No Salvation Outside the Church

Catholic Answers ^ | 12/05 | Fr. Ray Ryland

[bdeaner]

Why does the Catholic Church teach that there is "no salvation outside the Church"? Doesn’t this contradict Scripture? God "desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (1 Tim. 2:4). "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me" (John 14:6). Peter proclaimed to the Sanhedrin, "There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12).

Since God intends (plans, wills) that every human being should go to heaven, doesn’t the Church’s teaching greatly restrict the scope of God’s redemption? Does the Church mean—as Protestants and (I suspect) many Catholics believe—that only members of the Catholic Church can be saved?

That is what a priest in Boston, Fr. Leonard Feeney, S.J., began teaching in the 1940s. His bishop and the Vatican tried to convince him that his interpretation of the Church’s teaching was wrong. He so persisted in his error that he was finally excommunicated, but by God’s mercy, he was reconciled to the Church before he died in 1978.

In correcting Fr. Feeney in 1949, the Supreme Congregation of the Holy Office (now the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) issued a document entitled Suprema Haec Sacra, which stated that "extra ecclesiam, nulla salus" (outside the Church, no salvation) is "an infallible statement." But, it added, "this dogma must be understood in that sense in which the Church itself understands it."

Note that word dogma. This teaching has been proclaimed by, among others, Pope Pelagius in 585, the Fourth Lateran Council in 1214, Pope Innocent III in 1214, Pope Boniface VIII in 1302, Pope Pius XII, Pope Paul VI, the Second Vatican Council, Pope John Paul II, and the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Dominus Iesus.

Our point is this: When the Church infallibly teaches extra ecclesiam, nulla salus, it does not say that non-Catholics cannot be saved. In fact, it affirms the contrary. The purpose of the teaching is to tell us how Jesus Christ makes salvation available to all human beings.

Work Out Your Salvation

There are two distinct dimensions of Jesus Christ’s redemption. Objective redemption is what Jesus Christ has accomplished once for all in his life, death, resurrection, and ascension: the redemption of the whole universe. Yet the benefits of that redemption have to be applied unceasingly to Christ’s members throughout their lives. This is subjective redemption. If the benefits of Christ’s redemption are not applied to individuals, they have no share in his objective redemption. Redemption in an individual is an ongoing process. "Work out your own salvation in fear and trembling; for God is at work in you" (Phil. 2:12–13).

How does Jesus Christ work out his redemption in individuals? Through his mystical body. When I was a Protestant, I (like Protestants in general) believed that the phrase "mystical body of Christ" was essentially a metaphor. For Catholics, the phrase is literal truth.

Here’s why: To fulfill his Messianic mission, Jesus Christ took on a human body from his Mother. He lived a natural life in that body. He redeemed the world through that body and no other means. Since his Ascension and until the end of history, Jesus lives on earth in his supernatural body, the body of his members, his mystical body. Having used his physical body to redeem the world, Christ now uses his mystical body to dispense "the divine fruits of the Redemption" (Mystici Corporis 31).

The Church: His Body

What is this mystical body? The true Church of Jesus Christ, not some invisible reality composed of true believers, as the Reformers insisted. In the first public proclamation of the gospel by Peter at Pentecost, he did not invite his listeners to simply align themselves spiritually with other true believers. He summoned them into a society, the Church, which Christ had established. Only by answering that call could they be rescued from the "crooked generation" (Acts 2:40) to which they belonged and be saved.

Paul, at the time of his conversion, had never seen Jesus. Yet recall how Jesus identified himself with his Church when he spoke to Paul on the road to Damascus: "Why do you persecute me?" (Acts 9:4, emphasis added) and "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting" (Acts 9:5). Years later, writing to Timothy, Paul ruefully admitted that he had persecuted Jesus by persecuting his Church. He expressed gratitude for Christ appointing him an apostle, "though I formerly b.asphemed and persecuted and insulted him" (1 Tim. 1:13).

