. Otherwise, it would imply that all of humanity was excluded from salvation before Christ came, and that much of humanity (which has not had the opportunity to hear the Christian message until recently) was doomed to be eternally separated from God. This would imply a very cruel and elitist God. Our belief as Christians and Catholics is that God desires the salvation of all people … even those who are not Christian. How he achieves that, however, is a mystery. But we know that our God is a loving God who would not allow people to suffer on account of an ignorance that they were not responsible for.

The Church teaches that baptism, faith, and a life lived in Christ are necessary for salvation. However, Vatican II also taught that, within every human heart, God places the law of conscience. Everybody has a deep sense of right and wrong which ultimately comes from God, and which will lead people to God if they attempt to follow their conscience faithfully. Because Jesus is God, those who move in the direction of God (even non-Christians) are ultimately moving in the direction of Jesus. And if they are moving in the direction of Jesus and His truth, ultimately they are expressing a desire for the salvation that God gives. The Church teaches that, while it is certainly easier to receive salvation as a Christian, it is not impossible to receive salvation in other religions.

This is a challenging situation: on one hand, we must be respectful of the good things to be found in other faiths, and encourage people to live their faiths with sincerity and love.

On the other hand, this does not mean that all religions are the same. We believe that Christ is the ultimate revealing of God to the world, and that the more we know about his message, the greater the chance that we will accept his offer and be saved. We must therefore continue to preach the message of the Gospel, and encourage interested non-Catholics to examine the claims of our faith, without in any way coercing or intimidating them.

Father Feeney was an American priest who, back in the 1940s, taught that if a person was not a Roman Catholic, they were condemned to hell. This has never been the accepted teaching of Catholicism, and Father Feeney was reprimanded by the Vatican for his mistaken understanding.

Nevertheless, there are groups which continue to hold to this strict interpretation, even after the Pope and bishops have specifically rejected it.

The phrase "Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus" teaches us that salvation is only through Christ, the Way, the Truth and the Life. But God is able to save whomever he pleases, whether they are baptized in the Roman Catholic Church or not.

It is important to remember that "the Church" in this phrase does not refer exclusively to the Roman Catholic Church. Salvation is a great gift, and God is a loving Father who wants all of his children to receive it. How he works this out, however, we will only understand in heaven. That is why, whenever we quote "Outside the Church, there is no salvation", we should also remember that "God is in no way bound by the sacraments."

Until then, we continue to proclaim Jesus as Lord (evangelization) and engage in respectful dialogue with followers of other religions, to discover the truths that God had revealed to them to guide them toward salvation, and to share with them the truth as we have discovered it in Christ.

Thanks for the thoughtful reply.

I've read the quote from Mother Theresa (who's work I respect very much...I have a cousin who was adopted from one of the orphanages that Mother Theresa helped run), but the problem that opens for me is that it is more of the "all roads lead to God" theology that I can not accept.

Aside from being a doctrine heavily promoted by New Age philosophy, it flies in the face of simple logic. If it was not necessary for Jesus to die for our sins, then why would He have put Himself through all that. I mean, why step down from His rightful place of glory, humble Himself by becoming a man (as scripture teaches us) and then allow Himself to suffer and be put to a cruel death by the very ones He created? If "all roads lead to heaven" then God didn't need to do any of that....we could all just find our own way, or at least some way that didn't involve Jesus going to the cross for us.

Jesus said "I am the way [not just one way], the truth [not a version of truth] and the light [not one among many]".

This does not in any way discount the wonderful works of charity and kindness that Mother Theresa and thousands like her over the ages have done in God's name. The Bible tells us that if we have true faith we will also have good works (the one is a natural outpouring of the other), but it is also very clear that salvation is by faith alone.

Peace.

The institutional and earthly manifestation of the Church is only valid to the extent that it is true to the Spirit of Christ and the mystical/spiritual/invisible dimension of the "Mystical Body." Hence, a lot of institutional Christianity (of all denominations) is false and a form of pride or pharisaic charlatanism. Unfortunately, AmChurch offers a good deal of this infidelity.

To engage in this discussion, one must acknowledge the necessity of "salvation".

The concept of an "original" sin having been committed must also be acknowledged to participate in the discussion.

If neither is acknowledged, comments by churches and antiquity translations are meaningless.

What has one to say if they do not accept the original guilt trip?

Father Murray, whoever he might be, should examine the document of the Church from last year Dominus Iesus is he needs help defining the Church. Suffice it to say that the Church in this phrase is none other than the Catholic one, the only one.

So, Dave are you saying here that you have to be a member of the Catholic (captiol C) Church to gain salvation?

Becky

The author is so right - the "church" is not a denomination, but a condition of the heart. For those who have received Jesus as Savior and Lord, they have become a member of "the church".

The Mormons also make a statement, "we are the one true church". Which is a bunch of poppy-cock.

The true "church" consists of true believers; be they Methodists, Catholics, Presbyterians, Lutherans, and even us Fundamentalists, etc.

