Born Again Catholics.

Readings for Sunday, September 25, 2011, 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Ez 18:25-28
Ps 25:4-9
Phil 2:1-11
Matt 21:28-32

I was in the cemetery, standing at the head of the casket, leading the graveside prayers for my life-long Catholic parishioner. I decided, since we had already offered a full funeral Mass, to abbreviate this service and leave some time for the Protestant minister who had been invited by a daughter of the deceased. Looking up, I noticed that he had appeared, and stood opposite me. I nodded, stepped back, and he began by reading a passage from the Bible. He then told us, a mostly Catholic group, how at the daughter’s request he had visited the deceased in the hospital and asked him if he had been saved. The man answered, no, he never had known how to do it. The minister told him how, and the man did, and so the minister wanted to assure us that our departed had been saved, and therefore we should know he was with the Lord in heaven.

One couldn’t help but feel that the opposing team had scored. But that may not have been the reverend’s intent. In fact he seemed ill at ease, never looked at me, and left promptly. But, what about it? Are Catholics saved? Or are we, kept in ignorance by the Whore of Babylon, doomed to hell because we have not accepted Jesus as our personal Lord and Savior?

If someone asks you if you are “saved”, or they might say “born again”, they are probably operating out of the “born again Christian” theology, familiar to anyone who has seen Billy Graham on TV. According to this theology we are all sinners, doomed to hell unless we repent of sin and turn to Jesus Christ as our personal Lord and Savior. At that point you are saved, and forever saved. You did nothing, and in fact can do nothing to earn God’s mercy, and so you cannot lose that mercy either once you’ve received it. In summary, salvation is by faith alone, not by works, and once saved always saved.

The Catholic faith is that, true, we are sinners, and we cannot earn God’s mercy; salvation is a grace, a free gift; but it is a gift we must respond to and put into action. Salvation is more like a life-long journey of many decisions than a single moment’s decision; the grace of God making it all possible, but our acting on that possibility being part of the process. To say “I am now saved, and am forever saved” is presumptuous. And there are many Bible passages to support the Catholic view. I will quote the briefest I can think of. It’s in Paul’s Letter to the Galations, where he is arguing that observance of the Jewish ceremonial law is not required for salvation, and he says:

”For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is of any avail, but faith working through love.” – Gal 5:6

But let’s not plunge headlong into the whole faith vs. works debate. The born-again Christian wants to know if you have been born again, and the honest answer is “yes!”, because every Catholic has been baptized. Here you could quote what Jesus said to Nicodemus, recorded in the Gospel of John, ch. 3:

”Truly I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God.” – Jn 3:5

Objection: “But you were only a baby and didn’t know what was happening, much less accept Jesus for yourself.”

Your answer: Exactly! That’s how little Catholics believe that we earn salvation by what we do. God doesn’t even wait for that little child to grow up and reach the age of reason and make his own personal faith commitment. We take seriously what you claim to believe, that our relationship with God is God’s initiative, not our own. Christ did not wait for any personal recognition or affirmation on the part of children before he said, “let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for it is to just such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.”

But your born-again questioner is wanting some evidence that a Catholic truly repents of sin and personally accepts Jesus as Lord and savior. So tell them about the sacrament of Confirmation, when the candidate reaffirms, on her own volition, the faith commitment made for her at baptism, and consider the annual Easter renewal of baptismal promises that everyone in church is guided through:

Do you reject sin so as to live in the freedom of God’s children? I do.
Do you reject the glamour of evil, and refuse to be mastered by sin? I do.
Do you reject Satan, father of sin and prince of darkness? I do.

Do you believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth? I do.
Do you believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord, Who was born of the Virgin Mary, was crucified, died, and was buried, rose from the dead, and is seated at the right hand of the Father? I do.
Do you believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and lfe everlasting? I do.

Do you mean it? Okay, you have just repented of sin and professed faith that Jesus is Lord. If this is what the born-again Christian is looking for, you’ve just been born again.

But no need to wait for Easter. What does a Catholic do at every Sunday Mass? He or she starts by confessing that he is an unworthy sinner, has sinned through his own fault, in thought and word, in what he has done and failed to do, and he looks to God’s mercy, not his own efforts, for salvation. “May God have mercy on us, forgive us our sins, and bring us to everlasting life.”

Does your born-again friend need more evidence? Stay on through Mass until the priest raises the Eucharist before the people and says – and here I will use the new Missal translation because it is closer to the Bible story of the centurion who trusted Jesus with faith – the priest says, to all present:

”Behold the Lamb of God, behold Him Who takes away the sins of the world. Blessed are those called to the supper of the Lamb.”

”Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.”

“Only say the word and my soul shall be healed”. Who would say that but someone who looks to Jesus, their savior, to give what they cannot give themselves?

Is more evidence needed that the devout, believing Catholic has been born again and accepted Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior? There is more evidence to give, but this is surely enough for any one of us, being visited and questioned by a well-meaning minister, to answer, honestly and with conviction:

”Yes. And if you only knew, you’d be Catholic too.”