The Second Vatican Council says that the hierarchical structure of the Catholic Church and the mystical body of Christ "form one complex reality that comes together from a human and a divine element" (Lumen Gentium 8). The Church is "the fullness of him [Christ] who fills all in all" (Eph. 1:23). Now that Jesus has accomplished objective redemption, the "plan of mystery hidden for ages in God" is "that through the Church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places" (Eph. 3:9–10).

According to John Paul II, in order to properly understand the Church’s teaching about its role in Christ’s scheme of salvation, two truths must be held together: "the real possibility of salvation in Christ for all humanity" and "the necessity of the Church for salvation" (Redemptoris Missio 18). John Paul taught us that the Church is "the seed, sign, and instrument" of God’s kingdom and referred several times to Vatican II’s designation of the Catholic Church as the "universal sacrament of salvation":

"The Church is the sacrament of salvation for all humankind, and her activity is not limited only to those who accept her message" (RM 20).

"Christ won the Church for himself at the price of his own blood and made the Church his co-worker in the salvation of the world. . . . He carries out his mission through her" (RM 9).

In an address to the plenary assembly of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (January 28, 2000), John Paul stated, "The Lord Jesus . . . established his Church as a saving reality: as his body, through which he himself accomplishes salvation in history." He then quoted Vatican II’s teaching that the Church is necessary for salvation.

In 2000 the CDF issued Dominus Iesus, a response to widespread attempts to dilute the Church’s teaching about our Lord and about itself. The English subtitle is itself significant: "On the Unicity and Salvific Universality of Jesus Christ and the Church." It simply means that Jesus Christ and his Church are indivisible. He is universal Savior who always works through his Church:

The only Savior . . . constituted the Church as a salvific mystery: He himself is in the Church and the Church is in him. . . . Therefore, the fullness of Christ’s salvific mystery belongs also to the Church, inseparably united to her Lord (DI 18).

Indeed, Christ and the Church "constitute a single ‘whole Christ’" (DI 16). In Christ, God has made known his will that "the Church founded by him be the instrument for the salvation of all humanity" (DI 22). The Catholic Church, therefore, "has, in God’s plan, an indispensable relationship with the salvation of every human being" (DI 20).

The key elements of revelation that together undergird extra ecclesiam, nulla salus are these: (1) Jesus Christ is the universal Savior. (2) He has constituted his Church as his mystical body on earth through which he dispenses salvation to the world. (3) He always works through it—though in countless instances outside its visible boundaries. Recall John Paul’s words about the Church quoted above: "Her activity is not limited only to those who accept its message."

Not of this Fold

Extra ecclesiam, nulla salus does not mean that only faithful Roman Catholics can be saved. The Church has never taught that. So where does that leave non-Catholics and non-Christians?

Jesus told his followers, "I have other sheep, that are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they will heed my voice. So there shall be one flock, one shepherd" (John 10:16). After his Resurrection, Jesus gave the threefold command to Peter: "Feed my lambs. . . . Tend my sheep. . . . Feed my sheep" (John 21:15–17). The word translated as "tend" (poimaine) means "to direct" or "to superintend"—in other words, "to govern." So although there are sheep that are not of Christ’s fold, it is through the Church that they are able to receive his salvation.

People who have never had an opportunity to hear of Christ and his Church—and those Christians whose minds have been closed to the truth of the Church by their conditioning—are not necessarily cut off from God’s mercy. Vatican II phrases the doctrine in these terms: 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 consciences—those too may achieve eternal salvation (LG 16).

Since Christ died for all, and since all men are in fact called to one and the same destiny, which is divine, we must hold that the Holy Spirit offers to all the possibility of being made partakers, in a way known to God, of the Paschal mystery (Gaudium et Spes 22).

The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches:

Every man who is ignorant of the gospel of Christ and of his Church but seeks the truth and does the will of God in accordance with his understanding of it can be saved. It may be supposed that such persons would have desired baptism explicitly if they had known its necessity (CCC 1260).

Obviously, it is not their ignorance that enables them to be saved. Ignorance excuses only lack of knowledge. That which opens the salvation of Christ to them is their conscious effort, under grace, to serve God as well as they can on the basis of the best information they have about him.

