Author Topic: Why do all major Trad organisations teach those in false religions can be saved? (Read 32922 times)

Pax Vobis · « **Reply #90 on:** August 05, 2019, 01:38:06 PM »

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Ecuмenism and religious liberty seem like the key issues to me moreso than ecclesiology per se

Byzcat, you are not using these terms correctly. Ecclesiology means the theology of the Church. V2 ecclesiology/theology is new and not orthodox. Religious liberty and Ecuмenism are part of the new ecclesiology/theology. So if you have a problem with Religious liberty and Ecuмenism of V2 (and I hope you do), then you also have a problem with V2's overall ecclesiology, which is built upon these 2 errors (as well as a few others).

ByzCat3000 · « **Reply #91 on:** August 05, 2019, 02:12:34 PM »

Quote from: Ladislaus on August 05, 2019, 01:00:35 PM

Ah, so here you go, finally admitting that you have no real issues with V2 eccclesiology.

Unfortunately for your position, Ecuмenism and Religious Liberty are nothing more than logical consequences of the NewChurch ecclesiology and soteriology.

I don't understand this "finally admit" stuff. I'm here to discuss and learn, but I have no interest in or desire to "refuse to admit" to any positions.

My problem with Vatican II is, and always has been, its insufferable ambiguity. It seems *possible* to read Vatican II in such a way that the practice of false religions per se pleases God, that false religions themselves could lead to salvation (as opposed to people having the possibility of salvation *despite* their false religions, which is what most trad groups teach, to relate to the OP) and that the "possibility" of salvation outside the visible bounds of the Church is emphasized so much that the real danger of being outside said visible bounds is ignored and often forgotten.

ByzCat3000 · « **Reply #92 on:** August 05, 2019, 02:14:04 PM »

Quote from: Ladislaus on August 05, 2019, 01:15:50 PM

Religious Liberty:

According to the new soteriology, men please God and save their souls by following the lights of their even-erroneous consciences (rather than by possessing objective truth in supernatural faith). [Subjectivist soteriology.]

But men have a right (even an obligation) to please God and to save their souls.

Consequently, men have a right (and even an obligation) to follow the lights of their even-erroneous consciences.

I think that's a bit silly. How does it differ logically from "since its theoretically possible that some soul could be so mentally deficient [or a child] that he could commit murder without sufficient knowledge or consent of will for the sin to be mortal, therefore we shouldn't ban murder because by doing so we might be elevating guilt" or something like that.

forlorn · « **Reply #93 on:** August 05, 2019, 03:50:12 PM »

Quote from: Mithrandylan on August 05, 2019, 12:34:50 PM

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I am relaying views ascribed to them by Van Noort, who was a well-known, widely used, and traditional dogmatist writing in the nineteenth century. Vega and Soto wrote in Latin only (they were Spanish Dominicans, and Soto was rather famous, having helped draft the council's schemas on grace; I'm not as sure what Vega's specific involvement at Trent was only that he was a representative), I've not read their primary works. Van Noort says that each of them held that a purely natural faith in a God who exists and rewards those who seek him is sufficient for an act of faith on the part of one whom is invincibly ignorant of the Gospels. Just to be clear I don't agree with that at all, and it is to the credit of later theologians who qualified that belief by insisting that only a supernatural faith in such a God would satisfy the requisite faith needed for salvation. That (i.e., the notion that a supernatural faith in a rewarding creator is sufficient for an act of faith) is a far more defensible view. That, so far as I can tell, is what Fellay and Lefebvre believe. For them, the remote Hindu or Muslim simply functions as an example of someone who is invincibly ignorant and that is a substantially different view from the typical Novus Ordo representative (like Robert Barron, say) who maintains that infidels qua infidels, can be saved.

So then this argument does not apply to those who are aware of Catholicism, i.e 99.99% of non-Catholics. The SSPX et al. teach that even infidels who aren't invincibly ignorant can be saved, and that was the belief I was contesting in the OP. So it seems there isn't any centuries old support for it at all.

