“Why would those of us who have come out...who know we have eternal life by faith in Christ and who have the assurance of the Holy Spirit testifying with our spirits that we are the children of God, EVER want to return...?”
Catholics fully recognize that Jesus Christ died on the Cross for their sins and thus “opened the gates of Heaven,” and that salvation is a free gift which no amount of human good deeds could ever earn. Catholics receive Christ’s saving and sanctifying grace, and Christ Himself, into their souls when they are baptized. Yet they also know that Christ has established certain conditions for entry into eternal happiness in Heaven – for example, receiving His true Flesh and Blood (John 6:54) and keeping the commandments (Matt. 19:17). If a Christian refuses or neglects to obey Our Lord’s commands in a grave matter (that is, if he commits a mortal sin), Our Lord will not remain dwelling in his soul; and if a Christian dies in that state, having driven his Lord from his soul by serious sin, he will not be saved. As St. Paul warned the Galatians with regard to certain sins: “They who do such things shall not obtain the kingdom of God.” (Gal. 5:21). It must be added that Christ will always forgive and return to a sinner who approaches Him with sincerity in the Sacrament of Penance.
Catholics follow St. Paul, who did not think that his salvation was guaranteed once and for all at the moment he first received Christ into his soul; for he wrote: “I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection: lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway.” (I Cor. 9:27). Also: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation. For it is God who worketh in you...” (Phil. 2:12-13). “And unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required.” (Luke 12:48). “He that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved.” (Matt. 10:22). Nevertheless, Catholics realize that even the fulfilling of Our Lord’s requirements for salvation is impossible without the free gift of His grace.
Catholics know that theirs is the one true Church of Jesus Christ,
firstly, because theirs is the only Christian Church that goes back in history to the time of Christ;
secondly, because theirs is the only Christian Church which possesses the invincible unity, the intrinsic holiness, the continual universality and the indisputable apostolicity which Christ said would distinguish His true Church;
and thirdly, because the Apostles and primitive Church Fathers, who certainly were members of Christ’s true Church, all professed membership in this same Catholic Church (See Apostles’ Creed and the Primitive Christian letters).
Wrote Ignatius of Antioch, illustrious Church Father of the first century: “Where the Bishop is, there let the multitude of believers be; even as where Jesus is, there is the Catholic Church.” Our Lord said: “There shall be one fold and one shepherd”, yet it is well known that the various Christian denominations cannot agree on what Christ actually taught.
Since Christ roundly condemned interdenominationalism (”And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand.” Mark 3:25), Catholics cannot believe that He would ever sanction it in His Church.
(From http://www.olrl.org/apologetics/cathansr.shtml)
...how to receive...
Catholics fully recognize that Jesus Christ died on the Cross for their sins and thus “opened the gates of Heaven,” and that salvation is a free gift which no amount of human good deeds could ever earn.
Tada!
Although the bible indicates otherwise.
Yet they also know that Christ has established certain conditions for entry into eternal happiness in Heaven – for example, receiving His true Flesh and Blood (John 6:54) and keeping the commandments (Matt. 19:17).
YES!
Yes He did:
John 6:28-29
Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?”
Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”
25 When they found him on the other side of the lake, they asked him, “Rabbi, when did you get here?”
26 Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw the signs I performed but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. 27 Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For on him God the Father has placed his seal of approval.”
28 Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?”
29 Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”
30 So they asked him, “What sign then will you give that we may see it and believe you? What will you do? 31 Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written: ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’[c]”
32 Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, it is not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. 33 For the bread of God is the bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”
34 “Sir,” they said, “always give us this bread.”
35 Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. 36 But as I told you, you have seen me and still you do not believe. 37 All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. 38 For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. 40 For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.”
41 At this the Jews there began to grumble about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” 42 They said, “Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I came down from heaven’?”