The Church speaks of "implicit desire" or "longing" that can exist in the hearts of those who seek God but are ignorant of the means of his grace. If a person longs for salvation but does not know the divinely established means of salvation, he is said to have an implicit desire for membership in the Church. Non-Catholic Christians know Christ, but they do not know his Church. In their desire to serve him, they implicitly desire to be members of his Church. Non-Christians can be saved, said John Paul, if they seek God with "a sincere heart." In that seeking they are "related" to Christ and to his body the Church (address to the CDF).

On the other hand, the Church has long made it clear that if a person rejects the Church with full knowledge and consent, he puts his soul in danger:

They cannot be saved who, knowing that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ, would refuse either to enter it or remain in it (cf. LG 14).

The Catholic Church is "the single and exclusive channel by which the truth and grace of Christ enter our world of space and time" (Karl Adam, The Spirit of Catholicism, 179). Those who do not know the Church, even those who fight against it, can receive these gifts if they honestly seek God and his truth. But, Adam says, "though it be not the Catholic Church itself that hands them the bread of truth and grace, yet it is Catholic bread that they eat." And when they eat of it, "without knowing it or willing it" they are "incorporated in the supernatural substance of the Church."

Extra ecclesiam, nulla salus.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR



Fr. Ray Ryland, a convert and former Episcopal priest, holds a Ph.D. in theology from Marquette University and is a contributing editor to This Rock. He writes from Steubenville, Ohio, where he lives with his wife, Ruth.

[Marysecretary]

No, I have the assurance in Christ.

[Marysecretary]

AMEN, Markos. You got that right.

[Marysecretary]

Ohhh, yes I have.

[papertyger]

Legalisms and they are unnecessary thats all.

???????

[papertyger]

We take the wine and bread in remembrance of Him, as He said.

What part of "do this" is unclear?

[Mr Rogers]

I have the assurance of my salvation NOW, not after the casket is closed.

You have no other "assurance" than your interpretation of Scripture.

Yet we read in Romans 8:

"15 For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, "Abba, Father." 16 The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children."

From the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith:

18.2 This certainty is not mere conjecture or probability based on a fallible hope. Rather it is an infallible assurance of faith based on the blood and righteousness of Christ revealed in the Gospel, on the inward evidence of those graces of the Spirit (about which promises have been made), and on the testimony of the Spirit of adoption who witnesses with our spirits that we are the children of God. As the fruit of this assurance, the Spirit keeps our hearts both humble and holy.

18.3 This infallible assurance is not an essential part of faith, for a true believer may wait a long time, and struggle with many difficulties before obtaining it. Yet we may obtain it without extraordinary revelation and by the right use of ordinary means, for we are enabled by the Spirit to know the things which are freely given to us by God. Therefore it is the duty of everyone to be as diligent as possible to make their calling and election sure, so that their hearts may be enlarged in peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, in love and thankfulness to God, and in strength and cheerfulness in carrying out the duties of obedience. These duties are the natural fruits of this assurance, for it is far from inclining people to loose living.

My experience follows the confession - that assurance didn't come immediately, but followed as I matured and came to know more of God & Scripture.

If you lack assurance, I suggest you carefully consider your beliefs. For in scripture, our justification is past tense. There is no basis in scripture for facing death without assurance of eternal life, unless such is your choice.

[bdeaner]

The Church is the Mystical Body of Christ.

Acts 9:1-5 But Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. Now as he journeyed he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed about him. And he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?" And he said, "Who are you, Lord?" And he said, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting..."

We know Saul was persecuting Christians. Yet Christ asks Saul, "Why are you persecuting ME." The implication is obvious: to persecute the Chruch is to persecute Christ, becuse the Church is his mystical body.

As St. Paul said:

1 Cor. 12:12-14:
For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.

The Church is also described as the Spouse of Christ.

Eph 5:23
For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior.... For no man ever hates his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body.

See also: John 3:29 & Matt. 9:15, as well as Revelations 19:7, 21:3, and 22:17.

