I can only conclude from Benedict XVI’s interview on faith and the Church
(NZ Catholic, April 3) that he’s maintaining extra ecclesiam nulla salus without
obviously contradicting his successor.
The blogosphere’s confused. Some say Benedict’s upholding the necessity of
baptism and evangelisation, some say not. But Benedict wasn’t being
obscurantist; he was addressing the Italian bishops’ newspaper, a
highly-educated readership.
‘Outside the Church there is no salvation’ doesn’t mean people who don’t
know the Church was established by Christ for our salvation can’t be
saved. As Pius IX stated, God’s clemency doesn’t permit those who aren’t guilty
of deliberate sin to suffer eternal punishment. But those who know but refuse to
enter (the Pharisees) or to remain in the Church (totally lapsed Catholics),
won’t be saved.
Benedict’s question, ‘Why try to convince people to accept the Christian
faith when they can be saved even without it?’ indirectly referenced Pope
Francis’ jaw-dropping instruction not to convert others - which confutes St
James’statement, ‘He who converts a sinner shall save his soul from death’ (Jas
5, 20).
With exquisite tact, Benedict says that mercy steers us towards God. And
that mercy is best manifested by bringing people into the Church, to the
sacraments which Jesus instituted specifically for salvation.
As St Augustine remarked, ‘How many sheep there are without, how many
wolves within!’
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