God left us a treasury of graces which can be applied to non-members of the Church and help bring them to salvation through conversion or through being attached to the Church at the moment of death. It is quite humbling to consider how just one Ave uttered from our lips, or indulgence applied for a soul who is not a member of the Church, or a soul of God's choice, can be enough to be the difference between its salvation and damnation. You and I can be the difference between whether one is faithfully departed or not. We all should pray for the gift of perseverance and for a happy death.
can you give me an example of what happens in detail here " being attached to the Church at the moment of death"
would this involve baptism? any creeds to believe in..if it's at the moment of death and the non believer is incapacitated in some way is there any chance he can truly convert and make it to heaven?
A non-member of the Catholic Church/the Mystical Body of Christ, outside of which there is no salvation, and there are no exceptions to this Dogma, can die within the Church in a state of sanctifying grace.
Sanctifying grace cannot be obtained outside the Church but actual graces can. Actual graces nudge the good willed soul toward membership within the Church. If such as soul is on his way to becoming a member of the Church and dies before this actually happens he can be saved within the Church through his attachment to it by desire.
Inculpable ignorance by itself does not save a person. Much more is needed. Desire to be within the Church by itself does not save a person either by itself in combined with inculpable ignorance. Neither inculpable ignorance nor desire saves anyone.
For it to be possible for a non-member to be saved attached to the Church or "within" it one must have an effective desire to enter it. This means that the person believes, with a supernatural faith, that God exists and that He rewards good and evil and at least implicitly believes in the Holy Trinity and the Incarnation at a very minimum for salvation to even be possible. No one can be saved without a supernatural Faith. But even this is not enough for a non-member to be saved within the Catholic Church or from him to be brought to safety by the vessel/Church he is attached to.
He must also love God with the love of benevolence. He must love God with the love of supernatural charity above all things and desire to conform to His will.
But not just a loose desire to do God's will. He must actually try his best throughout his life to do God's will.
An example of an ineffective desire by analogy would be if I desired to go to New York. "Boy I sure wish I could go to New York" but do nothing about it.
"Boy I sure hope I'm doing what I should to get to Heaven."
But desiring to get to the right destination by itself is not enough, even if you are not sure where the destination is or how to get there. One can have an effective desire to get to New York even if, through no fault of his own, he does not know where it is or how to get there or even the name of the place where he wants to be if he starts asking people, "where is 'the big city' and how do I get there?
"I need to get on a plane? How do I do this? Tickets? Where can I get them? How much do they cost? I don't have any money. Do you know where I can get a job?"
"How do I get to Heaven? I have die within the Church? Which Church? The Catholic Church? Why the Catholic Church? Because God founded it? How did He found it? Etc. She teaches I can't have sex outside of marriage or use conception prevention?"
Here the good willed are separated from the bad willed:
Either:
"Oh boy! The Catholic Church can't be right"
Or:
"Okay, if it is God's will I will comply." "How do I become a member?" "I need to get baptized? Okay, let's do it. I have to learn catechism first? When can I start?"
You can see the difference between an ineffective desire and an effective desire here can't you?
Did you see in the above example where he could have become willfully blind or ignorant and been damned for that culpable ignorance?
Now if our good willed person dies on any step of the journey in a state of sanctifying grace he dies within the Church and goes to Heaven, probably after some Purgatory time unless he is martyred for the Faith whereby he will go straight to Heaven.
But this good willed person, and our example must actually be good willed in the eyes of God, our eyes do not matter here, he will, at the very least have a supernatural Faith in God's existence based upon God's own revelation and believe that God rewards good and punishes evil. He will try his best throughout His life to conform to God's will and love God with the love of charity, loving Him above all things and being willing to suffer all rather than to offend Him. So long as he has this effective desire, even if he has mistaken notions of what God's will actually is, and so long as he tries his best to do God's will he is on the road to salvation.
Each and every human being in existence is either in the Kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Satan. There is no other place for them to be located.
Those who have an aversion to God by willing something or loving something more than God are in the Kingdom of Satan, whether they realize it or not, and if they die in that state will surely be damned.
Those who have a supernatural faith and a perfect charity and will to do God's will and try their best to do God's will throughout their life can only accomplish such things while in a state of sanctifying grace. It is impossible to love God with the love of charity and to continue to try your best to do His will for an extended period of time without being in a state of sanctifying grace according to Saint Thomas and others. And one cannot be in a state of sanctifying grace while being outside the Church. But as we have seen non-members of the Church can be attached to that Church or theologically "within" her so long as all the other prerequisites are present.
Maybe some get into Heaven after only working one hour same as those who worked twelve. But those of us who worked twelve should not complain about it. God will have mercy on whom He has mercy.
God does not give a person the actual graces needed to join the Church without giving such a person the ability and means to accomplish that goal. God does not cut down the good willed and damn him through no fault of his own even as he was trying his best to do God’s will and was on a journey that would have led to formal membership in the Church were he allowed to continue. God is perfectly merciful and perfectly just. He is not an arbitrary tyrant who excludes the heart and only looks at the letter. “No water Baptism, too bad for you.” The good willed are not damned any more than the bad willed are saved. It comes down to the heart, supernatural faith and charity which encompasses willing to do God's will, whatever it is and trying your best to do it and preferring to suffer anything rather than to offend Him. God will not damn such a person anymore than he will save one who goes to daily Mass, prays 15 decades of the Rosary daily but dies in a state of mortal sin.
Does any of this seem plausible?
The thing is as I see it,if there is this good willed person, who wants to be catholic, wants to be baptised, wouldn't God in His merciful way allow this person to be baptised before his death?
can you explain in more detail your following quotes
"Non-members of the Roman Catholic Church can be joined to God through the Roman Catholic Church without realizing it."
how can this happen, what is the thought process of the jew who can be joined to God through the Church without realizing it? I have a hard time understanding what you are precisely talking about
"noting that they become actual members at the moment of death."
again,pls explain this to me, what happened to this person before dying, did he make a profession of gfaith? was he baptised?
"and that non-members of that Church can be saved"
pls explain, I thought your position was non members become members at death.or without realizing it.yet still become members......now are you saying non members who stay as non members and die as nonmembers can be saved??
Topic: How can you defend the salvation dogma with... (Read 8786 times)