43 “Stop grumbling among yourselves,” Jesus answered. 44 “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them, and I will raise them up at the last day. 45 It is written in the Prophets: ‘They will all be taught by God.’[d] Everyone who has heard the Father and learned from him comes to me. 46 No one has seen the Father except the one who is from God; only he has seen the Father. 47 Very truly I tell you, the one who believes has eternal life. 48 I am the bread of life. 49 Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, yet they died. 50 But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which anyone may eat and not die. 51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.”
52 Then the Jews began to argue sharply among themselves, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”
ork work work work, ya gotta earn that catholic salvation through obedience to Rome. Yes, we know well what your religion teaches, even as its apologist claim otherwise while exposing the work work work striving for salvation romish lie.
Like cults, you can use evangelical terms yet not mean what Scripture does. Salvation being a free gift does not mean that by the act of baptism (ex opere operato) one actually becomes good enough to go to Heaven (being formally justified by his own personal justice and holiness) - unless you do not believe the newly baptized would thus directly do there - thus resulting in such later on usually having to spend an indeterminate period (even centuries of earth time) experiencing postmortem "purifying torments" in RC "Purgatory" (as if suffering itself developed character) until he/she (atones for sins and ) once again becomes good enough to enter Heaven and be with the Lord.
Instead, since believers are justified on Christ's account, and made "accepted in the Beloved," and are seated together with Him in Heaven (Eph. 1:6; 2:6) and have direct access into the holy of holies in Heaven (Heb. 10:19) - not because they are actually good enough - then wherever Scripture clearly speak of the next conscious reality for believers then it is with the Lord, (Lk. 23:43 [cf. 2Cor. 12:4; Rv. 2:7]; Phil 1:23; 2Cor. 5:8 [“we”]; 1Cor. 15:51ff'; 1Thess. 4:17) Note in the latter case all believers were assured that if the Lord returned, which they expected in their lifetime, so would they “ever be with the Lord,” though they were still undergoing growth in grace, as was Paul. (Phil. 3:10f)
And the next transformative experience that is manifestly taught is that of being like Christ in the resurrection. (1Jn. 3:2; Rm. 8:23; 1Co 15:53,54; 2Co. 2-4) At which time is the only suffering after this life, that of the loss of rewards due to the combustible nature of the material one built the church with, which one is saved despite of, not because of. (1Co. 3:8ff)< /p>
Yet they also know that Christ has established certain conditions for entry into eternal happiness in Heaven – for example, receiving His true Flesh and Blood (John 6:54)
. While the only kind of faith that justifies in the kind that effects obedience to the Lord, and practical holiness and repentance for failing that, yet Jn. 6:54 goes with v. 53: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you." (John 6:53) But the Lord's supper is nowhere preached as the means of obtaining spiritual life , or nourishment. Instead it is the words that Christ speaks which are spirit and life, and is called spiritual "milk" (1Pt. 2:2) and "meat" (Heb. 5:12,14) and whereby believers obtain spiritual nourishment and are built up. (Acts 20:28.32; 1Tim. 4:6)
And rather than the Catholic priestly Eucharist being the premier, paramount cardinal event, not only do we never see a Catholic priest (or even a presbyter) conducting the Lord's supper, it is not even manifestly described in the life of the NT church except in one epistle (besides the "feast of charity in Jude 1:12).
And which the church is "one bread," having fellowship with Christ and each other the same way pagans have fellowship with demons by taking part in their dedicatory feasts, (1 Corinthians 10:16-21) while the focus is on the church as the body of Christ, whom carnal believers did not effectually recognize (thus "shame them that have not") in 1Co. 11:17ff.
As St. Paul warned the Galatians with regard to certain sins: “They who do such things shall not obtain the kingdom of God.” (Gal. 5:21).