The obvious implication here is that Christ treats the Church the way a husband treats his bride--that is, with love, nourishing her, guarding her and sacrificing for her. In addition, as Christ's bride, the Church functions as a wife should function--depending upon the protection of her spouse and begetting and nurturing the children of our Lord, His adopted sons and daughters, so that they can be brought to eternal life.

In addition, the Bible also refers to the Church as the Kingdom of God.

Matt 18: 23
Therefore is the kingdom of heaven likened to a king, who would take an account of his servants".

Also see: Matt 22:2, 16:19.

In this analogy, God is the King. He provides the rules, defends his subjects, and provides a means for justice -- rewarding those who are just and punishing the unjust.

The Bible also refers to the Church as a Sheepfold.

Like 12:32
Fear not, little flock, for it hath pleased your Father to give you a kingdom.

Also see: Matt. 15:24 and 1 Peter 2:25:54.

Christ cares for His Church in the same way a shepherd cares for his flock -- caring for them, feeling them, leading them and watching over them.

The Scriptures also compare the Church to the Mountain of God.

Hebrews 12:22
But you are come to Mount Sion and to the city of the living God.

Also see:Matt 5:14, Gal 4.

The Church is like a mountain in that she is strong, immovable, visible, stable, and will endure for all time.

Domus Dei, or the house of God, as well as the foundation and Pillar of Truth, are other ways the Church is described in the Scriptures.

Timothy 3:15
That thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.

See also: 1 Peter 2:5; Eph. 2:19-20; Matt. 16:18; Gal. 6:10.

This way of understanding the Church as a house seems especially appropriate -- a homestead in which the Lord's flock is sheltered and kept. When someone leaves the "house" of the Church, they do not divine the Church, anymore than a person leaving a house divides the house. Rather, by leaving, they separate themselves from the house/Church. Anyone can leave, anyone can return, but the house always persists as a unity and does not depend on it's occupants to be as a whole. It's unity relies only on it's foundation, the Lord.

St. Paul told us, "Let us work good to all men, especially to those who are of the household of faith." Indeed, the Church-hood that unites us in Christ is a fortress like a well-built structure -- stronger and more enduring than any flesh could be.

So What?

The implications of these Biblical descriptions of the Church are clear and profound. First, they reveal how Christ saves us, yet He chooses to do so through the Church which He founded as the instrumental means of Salvation. Indeed, it was this instrumental means of Salvation, the Church, guided by the Holy Spirit sent by our Lord, that the inspired books of the New Testament were delivered to the world as the good news of our salvation through Christ.

Christ certainly did not need us. He did not need a Church. He is God! And yet, nevertheless, the Scriptures reveal how our Lord chose and founded the Church for the application of his redemption and for the Glory of the Church which He likewise uses as a means to Glorify Himself.

As members of the Body of Christ, each person of the Church has their own unique purpose and role--although, like parts of any body, not equally -- which gives meaning to our lives. Each part of the Church works for the salvation of souls -- a key purpose of the Church both on earth and in heaven.

The Church is Supernatural Society, (what we term Totus Christus - the whole Christ) as it has a divine origin and continues to receive the graces of its founder (Jesus Christ, the Son of God).

The Head of the Church is Christ, and He ultimately rules the Church.

Ephesians 1:22
he hath subjected all things under his feet and hath made him head over all the church,

Christ bestows grace upon the Church both as God and Man. In His divinity He bestows grace on the Church authoritatively and instrumentally as Man (as His humanity was the instrument of His divinity).

[cva66snipe]

???????

Look some in the church I was raised in thought they were the only church going to heaven too. Their main ones to attack were the Catholics which I still don't agree with doing to any degree of condemnation. I disagree with the RC church doctorines on some things but do not see it as being the key to ones salvation or loss thereof. It's a waste of energy for both churches and changes nothing.

Be content where GOD has placed you. If it's Roman Catholic fine, Baptist fine, Church or Assembly of GOD fine. Church of Christ fine. Methodist or Luthern? etc. Some limited exceptions I question like United Church of Christ. I would question because of their deeds and their fruits. From that sect has came some real damage to us all if you follow the attacks on the church and moral attacks on this nation.