Mithrandylan · « **Reply #94 on:** August 06, 2019, 09:29:04 AM »

Quote from: forlorn on August 05, 2019, 03:50:12 PM

So then this argument does not apply to those who are aware of Catholicism, i.e 99.99% of non-Catholics. The SSPX et al. teach that even infidels who aren't invincibly ignorant can be saved, and that was the belief I was contesting in the OP. So it seems there isn't any centuries old support for it at all.

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Well what you're doing here is objecting to the fact of the matter, not the principle. Even if you were right-- that 99.99% of non-Catholics knowingly reject the Gospel and the Catholic Church-- you would be making an argument against the examples Fellay and Lefebvre use, not against their actual argument. Substitute the examples they give for someone who you actually think would be invincibly ignorant and then address the principle, not some ancillary matter.

forlorn · « **Reply #95 on:** August 06, 2019, 09:31:47 AM »

Quote from: Mithrandylan on August 06, 2019, 09:29:04 AM

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Well what you're doing here is objecting to the fact of the matter, not the principle. Even if you were right-- that 99.99% of non-Catholics knowingly reject the Gospel and the Catholic Church-- you would be making an argument against the examples Fellay and Lefebvre use, not against their actual argument. Substitute the examples they give for someone who you actually think would be invincibly ignorant and then address the principle, not some ancillary matter.

The 99.99% are ancillary to the 0.01% who are invincibly ignorant? I'm not using an example at all, it's you who's stuck on the example of an invincibly ignorant person and are bafflingly using that to defend the belief that those who aren't invincibly ignorant can be saved.

Last Tradhican · « **Reply #96 on:** August 06, 2019, 09:49:25 AM »

Invincible Ignorance is old school, no longer in fashion, it was just a ivory tower theological speculation stepping stone to salvation by belief in a God that rewards, no BODer uses invincible ignorance anymore, now anyone in any religion can be saved just by their belief in a god the rewards.

Invincible ignorance should be called invisible ignorance, for it is all hot air and always was. If one follows the ivory tower theological speculations they will end up losing the faith altogether as all the Vatican II clergy has today.

The only safe course is clear dogma as it is written.

Pax Vobis · « **Reply #97 on:** August 06, 2019, 09:53:42 AM »

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Substitute the examples they give for someone who you actually think would be invincibly ignorant and then address the principle, not some ancillary matter.

Ok, here's the best argument against the error that the 'invincibly ignorant' can get to heaven. At best, they can get to Limbo.
The Church Fathers are unanimous that infants must be baptized to get to heaven. Is there any man who is more invincibly ignorant than a baby? Yet, a baby must be baptized to be saved.

It is this one Spirit who makes it possible for an infant to be regenerated . . . when that infant is brought to baptism; and it is through this one Spirit that the infant so presented is reborn. For it is not written, “Unless a man be born again by the will of his parents” or “by the faith of those presenting him or ministering to him,” but, “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit.” The water, therefore, manifesting exteriorly the sacrament of grace, and the Spirit effecting interiorly the benefit of grace, both regenerate in one Christ that man who was generated in Adam.
-- St Augustine, (Letters 98:2 [A.D. 408]).

If reconciliation through Christ is necessary to all men, on all men has passed sin by which we have become enemies, in order that we should have need of reconciliation. This reconciliation is in the laver of regeneration and in the flesh and blood of Christ, without which not even infants can have life in themselves….
-- St Augustine, (Against Two Letters of the Pelagians, Bk 4)

“Every soul that is born into flesh is soiled by the filth of wickedness and sin. . . . In the Church, baptism is given for the remission of sins, and, according to the usage of the Church, baptism is given even to infants. If there were nothing in infants which required the remission of sins and nothing in them pertinent to forgiveness, the grace of baptism would seem superfluous”
-- Origen, (Homilies on Leviticus 8:3 [A.D. 248]).

