I’m not questioning your honesty but in my ten years here I can’t recall a single time I’ve read such a statement. Are you sure you understood their point? We are discouraged from dragging arguments across threads but I can tell you that someone’s salvation is based upon their faith in Jesus Christ and not on which church they belong to. Only God sees the hearts of men and knows if faith is genuine. It’s not for me or you to proclaim who is or isn’t a Christian. I was born and raised a Catholic but didn’t become a real Christian until I was sixteen and heard the gospel in a Southern Baptist Church Sunday school. Jesus said we can know others by their fruit. Scalia bore good fruit by his life, words and actions. I have no doubt he was a Christian - Catholic or not - and that he is rejoicing in the presence of our Savior.
Disagree, I've seen numerous freepers argue flat out that "Catholics aren't Christians". It got so bad that Jim Robinson had to start a thread warning the anti-Catholic FReepers to stop post anti-Catholic threads or get banned. This is NOT to say that a majority of this forum or even a significant minority holds those views, or even that its a common viewpoint in protestant circles. Most of the protestants I've met have no problem accepting non-Protestants and non-evangelicals as Christians. Nevertheless, there is a small but vocal group of fundamentalists who believe the ONLY people who "count" as Christians are those who joined some evangelical protestant church in the bible belt.
I've actually never met a single Catholic claim that you're not "Christian" unless you join the Catholic Church. I recall when Pope Benedict XVI made the statement that protestant churches can't properly be called churches because they don't have apostolic succession, and some protestants went ballistic here and claim the Pope stated that protestants aren't Christians. He made so such claim that the individual members of those churches aren't Christians. He simply made the argument that they belonged to new ecclesiastical communities rather than the historic original Christian church.
>> Are you sure you understood their point? <<
The poster on the Cruz thread didn't flat out state that Catholics aren't Christian, but the argument that you CANNOT be Christian UNLESS you are able to "recall the exact moment you were saved" would automatically exclude all Catholics, all eastern Orthodox Christians, as well as numerous major protestant churches.
If he had made the point that Ted Cruz's dad wasn't a PRACTICING Christian until he joined a protestant church, then it could have been a valid point. But that doesn't mean the Cruz family "wasn't Christian" unless they joined the Southern Baptist Church. If I buy a car, leave it in the garage, and never drive it, it doesn't mean that my car doesn't exist, it means its not being used. If you're baptized into another church and pledge to live a Christian life, but DON'T, then you'll just failing to exercise the grace that got gave you when you entered that faith -- not that you "never" became a Christian in the first place.
Miley Cyrus can "name the exact moment she was saved", since she was baptized at age 13 in a fundamentalist protestant church. But she no more PRACTICES her faith than lapsed Catholics do. This doesn't mean I should deny that her baptism ever happened, isn't valid in the eyes of God, or that she's "not Christian" unless she joins the Catholic Church. She's perfectly capable of exercising her faith if she chooses to do so.
>> Only God sees the hearts of men and knows if faith is genuine. It’s not for me or you to proclaim who is or isn’t a Christian. <<
Again, you're not distinguishing between whether someone BECOMES a Christian and whether someone chooses to PRACTICE their faith.
I can certainly proclaim who is a Christian and who isn't, based on what religion they join. Catholics are Christian, Baptists are Christian, Greek Orthodox are Christians. Muslims AREN'T Christian, nor are Jews or Mormons.
Whether they are good people, actually PRACTICE their faith, and whether they are "saved" and will go to heaven isn't for me to say. God will judge their heart. I simply evaluate whether the church they belong to is Christian based on what it professes.
>> Jesus said we can know others by their fruit. Scalia bore good fruit by his life, words and actions. I have no doubt he was a Christian - Catholic or not - and that he is rejoicing in the presence of our Savior. <<
Agreed 100%. It would be nice if the people claiming you're not Christian unless you can "remember the exact moment you were saved" would acknowledge that. Not only do they deny that Ted Cruz's relatives are Christians, they would deny George Washington and Ronald Reagan were Christian, simply because those individuals couldn't tell you about the moment they were "saved".
That's not right and that definition of "Christian" excludes about 90% of their fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. Citing Scalia's life was simply a way to prove their defition is flawed.