It is one thing to realize that saving faith is that which effects "things that accompany salvation," (Heb. 6:9) and thus the warnings about "departing from the living God" and drawing back unto perdition, (Heb. 3:12; 10:38; cf. Gal. 5:1-4) and that works evidence that one has true faith and is fit to be rewarded under grace, since God rewards faith (Heb. 10:35, even though only God deserves credit), and it is another thing to teach or foster the belief that what one practically is and does actually merits the attainment of eternal life eternal life. No wonder Catholics typically express that the reason they believe that God will let them into Heaven is because they are pretty good, and never can testify to a day of conversion. Sprinkling an infant (which cannot fufill the requirements for baptism: Acts 2:38; 3:36,37) will not effect Biblical regeneration in them any more than it did Hitler.
firstly, because theirs is the only Christian Church that goes back in history to the time of Christ;
Under the New Covenant it is not formal historical descent that validates one but historical Scriptural faith, (Rm. 2:28,29; cf. Mt. 3:9) and what goes back in history to the time of Christ is the record of Catholic deformation of the NT church, in which she substantially is a foreigner!
The veracity of Catholic claims to be the NT church rest upon the premise of her ensured magisterial infallibility, under which Scripture, history and tradition only consist of and mean what she says. Yet ensured magisterial infallibility is a novel and unScriptural premise, being unseen and unnecessary in Scripture.
The OT magisterium had such authority that dissent was a capital offense, (Dt. 17;8-13) but which did not mean it was infallible. And instead, God often raised up men from without the magisterium, even in dissent from it, and thereby preserved faith. And which is how the church began, with itinerant preachers (and Preacher) who established their Truth claims upon Scriptural substantiation in word and in power. But which the claims of Rome to be the One True Church" are exposed as fallacious.
secondly, because theirs is the only Christian Church which possesses the invincible unity,
That is pure misleading bombast! Invincible unity? You yourself are part of a church without a pope, or with a poor depending upon who you ask, with both extremes invalidation each other. And read on:
the intrinsic holiness, the continual universality
More or the same. Besides today and the past unScriptural murderous use of the sword of men against simple theological offenders, even your own Bellarmine attested of your historical holiness (during the Western Schism),
"Some years before the rise of the Lutheran and Calvinistic heresy, according to the testimony of those who were then alive, there was almost an entire abandonment of equity in ecclesiastical judgments; in morals, no discipline; in sacred literature, no erudition; in divine things, no reverence; religion was almost extinct. (Concio XXVIII. Opp. Vi. 296- Colon 1617, in “A History of the Articles of Religion,” by Charles Hardwick, Cp. 1, p. 10,
Cardinal Ratzinger (regardless of your disrespect) states, "For nearly half a century, the Church was split into two or three obediences that excommunicated one another, so that every Catholic lived under excommunication by one pope or another, and, in the last analysis, no one could say with certainty which of the contenders had right on his side. The Church no longer offered certainty of salvation; she had become questionable in her whole objective form--the true Church, the true pledge of salvation, had to be sought outside the institution. (“Principles of Catholic Theology," 1989, p.196)
You can restrict your misleading claim to a relative remnant, and to paper doctrine, but it remains that the Catholic distinctives are simply not seen in the NT church, which it is contrary to!
and the indisputable apostolicity which Christ said would distinguish His true Church;
More propaganda. Rome's so-called apostolic successors simply fail of the qualifications and credentials of manifest Biblical apostles. (Acts 1:21,22; 1Cor. 9:1; Gal. 1:11,12; 2Cor. 6:1-0; 12:12) So do i, but i do not claim to be a Biblical apostle.
and thirdly, because the Apostles and primitive Church Fathers, who certainly were members of Christ’s true Church, all professed membership in this same Catholic Church (See Apostles’ Creed and the Primitive Christian letters).
Nonsense. The claim that the apostles professed the Apostles’ Creed , which is expanded version, is based upon unverifiable tradition, and once again the veracity of this claim rests upon the premise of Rome's self-proclaimed veracity.
Regardless, professing this creed no more makes on a Roman Catholic than it does for evangelicals, who can and do profess this creed with its basic truth, as we concur with it, and with "catholic" meaning universal.