“The Church received from the apostles the tradition of giving baptism even to infants. The apostles, to whom were committed the secrets of the divine sacraments, knew there are in everyone innate strains of [original] sin, which must be washed away through water and the Spirit”
-- Origen, (Commentaries on Romans 5:9 [A.D. 248]).

“If, in the case of the worst sinners and those who formerly sinned much against God, when afterwards they believe, the remission of their sins is granted and no one is held back from baptism and grace, how much more, then, should an infant not be held back, who, having but recently been born, has done no sin, except that, born of the flesh according to Adam, he has contracted the contagion of that old death from his first being born. For this very reason does he [an infant] approach more easily to receive the remission of sins: because the sins forgiven him are not his own but those of another” (ibid., 64:5).
-- St Cyprian, (Letters 64:5 [A.D. 253]).

“‘Well enough,’ some will say, ‘for those who ask for baptism, but what do you have to say about those who are still children, and aware neither of loss nor of grace? Shall we baptize them too?’ Certainly , if there is any pressing danger. Better that they be sanctified unaware, than that they depart unsealed and uninitiated” (ibid., 40:28).
-- St Gregory nαzιenzen, (Oration on Holy Baptism 40:28 [A.D. 388]).

“You see how many are the benefits of baptism, and some think its heavenly grace consists only in the remission of sins, but we have enumerated ten honors [it bestows]! For this reason we baptize even infants, though they are not defiled by [personal] sins, so that there may be given to them holiness, righteousness, adoption, inheritance, brotherhood with Christ, and that they may be his [Christ’s] members”
-- St John Chyrsostom, (Baptismal Catecheses in Augustine, Against Julian 1:6:21 [A.D. 388]).

Of those engendered of the seed of Adam no man is born without sin, and it is necessary even for babes to be born anew in Christ by the grace of regeneration.
-- St Jerome, (Letter 144)

Last Tradhican · « **Reply #98 on:** August 06, 2019, 09:55:26 AM »

Quote

The only safe course is clear dogma as it is written.

What those dogmatic Decrees Mean

From: Who Shall Ascend, by Fr. Walthen

Being ex cathedra definitions, they must be taken literally, unequivocally, and absolutely. Hence, to attempt to modify or qualify them in any way is to deny them.

3. The doctrine says clearly that only Catholics go to Heaven; all others are lost, that is, they do not go to Heaven, but to Hell. All who are inclined to dispute this dogma should have the good sense to realize that if this is not what the words of the definitions mean, the Church would never have promulgated such a position. To give any other meaning to these words is to portray the Church as foolish and ridiculous.

4. The pronouncements indicate that, by divine decree, those only will be saved who are members of the Church when they die. This membership must be formal, real, explicit, and, in those of the (mental) age of reason, deliberate. There is no such thing as "potential" membership in the Church, or "implicit" membership, or "quasi-membership," or "invisible membership," or anything of the kind. Neither can those who are catechumens, that is, those who are preparing to enter the Church, be considered members.

12. Let the reader accept the reasonable fact that the Pontiffs who pronounced these decrees were perfectly literate and fully cognizant of what they were saying. If there were any need to soften or qualify their meanings, they were quite capable of doing so.[/size]

Mithrandylan · « **Reply #99 on:** August 06, 2019, 10:18:57 AM »

Quote from: forlorn on August 06, 2019, 09:31:47 AM

The 99.99% are ancillary to the 0.01% who are invincibly ignorant? I'm not using an example at all, it's you who's stuck on the example of an invincibly ignorant person and are bafflingly using that to defend the belief that those who aren't invincibly ignorant can be saved.