Reference Material

Return to Web Site Log (Blog) page

Return to HOME PAGE

Build/Host/Maintain Your Own Personal Website using SBI! (Advertisement)

Date: Wed Sep 28 23:54:47 2011
From: Dennis
Email: dennis2r@msn.com
Location: Lewiston, Idaho, USA
Comment:

According to the Lutheran’s Augsburg Confession (1530) “Men are freely justified for Christ’s sake through faith, when they believe that they are received into favor and that their sins are forgiven for Christ’s sake.” This doctrine of justification by faith was the keystone of the whole Lutheran system and became the battle cry of the Protestant Reformation. Drastic consequences followed. An almost entirely self-centered individualism resulted, evangelical piety making personal conversion, guaranteed by feelings of assurance, the center of its work. Popular Protestantism urges the individual “to believe in Christ and be saved.” The sense of community and of corporate religion declined. No intermediaries – priests, sacraments, or saints – were needed. The church was redefined: no longer as a visible institution founded by Our Lord, but as a vague, invisible aggregate of the “saved,” known only to God.

In the new interpretation of Christianity, the sacraments could not be a means of grace. They were merely symbols of a favor already conferred, and they came to be neglected. The logical end of the road was reached in the complete abandonment of liturgical worship and sacramentalism by such bodies as the Quakers and the Salvation Army. The effect on the spiritual life was calculated to have equally sad results: the theory of justification by faith alone could not maintain Christian standards of spirituality.

Is just the “feeling” of salvation all that is necessary, if you are “justified by faith alone?” This idea has resulted in a self-centered and subjective individualism, divorced from all ideas of the Church incorporating us as members of the mystical body of Christ. People have tended to regard the whole of religion as consisting in their own interior and personal state of religious “feeling.” It has led to the most extravagant and even morbid attempts to induce an artificial sense of security by periodic outbreaks of highly-charged emotional revivalism. In those converted at such meetings there has resulted only too often an appalling complacency in the thought of being among the “saved” that is as far removed as possible from the humility declared by the gospel to be a first condition of our rehabilitation in the sight of God.

Christ warns us to watch and pray lest we enter into temptation (Matt 26:41); he makes us pray to be preserved from temptation (Luke 11:4). Surely such warnings are meaningless to the man who thinks himself already and permanently saved.

The idea of “full, free, and present salvation” for those “justified by faith” – as if Christ had done all the work and the Christian had to do nothing toward his own salvation – led to the dreadful doctrine that it is belief and not behavior that matters – a doctrine that is the very basis of hypocrisy. Christ warned his hearers against imitating the Pharisees, of whom he declared, “They preach but they do not practice.” (Matt 23:3). Quite evidently He thought that not only what we believe matters but also how we behave.

Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to me “Lord, Lord” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” (Matt 7:16-20) And then later, “I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me. Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.” (Matt 25:40-46) And further on Jesus says, “And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.” How can it be said that salvation is “wholly without works” if, for lack of good works, it can be forfeited?

Apart from the fact that were it not for the Catholic Church, Protestants would have no Bible at all, does the Bible support this idea of salvation based on faith alone? Scripture teaches that one’s final salvation depends on the state of the soul at death. As Jesus Himself tells us, “He who endures to the end will be saved” (Matt 24:13; cf. 25:31-46). One who dies in the state of friendship with God (the state of grace) will go to heaven. The one who dies in a state of enmity and rebellion against God, (the state of mortal sin) will go to hell.

For many fundamentalists and evangelicals it makes no difference – as far as salvation is concerned – how you live or end your life. Consider the warning Paul gave: “See then the kindness and the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness; otherwise you too will be cut off: (Rom. 11:22; see also Heb. 10:26-29, 2Pet. 2:20-21).

Can we know we are saved for certain? Yes. This is why God gave us the sacraments – to provide visible assurances that He is invisibly providing us with His grace. And one can be confident that one has not thrown away that grace by simply examining one’s life and seeing whether mortal sin has been committed. Indeed, the tests that John sets forth in his first epistle to help us know whether we are abiding in grace are, in essence, tests of whether we are dwelling in grave sin.

“For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome” (1 John 5:3).

Likewise, by looking at the course of one’s life in grace and the resolution of one’s heart to keep following God, one can also have an assurance of future salvation. Paul’s letter to the Philippians (2:12) says, “Therefore my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” This is not the language of self-confident assurance. Our salvation is something that remains to be worked out.

How to answer the question: Are you saved? The Catholic response is: “As the Bible says, I am already saved (Rom 8:24; Eph 2:5-8), but I’m also being saved (1 Cor. 1:8; 2 Cor. 2:15; Phil. 2:12), and I have the hope that I will be saved (Rom 5:9-10; 1 Cor 3:12-15). Like the apostle Paul I am working out my salvation in fear and trembling (Phil. 2:12), with hopeful confidence in the promises of Christ (Rom 5:2; 2 Tim 2:11-13).

Date: Thu Sep 29 06:44:31 2011
From: Vic Biorseth
Comment:

Dennis:

Amen.

See also the Are You Saved? page.

Regards,

Vic

Please note the language and tone already established in this Website. This is not the place to stack up vulgar one-liners and crude rejoinders. While you may support, oppose or introduce any position or argument, your comments must meet our standards of logical rigor and of civil discourse. We will not participate in trading insults, and we will not tolerate participants trading insults with each other. Participants should not be thin-skinned or over sensitive to criticism, but should be prepared to defend their arguments when challenged. If you don’t really have a coherent argument or counter-argument of your own, sit down and don’t embarrass yourself. If you have something serious to contribute to the conversation, please keep it civil. We apologize to religious conservative thinkers for the need to even say these things.