Roman Catholics believe devout Muslims are saved.

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Not necessarily. RCs believe that it's possible for devout Muslims to be saved by Christ. But it hinges on many caveats -- it presupposes the fact that such a devout Muslim never heard the Gospel, never was exposed to Christianity. A Muslim is accountable for informing his conscience to the best of his ability, and if he were exposed to the truth of the Gospel and did not further investigate, then he would be culpable for his own ignorance in that case. However, there would be mitigating circumstances -- was he briefly exposed? had he been brainwashed into thinking Christianity was evil? etc. These types of things could be considered extenuating circumstances.

However, the point is, it's no simple "Follow your conscience, and you're in." That attitude belies a presumption of God's mercy, and is a grave sin in itself. I think the better way of phrasing it is that "Salvation is possible outside formal membership within Christianity."

What happens to pagan idol worshippers who do follow their conscience?

That depends on whether they have participated in the proper formation of an informed conscience to the best of their abilities (i.e. - if they were part of a child sacrificing cult, and they had a nagging sense that something was wrong with throwing children to the pits of flames and spikes, that they took the necessary steps, no matter how dangerous, to figure out if this was right).

You should not be so smug. What if you had been born a Hindu? What if all your ancestors for centuries were Hindu and you loved them and respected them. What if the ties that bound you to them and to your land and culture were intertwined with Hinduism? Are you so smug as to think that just hearing the gospel once or twice could overcome all that conditioning?

It is not "smug" to believe that God can overcome any obstacles to belief in Jesus Christ, including Hinduism, Islam, or any other false religions.

The arm of the Lord is never too short to save those He has chosen as His own...

-penny

Whosoever, therefore, knowing that the Catholic Church was made necessary by God through Jesus Christ, would refuse to enter her or to remain in her could not be saved.

There is a lot of wiggle room in this statement created by the word knowing. Certainly if one was never exposed to the RC teachings, one could not know. If were exposed (as might be the case for a Muslim) they may still not know in the sense that they do not believe.

Does this Vatican II fuzzy statement supercede the previous black and white statements?

Are you saying that if they honestly and totally believed that child sacrifices were holy in the eyes of their god, they would be saved?

This, of course, is very hypothetical. A sane man anywhere in today's world would have to have a sense of wrongness about child sacrifices.

At this point in the hypothetical, I fear we would be forced to make too great an assumption. You either assume that the person has *no* moral qualms within his consciousness whatsoever about sacrificing children, or assume that he *does* have some sort or presence of internal convulsion, either great or small, that suggests the act is wrong. I think that someone of the Judeo-Christian fold would tend toward assuming that in all humanity there is the law of God imprinted upon the soul that, at the least, would send off at least some sort of internal moral incongruity in sacrificing a child, at some level in the individual.

However, that said, I would just back up to the general statement that the Catholic position regards a person's willingness to not only follow their conscience, but also suitably inform that conscience to the best of their abilities. This becomes a subjective matter that is left up to God to determine (that is, how culpable a person is with regard to their own participation in the formation of conscience). Discussing this relative to a child-sacrificing pagan seems to be a moot point since we'd be trying to do it in a vacuum. All a Catholic could say with regard to that individual's salvation would be that it would be possible for God to save the person.

For, it must be held by faith that outside the Apostolic Roman Church, no one can be saved; that this is the only ark of salvation (Pius IX (1846-1878 A.D.)

When the voice of the Pope speaks on matters of morality, salvation and Church Doctrine the truth of those pronouncements is infallible; unarguable and absolute.

It is actually the voice of God speaking through the Pope.

When Becky asks SoothingDave "are you saying here that you have to be a member of the Catholic (captiol C) Church to gain salvation?" his answer must be a resounding "YES!"

Iowegian has presented an unimpeachable set of historical Papal pronouncements that makes this basic article of Catholic faith abundantly clear.

There is no interpretive argument possible here on such a fundamental point of Catholic Doctrine.

You all have made me curious about this subject. I did a web search. I found a site which claims to give the answer to this question. The summation says

Salvation is a matter of how we respond to the truth we are given in life. Only for those who have encountered the fullness of truth in Christ is a formal proclamation of belief in Christ necessary.

The web site is located at http://www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/augustine/a/salvation.html

Canon IV: If any one saith, that the sacraments of the New Law are not necessary unto salvation, but superfluous; and that, without them, or without the desire thereof, men obtain of God, through faith alone, the grace of justification; - though all (the sacraments) are not necessary for every individual: let him be anathema.

Amazing! I bookmarked this bad boy.

If any one saith, that by the said sacraments of the New Law grace is not conferred through the act performed

Grace is an act? I'm sure that we've been told that grace and works were not the same. Grace is a gift. Since when did we earn a gift?

The Greek word for gift is charis. It is also used for grace. I go to work for a paycheck, not a gift.

I am saved through grace, and not by my own actions.

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