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I've already said that my view is that without explicit faith in the Incarnation and the Trinity, no man can be saved. I'm trying to help you make a better argument, because you're not thinking clearly about what you're arguing against. You are hung up on Fellay's example of someone who might be invincibly ignorant, not on his underlying argument. As a result, you're not making a convincing case. Think of this as an analogy:
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Suppose you argue that the Catholic Church teaches that all who die without explicit faith in Jesus Christ and the Trinity are damned. You give evidence from scripture and Tradition to support this belief. Then you apply the example to Scandanavians in the twelfth century, and point out that since they had not yet received the Gospel, they could not have been saved.
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Then I say "But the Gospel was received in Scandanavia and the Scandanavian people were Catholic by that time." And I castigate you for believing that Scandanavians are damned even if they've heard the gospel.
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I'd be missing the point, wouldn't I? In showing that the Scandanavians were evangelized before the twelfth century all I do is prove that you were mistaken about a fact, not about what the Church teaches. Likewise, even if you could show that there was no Hindu or Muslim who was ever invincibly ignorant all you would be doing is showing that Fellay and Lefebvre picked bad examples; left completely unaddressed is their actual point which is that an invincibly ignorant person might be saved.
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In both of the passages from Lefebvre and Fellay, it is abundantly clear that they are using as examples of the invincibly ignorant this Hindu or that Muslim; for, both quotes are packed within a larger discussion about invincible ignorance and the like. If they are bad examples fine, but knowing that they are bad examples tells us absolutely nothing about the argument we're supposed to be addressing.

Mithrandylan · « **Reply #100 on:** August 06, 2019, 10:26:52 AM »

Quote from: Pax Vobis on August 06, 2019, 09:53:42 AM

Ok, here's the best argument against the error that the 'invincibly ignorant' can get to heaven. At best, they can get to Limbo.
The Church Fathers are unanimous that infants must be baptized to get to heaven. Is there any man who is more invincibly ignorant than a baby? Yet, a baby must be baptized to be saved.

It is this one Spirit who makes it possible for an infant to be regenerated . . . when that infant is brought to baptism; and it is through this one Spirit that the infant so presented is reborn. For it is not written, “Unless a man be born again by the will of his parents” or “by the faith of those presenting him or ministering to him,” but, “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit.” The water, therefore, manifesting exteriorly the sacrament of grace, and the Spirit effecting interiorly the benefit of grace, both regenerate in one Christ that man who was generated in Adam.
-- St Augustine, (Letters 98:2 [A.D. 408]).

If reconciliation through Christ is necessary to all men, on all men has passed sin by which we have become enemies, in order that we should have need of reconciliation. This reconciliation is in the laver of regeneration and in the flesh and blood of Christ, without which not even infants can have life in themselves….
-- St Augustine, (Against Two Letters of the Pelagians, Bk 4)

“Every soul that is born into flesh is soiled by the filth of wickedness and sin. . . . In the Church, baptism is given for the remission of sins, and, according to the usage of the Church, baptism is given even to infants. If there were nothing in infants which required the remission of sins and nothing in them pertinent to forgiveness, the grace of baptism would seem superfluous”
-- Origen, (Homilies on Leviticus 8:3 [A.D. 248]).

“The Church received from the apostles the tradition of giving baptism even to infants. The apostles, to whom were committed the secrets of the divine sacraments, knew there are in everyone innate strains of [original] sin, which must be washed away through water and the Spirit”
-- Origen, (Commentaries on Romans 5:9 [A.D. 248]).

“If, in the case of the worst sinners and those who formerly sinned much against God, when afterwards they believe, the remission of their sins is granted and no one is held back from baptism and grace, how much more, then, should an infant not be held back, who, having but recently been born, has done no sin, except that, born of the flesh according to Adam, he has contracted the contagion of that old death from his first being born. For this very reason does he [an infant] approach more easily to receive the remission of sins: because the sins forgiven him are not his own but those of another” (ibid., 64:5).
-- St Cyprian, (Letters 64:5 [A.D. 253]).

