Respected apologist Peter Kreeft who is on the Philosophy Faculty at Boston College denies the thrice defined dogma on extra ecclesiam nulla salus and also Vatican Council II and other Magisterial texts which say that everyone , all, need to enter the Church with no exception for salvation.
Kreeft, whom I admire as an apologist, having read some of his books some nine years back, rejects the dogma extra ecclesiam nulla salus in the name of Vatican Council II (Lumen Gentium 16 and 14).
He writes since we have no salvation without the Church it follows that there is no salvation without the Church. Then Kreeft suggests that Protestants and others are saved. This is the familiar YES and NO on this subject.
He writes :
He then supports this view with Lumen Gentium 14In fact the Church explicitly teaches that many who call themselves non-Catholics are saved.
Vatican Council II said that "they could not be saved who, knowing that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ, would refuse either to enter it, or to remain in it" (Lumen Gentium #14),
The dogma and Ad Gentes 7 says all need to enter the Church for salvation Kreeft says No, only those who know about the Church.Perhaps Kreeft means well and the problem is the lack of precise terms.
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De facto every one needs to enter the Church :
Basing itself upon Sacred Scripture and Tradition, it teaches that the Church, now sojourning on earth as an exile, is necessary for salvation. Christ, present to us in His Body, which is the Church, is the one Mediator and the unique way of salvation. In explicit terms He Himself affirmed the necessity of faith and baptism(124) and thereby affirmed also the necessity of the Church, for through baptism as through a door men enter the Church.- Lumen Gentium 14,Vatican Council II.(Also see Ad Gentes 7)
De jure we accept there can be people in invincible ignorance known only to God. It is God who will judge who ‘knows’ and who is in invincible ignorance.
Whosoever, therefore, knowing that the Catholic Church was made necessary by Christ, would refuse to enter or to remain in it, could not be saved.-Lumen Gentium 14,Vatican Council II
Dejure we know that a person can be saved in invincible ignorance. De facto we do not know any specific case in the present times.
Kreeft then mentions Lumen Gentium 16 (invincible ignorance).
De jure we accept there can be people in invincible ignorance known only to God. It is God who will judge who ‘knows’ and who is in invincible ignorance.
De jure, in principle we accept the possibility of a Protestant being saved and it would be known to God. De facto we do not know a single such case.
De facto everyone needs Catholic Faith and the Baptism of water for salvation. De jure there could be exceptions known only to God.
De facto every Protestant and Orthodox Christian, according to the dogma and Ad Gentes 7, need to convert into the Catholic Church to avoid Hell. So LG 16 does not contradict Lumen Gentium 14 above.
Kreeft then mentions Lumen Gentium 16 (invincible ignorance).
De jure we accept there can be people in invincible ignorance known only to God. It is God who will judge who ‘knows’ and who is in invincible ignorance.
De jure, in principle we accept the possibility of a Protestant being saved and it would be known to God. De facto we do not know a single such case.
De facto everyone needs Catholic Faith and the Baptism of water for salvation. De jure there could be exceptions known only to God.
De facto every Protestant and Orthodox Christian, according to the dogma and Ad Gentes 7, need to convert into the Catholic Church to avoid Hell. So LG 16 does not contradict Lumen Gentium 14 above.
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Step by step, your understanding and appreciation of your Catholic Church will climb to new heights as you take this hike through the history and an explanation of the whats and whys of Christ's "Sacrament of Salvation." One small but potent entry every Sunday.
Is the Church Necessary for Salvation?
Was Noah's Ark necessary to escape the flood? The Church is like Noah's Ark — spiritually speaking. If God wants to let some folks in to heaven by the back door, he is certainly able to do so. But he has made it clear that Christ is the "way, the truth, and the life," and we reach Christ through the Church, so why risk it? Dr Kreeft gives us his typically well balanced take on the topic:
Since we have no salvation without Christ,
And we do not know Christ without the Church,
It follows that there is no salvation without the Church.
This traditional formula of the Church Fathers (see Catechism of the Catholic Church #846), "Outside the Church there is no salvation", does not mean that Protestants and others are not saved, because this formula is not an answer to the mind's curiosity about the populations of heaven and hell, but an answer to the sincerely seeking heart's question "Where is salvation? Where is the road? What has God done to show me how to be saved?" Similarly, Christ's words to his disciples about "many" choosing the "wide" road to destruction and only "few" finding the "narrow" road to life (Mt 7: 14) are not the words of a statistician spoken to a census taker, but the words of a loving heavenly Father to his beloved children, warning them of danger. To the Good Shepherd even one out of a hundred sheep is too many to lose and ninety-nine too few to save (Mt 18:12).
In fact the Church explicitly teaches that many who call themselves non-Catholics are saved. Vatican Council II said that "they could not be saved who, knowing that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ, would refuse either to enter it, or to remain in it" (Lumen Gentium #14), but also that "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 conscience — those too may achieve eternal salvation" (Lumen Gentium #16) — not because conscience is an adequate substitute for the Church, but because conscience, too, is contact with God.
From Catholic Christianity, by Peter Kreeft, available from Ignatius Press at www.ignatius.com
-from COMPASS Spotlight
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