And what the apostles did NOT profess/teach practice (as seen in Acts onward, which are interpretive of the gospels) were such things as:
• Praying to created beings in Heaven, which is utterly unseen in Scripture despite the Holy Spirit inspiring approx. 200 prayers by believers. Only pagans prayed to someone else!
•Directing the church to look to Peter as the first of a line of supreme infallible popes whom they were especially enjoined to honor and obey.
•That the magisterial office possessed ensured magisterial infallibility (by which she declares she is infallible), enabling them to even claim to essentially "remember" an extraScriptural event which lacks even early historical testimony. , and was opposed by RC scholars themselves the world over as being apostlic tradition.
• Ordaining a separate class of believers distinctively titled "priests ," whose primary active function was conducting the Lord's supper and offering up "real" flesh and blood as a sacrifice for sin.
•That the Catholic Eucharist as the paramount, supreme prevalent practice, the "source and summit of the Christian life," in which "our redemption is accomplished," around which all else basically revolved.
•That presbuteros (senior/elder) and episkopos (superintendent/overseer) denoted two separate classes .
• That celibacy was a requirement for clergy .
• That believers were separated into two classes, one formally called "saints."
•That imperfect believers must endure postmortem purifying torments in order to become good enough to enter Heaven, and saying prayers to obtain early release from it,
And more , to see by God's grace. ,
They may think so, but that doesn't make it so. The TRUE Church of Jesus Christ is made up of ALL believers in Jesus Christ and contains not even one "heretic". You come on this thread and accuse the majority of Roman Catholics of being heretics and covert "Protestants" - not even your POPE qualifies as a Catholic to you! Christ's own are a spiritual house of which all believers are living stones being built into it. There's no way any physical organization can be THE church because until Christ returns, there are wheat and tares within.
firstly, because theirs is the only Christian Church that goes back in history to the time of Christ;
Revisionist history hardly qualifies as the truth. EVERY person who follows and believes in Jesus Christ is a member of the same church begun at Pentecost. Perhaps you aren't familiar with the existence back then of local churches throughout the known world - you know, the church AT Rome, the church AT Corinth, the church AT Ephesus, the church AT Thessalonika, etc...? It is the faith in the truth of the gospel that makes us members of Christ's body, His bride. Not membership in an earthly, man made organization.
secondly, because theirs is the only Christian Church which possesses the invincible unity, the intrinsic holiness, the continual universality and the indisputable apostolicity which Christ said would distinguish His true Church;
Riiigghhtt...that "invincible" unity that you can't even defend with your OWN magisterium today! Intrinsic holiness is hardly a characteristic of every Catholic Pope much less the laity. That holiness comes from the indwelling Holy Spirit who resides within every genuine believer and who will never leave us or forsake us. It is with whom we are sealed unto the day of redemption. What's humorous is your insistence that there has been "continual" universality and "indisputable apostolicity" when you deny there even IS or has been a valid pope in Rome for nearly sixty years! That's not to mention the splits and schisms long before the Reformation happened. PLENTY of disputes are there!
and thirdly, because the Apostles and primitive Church Fathers, who certainly were members of Christ’s true Church, all professed membership in this same Catholic Church (See Apostles’ Creed and the Primitive Christian letters).
Actually, the adjective "catholic" - which means universal, wasn't even in use until the second century after Christ. So, no, the Apostles NEVER professed membership in any "Catholic" church. To repeat, the TRUE church of Jesus Christ is not an organization with headquarters in Rome, it is an organism - a spiritual house which every believer is a living stone. Your so-called first Pope told us that (see I Peter 2:5)!
Are you serious?!?!
Just who do you think you're kidding?
You're trying to convince us of some kind of *invincible unity* the whole time you reject the last few current popes?
There's NO unity within Catholicism. There are many rites, the EO disagree with the Roman rite which disagrees with the Ukrainian rite, etc, and the Roman rite is itself fractured and fragmented especially over this latest pope.
Try that on some brainwashed Catholic but not people who can think and use logic.