“‘Well enough,’ some will say, ‘for those who ask for baptism, but what do you have to say about those who are still children, and aware neither of loss nor of grace? Shall we baptize them too?’ Certainly , if there is any pressing danger. Better that they be sanctified unaware, than that they depart unsealed and uninitiated” (ibid., 40:28).
-- St Gregory nαzιenzen, (Oration on Holy Baptism 40:28 [A.D. 388]).

“You see how many are the benefits of baptism, and some think its heavenly grace consists only in the remission of sins, but we have enumerated ten honors [it bestows]! For this reason we baptize even infants, though they are not defiled by [personal] sins, so that there may be given to them holiness, righteousness, adoption, inheritance, brotherhood with Christ, and that they may be his [Christ’s] members”
-- St John Chyrsostom, (Baptismal Catecheses in Augustine, Against Julian 1:6:21 [A.D. 388]).

Of those engendered of the seed of Adam no man is born without sin, and it is necessary even for babes to be born anew in Christ by the grace of regeneration.
-- St Jerome, (Letter 144)

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I am unsure how significant the necessity of infant baptism is to the question. For, it is certain that infants cannot make moral choices one way or the other, whereas it is certain that adults can. The point being that if we imagine an invincibly ignorant adult we imagine someone who can, by a free act of the will and a genuine assent to supernatural faith, accept God's grace. An infant categorically cannot do this, whether they are born into a Christian society or a remote pagan one.

Pax Vobis · « **Reply #101 on:** August 06, 2019, 10:50:24 AM »

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I am unsure how significant the necessity of infant baptism is to the question. For, it is certain that infants cannot make moral choices one way or the other, whereas it is certain that adults can. The point being that if we imagine an invincibly ignorant adult we imagine someone who can, by a free act of the will and a genuine assent to supernatural faith, accept God's grace. An infant categorically cannot do this, whether they are born into a Christian society or a remote pagan one.

If an infant, who is blissfully innocent of ANY personal sin, but who is stained with Original Sin, still needs baptism to be saved, how much more so does a person of the age of reason need the remission of his sins, since Scripture tells us that even a just man falls 7 times a day (and only those who are in the state of grace are "just")?
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If an infant, who cannot make an act of free will, and who cannot make a religious choice, still needs baptism to be saved, how much more so does a person of the age of reason need baptism, who has used his free will in sin and who has the obligation to find the True Religion?
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If an infant, who has no knowledge of God or religion, and yet they require baptism to be saved, how much more so does an age-of-reason person need baptism, who knows of God, generally speaking and who has the natural law on their conscience?

Ladislaus · « **Reply #102 on:** August 06, 2019, 11:29:40 AM »

Quote from: ByzCat3000 on August 05, 2019, 02:14:04 PM

I think that's a bit silly. How does it differ logically from "since its theoretically possible that some soul could be so mentally deficient [or a child] that he could commit murder without sufficient knowledge or consent of will for the sin to be mortal, therefore we shouldn't ban murder because by doing so we might be elevating guilt" or something like that.

Well, Religious Liberty goes out of its way to declare that this right exists only in so far as it does not infringe upon the rights of others or harm them. So the murder example does not apply. Of course, then, one could make the case that promoting a false religion causes harm to others. Yet Religious Liberty doesn't acknowledge that harm comes from following a false religion, since so long as someone is following his conscience, he's pleasing God and in the process of saving his soul. And that's key. Traditionally the Church has likened the spreading of heresy to murder, and worse, since one would be killing souls by spreading heresy. V2 no longer believes that heresy kills.

So that's why your rebuttal here fails. Murder would infringe upon the rights of someone else, and therefore should be banned ... even according to the principles of Religious Liberty.

And the argument still holds. If I please God and save my souls by following my own conscience (the subjectivist soteriology of most BoDers), then I have a right to please God and save my soul, and therefore a right to follow my own conscience ... even if erroneous, with the restriction that it cannot infringe on the rights of others, cause them harm, or damage the public good. (same restriction made in Dignitatis Humanae).

