The Catholic Church alone
Lots of folks have their panties in a bunch over the new document released from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) which reaffirms that the “one Church established by Christ subsists in the Catholic Church“. In other words, only the Catholic Church has the fullness of the faith given and revealed by Christ Jesus, through the Holy Spirit.
But, this document is still not saying that Protestants are not Christians.
Over the years, I’ve had conversations where I’ve been accused of not being Christian because I was Catholic. These folks — and there are more of them out there than some may think — blatantly stated that they believed the Catholic Church to be a cult, and not a Christian Church.
Of course, these will say that this is just one more proof that the Catholic Church is not Christian.
Eric Scheske over at The Daily Eudemon gives a bit different take, saying that Protestants shouldn’t be upset since they don’t believe the Church is the means of salvation.
Folks need to calm down
For me, this statement from the CDF is nothing new. It provides a clarification to those theologians who have attempted to nuance the meaning of previous statements in order to teach things that weren’t intended.
“There is no better comment to make than to say that this promulgation really changes nothing of the traditional doctrine. What Christ willed, we also will. What was, still is. What the Church has taught down through the centuries, we also teach. In simple terms that which was assumed, is now explicit; that which was uncertain, is now clarified; that which was meditated upon, discussed and sometimes argued over, is now put together in one clear formulation.”
All should strive to understand the truths as they are even revealed and handed to us in the Scriptures. Christ Jesus established the Church a “a visible and spiritual community”.
But, that is not to say that non-Catholics are not saved, cannot be saved, and even that they don’t have a relationship with God.
It is possible, according to Catholic doctrine, to affirm correctly that the Church of Christ is present and operative in the churches and ecclesial Communities not yet fully in communion with the Catholic Church, on account of the elements of sanctification and truth that are present in them.
It is just to say that they do not possess all the marks of the Church that Jesus Christ established — being one (in belief, profession and worship — most fully in the Eucharist), holy, catholic (universal — at all times and places since being established by Christ), and apostolic (having the fullness of faith received from the apostles and taught with authority of them, in succession from them via laying on of hands). They may possess some aspects of these, but not the fullness of each of them.
For all this legal-ese, if you will, there are many reasonable truths expressed. If one looks around at all the various churches and denominations around this country and the world, one quickly sees that they do not all profess the same beliefs and faith. In fact, many of them are contradictory and/or mutually exclusive professions that cannot be held together. It is obvious that two competing doctrines cannot be equal, therefore one or both are not holding to the doctrines revealed by Christ Jesus and the Holy Spirit — they cannot both hold the fullness of truth.
As I’ve said, that doesn’t mean those attending either one of these churches are not “saved” or won’t be saved.
The clarification issued by the CDF will hopefully lead those to look at what they believe in order to be drawn into deeper understanding and true faith in Christ Jesus.
What do you think?
If you are Catholic, I’d love to hear what you like about this latest document by the CDF. If you’re not Catholic, I’d like to hear what your impressions are of what the document says, and whether it offends you, gives you hope, caused you to look closer at what you believe, or whatever else.
[tags]catholic, church, protestant, vatican, pope, catholicsphere, apologetics, salvation, faith, religon[/tags]
What do I think of the document? I think it’s great! Not in a triumphal, “I told ya so” sort of way, but more along the lines of an affirmation of what the Church has always taught and what I’ve always believed.
Reflecting specifically upon the section of the document that says that one can “affirm correctly that the Church of Christ is present and operative in the churches and ecclesial Communities not yet fully in communion with the Catholic Church”, I wonder how many have realized that “Church of Christ” and “Catholic Church” are being used interchangably here? What is the Church asserting, then? She’s asserting that She is operative in any body that correctly clais to have - or in fact does have - elements of the truth in it!
God bless.
Cocol
Cocol said this on July 12th, 2007 at 11:36 pm
The document is true and the publishing of it is imprudent. Did it convert one Protestant? No.
It is meant to please the choir of those Catholics who already believe what it says….like an exercise of spending too much time at the mirror.
That means that beside annoying Protestants; it produced no new fruit in Catholicism. The only people on earth who will read the document are those who need it not at all because they already know what it says and they could have written it too. Catholicism’s drop away non Mass attending population does not read encyclicals let alone documents from the CDF so the document was not meant to reach them since all we do is send them envelopes for parish donating. So who was helped by this document? If no one was helped, it produced no fruit whatsoever. We need the CDF to be working on real problems like cooperation in sin at various forms of employment: can Catholics work in a bookstore like Barnes and Noble which sells both good books and books with truly devilish morals as implicit in them/ can Catholics who own a pizza place deliver pizza to the same abortion clinic each week on Wednesday without giving scandal/ can Catholics sell furniture without noting to the customer that thin cottons on a sofa last about 3 years in heavy traffic while synthetics which the customer likes less, last 10 years and up/ can Catholics have their 401 in foreign stocks without knowing what those companies are making or whether they are paying a just wage…get my drift? There are reality questions that the Church is never working on because we are posturing half the time with non reality questions like Latin at Mass….what does “subsist” mean…”let’s save Timothy McVeigh from the death penalty…he only killed 40 children or so”….all things that don’t involve the intimate reality of living day to day religion.
Ask yourself….who will read the document: people who already love it and Protestants who long to hate it by reading it so that they can hate it more. The CDF should be working on reality instead of the ivory tower dilemnas of the ivory tower.
bill bannon said this on September 16th, 2007 at 10:34 am