[bdeaner]

Please show me where Jesus said “ I created the Catholic Church”, he did not.

See my recent post on the Scriptural basis for the Catholic Church, as instituted by Christ as His Mystical Body for the instrumental means of salvation on earth.

[papertyger]

And you are not?

No, I constrain protestants to their own punctilious, parochial, rhetorical standards. They just don't like it because it shows how arbitrary their hermeneutics are aside from the goal of undermining Catholic doctrines.

The Catholic Church teaches that salvation is by grace; it is not by communion or baptism. Thus the issue of transubstantiation - while interesting - is a minor, dogmatic issue.

No, the Catholic Church teaches you WILL go to hell for not fulfilling your religious obligations. Communion is the very summit of those obligations.

[bdeaner]

So you claim that God was with his church always but yet He let them wander in the wilderness for 400 years til He summoned your Roman religion to come up with doctrine???



I said the Catholic Church was founded by Christ Himself, not 400 years later. He gave the authority to St. Peter and His Disciples, who passed their authority along to their successors, and that unbroken succession of authority is the Magisterium of the Catholic Church.

Sola Scriptura is a self-refuting doctrine.

[papertyger]

Are you insinuating that God has nothing to do with me?

I'm raising it as a possibility.

I know God is empowering my faith because I know how fervently I believed, yet remained enslaved to sin, as a protestant.

[Semper Mark]

“No the Catholic Church teaches that you WILL got to hell for not fulfilling your religious obligations.”

Then what good is grace?

[bdeaner]

Number VI. has been removed in later versions of this 1646 version.

Not exactly a rock solid doctrine if it keeps changing all the time.

[bronxville]

“And Calvinists are the last people who should bring up witch burnings and stealing property, after their looting of Ireland.”

In Drogheda there’s a street named Scarlett.

First, the Church of St. Mary was destroyed and later St. Peter’s Church was set afire. The defenders put up a vigorous defense but when Drogheda fell, 3500 defenders and civilians of the city had been killed.

Hence, why there’s a street in Drogheda named Scarlett.

After the slaughter of Drogheda, Cromwell gave this address:-

“This is a righteous judgment of God upon these barbarous wretches, who have imbrued their hands in so much innocent blood.... it will tend to prevent the effusion of blood for the future, which are satisfactory grounds to such actions, which otherwise work remorse and regret.”

And that was only the beginning for the “papists whores of babylon”....

[Semper Mark]

“Sola Scriptura is a self refuting doctrine.”

Is it?

I've heard a great deal about the eating of Christ's flesh on this thread. What is Christ's flesh and how does one consume it?

[papertyger]

Dood, you’re missing the forrest for the trees! Walking and playing your six string is ritualistic behavior! Why do you think Catholics love their rosaries so much in the face of biblical injunction against “vain” repetition?

It’s not the repetition, it’s the meditation. It’s really hard to describe until you’ve felt it. It’s kind of like all of a sudden discovering you’ve been carrying around another sensory organ you never noticed before. I’m not kidding. Some of my most profound biblical discoveries have been made straight out of my memory while praying the rosary.

If the Mary thing makes you squeamish, find an ecumenical rosary page online. I’m serious. Just try it.

[bdeaner]

Then what good is grace?

Grace gives us the faith and hope in eternal life by which we are lead in the first place to participate in the sacraments which are the instrumental means of salvation Christ institutes through the Church.

[PugetSoundSoldier]

So it is your faith that leads you to believe. And your faith is stronger than mine (so you believe).

Ultimately, it is your faith that puts you as God above me, or any Protestant.

Your words have made it clear; you view Protestants as going to Hell, as unworthy of the grace of God, even unable to experience that Grace and personal relationship.

Thank you, good night. There is nothing more to discuss.

[papertyger]

For in scripture, our justification is past tense.

In scripture, you have to skip over all the places that talk about losing that salvation.