Mithrandylan · « **Reply #103 on:** August 06, 2019, 11:31:03 AM »

Quote from: Pax Vobis on August 06, 2019, 10:50:24 AM

If an infant, who is blissfully innocent of ANY personal sin, but who is stained with Original Sin, still needs baptism to be saved, how much more so does a person of the age of reason need the remission of his sins, since Scripture tells us that even a just man falls 7 times a day (and only those who are in the state of grace are "just")?
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If an infant, who cannot make an act of free will, and who cannot make a religious choice, still needs baptism to be saved, how much more so does a person of the age of reason need baptism, who has used his free will in sin and who has the obligation to find the True Religion?
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If an infant, who has no knowledge of God or religion, and yet they require baptism to be saved, how much more so does an age-of-reason person need baptism, who knows of God, generally speaking and who has the natural law on their conscience?

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I understand the a fortiori logic. It isn't a bad argument, I'm just not sure if it holds up to scrutiny. Per Trent, we know that an adult can be justified before water baptism and a major reason for this is because the adult, having the developed faculties of intellect and will, can assent to supernatural faith and be animated by supernatural charity. The fundamental reason that infants need to be baptized, metaphysically speaking, is that they simply cannot do this. It quite truly is impossible, at the metaphysical level, for an infant to assent to supernatural faith and make a perfect act of charity.
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The real question for the person who is invincibly ignorant is the question of the required act of supernatural faith, which is the root of justification, without which no man can be justified. For one who is invincibly ignorant of the Catholic Church I am sure could be saved so long as they had explicit faith in the Incarnation and the Trinity (supposing of course that all the other boxes were ticked, too: hope and charity, sanctifying grace, in which of course is implied a desire for baptism). The Incarnation and the Trinity are proper objects of faith, and certainly suffice to prepare the way for hope and charity. But what of a man who is invincibly ignorant of the Incarnation? It seems such a man would lack the proper object of faith to develop hope and charity, for hope is premised in an awareness of man's sinfulness, an awareness that he is deserving of God's justice, and a trust that God is merciful. While the Incarnation as an object of faith clearly implies this, a Rewarder God as object of faith implies no such thing. True, it's certainly not incompatible with hope or charity, but those virtues "grow," in a sense, from the foundation of faith and faith's objects. They're not brute facts, they have a logical relationship to faith as their foundation. I struggle to see the logical relationship between supernatural faith with a Rewarder God as its object and the virtues of hope and charity.
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Ladislaus · « **Reply #104 on:** August 06, 2019, 11:42:34 AM »

Quote from: Mithrandylan on August 06, 2019, 10:18:57 AM

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I've already said that my view is that without explicit faith in the Incarnation and the Trinity, no man can be saved.

OK, well, so what? Then this debate doesn't apply to you. We're specifically discussing the SSPX position that the "Hindu in Tibet" can be saved.

Someone who explicitly holds this minimum is in fact a Catholic even if he happens to be in material ignorance or error about some other things. They are not then "in a false religion" but in the Catholic religion.

If you happen to hold this Thomistic view regarding BoD and its scope, the you do not in fact hold Vatican II ecclesiology. In this view, you are being saved by virtue of our accepting objective truth with the supernatural virtue of faith ... and not because of the natural dispositions of your conscience (Pelagianism).

Author Topic: Why do all major Trad organisations teach those in false religions can be saved? (Read 32922 times)

Pax Vobis

Re: Why do all major Trad organisations teach those in false religions can be saved?

ByzCat3000

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ByzCat3000

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forlorn

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Mithrandylan

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forlorn

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Last Tradhican

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Pax Vobis

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Last Tradhican

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Mithrandylan

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Mithrandylan

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Pax Vobis

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Ladislaus

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Mithrandylan

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Ladislaus

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