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Author Topic: Why do all major Trad organisations teach those in false religions can be saved?  (Read 10977 times)

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Offline forlorn

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Rationally, I cannot see a foot to stand on with this position. Any way of saying someone who's not a baptised Christian and doesn't even desire baptism could be saved seems like a direct contradiction of EENS. And yet even the largest Trad groups all teach the same. Even +Lefebvre taught that people in false religions can be saved. How is it that even those who claim to be rejecting V2 are still supporting this denial of EENS? Even groups that don't even claim communion with Rome at all, like the CMRI, still teach this. Only various independent individuals like the Dimonds seem to teach otherwise. Despite how obvious it is that EENS = EENS, it still seems like the overwhelming majority of clergymen, even those who claim to reject modernism and its associated heresies, still teach that those in false religions can be saved. "Implicit baptism of desire" or what have you. Why do they teach this?


Offline Mithrandylan

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Are you sure you've not mis-assessed the position of those you mention in your OP?  The claim that ABL and the CMRI are each committed to Vatican II soteriology is one that crops up again and again, but I've never seen sufficient evidence that this is the case for either.
"Be kind; do not seek the malicious satisfaction of having discovered an additional enemy to the Church... And, above all, be scrupulously truthful. To all, friends and foes alike, give that serious attention which does not misrepresent any opinion, does not distort any statement, does not mutilate any quotation. We need not fear to serve the cause of Christ less efficiently by putting on His spirit". (Vermeersch, 1913).


Offline SeanJohnson

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Are you sure you've not mis-assessed the position of those you mention in your OP?  The claim that ABL and the CMRI are each committed to Vatican II soteriology is one that crops up again and again, but I've never seen sufficient evidence that this is the case for either.
That's because you do not view these various statements through the lens of Fr. Feeney's error.
Rom 5: 20 - "But where sin increased, grace abounded all the more."

Offline sedevacantist3

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Are you sure you've not mis-assessed the position of those you mention in your OP?  The claim that ABL and the CMRI are each committed to Vatican II soteriology is one that crops up again and again, but I've never seen sufficient evidence that this is the case for either.
Surely you have seen the quotes by Fellay and Lefebvre that hindus can be saved, they spin it by saying there are saved not in their religion but by the Catholic Church 

Offline Mithrandylan

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Surely you have seen the quotes by Fellay and Lefebvre that hindus can be saved, they spin it by saying there are saved not in their religion but by the Catholic Church
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I have, yes, and I have maintained that there is no "spin" in reading it that way.  There's no meaning in a vacuum, so if we want to understand something we can't read it in a vacuum.  If you think what Lefebvre said is irredeemable, quote the passage and make the argument. 
"Be kind; do not seek the malicious satisfaction of having discovered an additional enemy to the Church... And, above all, be scrupulously truthful. To all, friends and foes alike, give that serious attention which does not misrepresent any opinion, does not distort any statement, does not mutilate any quotation. We need not fear to serve the cause of Christ less efficiently by putting on His spirit". (Vermeersch, 1913).


Offline sedevacantist3

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I have, yes, and I have maintained that there is no "spin" in reading it that way.  There's no meaning in a vacuum, so if we want to understand something we can't read it in a vacuum.  If you think what Lefebvre said is irredeemable, quote the passage and make the argument.
Consider a Hindu in Tibet who has no knowledge of the Catholic Church.  He lives according to his conscience and to the laws which God has put into his heart.  He can be in the state of grace, and if he dies in this state of grace, he will go to heaven.” (The Angelus, “A Talk Heard Round the World,” April, 2006, p. 5.)

Offline forlorn

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I have, yes, and I have maintained that there is no "spin" in reading it that way.  There's no meaning in a vacuum, so if we want to understand something we can't read it in a vacuum.  If you think what Lefebvre said is irredeemable, quote the passage and make the argument.
Quote
Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff
EENS doesn't translate to "there is no salvation except through the Church", it translates to "there is no salvation OUTSIDE the Church". How can a non-Christian be within the Church? 

Offline forlorn

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Consider a Hindu in Tibet who has no knowledge of the Catholic Church.  He lives according to his conscience and to the laws which God has put into his heart.  He can be in the state of grace, and if he dies in this state of grace, he will go to heaven.” (The Angelus, “A Talk Heard Round the World,” April, 2006, p. 5.)
It's important to note that +Lefebvre did not think only the "invincibly ignorant" can be saved. 

Quote from: Bishop Marcel Lefebvre, Open Letter to Confused Catholics, Pages 73-74
Does this mean that no Protestant, no Muslim, no Buddhist or animist will be saved?  No, it would be a second error to think that.  Those who cry for intolerance in interpreting St. Cyprian’s formula Outside the Church there is no salvation, also reject the Creed, “I accept one baptism for the remission of sins,” and are insufficiently instructed as to what baptism is…



Offline Mithrandylan

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Yes, that's the quote, but what's the argument?  
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Try reading the whole thing, or at least try reading the surrounding material.  It is obvious that he is speaking of membership in voto, which is described in Pope Pius XII's Mystici Corporis Christi (§103).  He is not speaking of someone who is outside the Church, but someone who is in the Church, but who does not share the bond of membership.  This distinction between "in" and "membership" is an important one that is discussed by Fenton at great length, acknowledged in Mystici Corporis Christi and its ghost-writer the great Dutch ecclesiologist Sebastiaan Tromp, and even contained-- if with different terminology-- in Bellarmine's great counter-reformation works on the Church Militant.  
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In other words, there's nothing uniquely Vatican II-ish about any of this.  
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One might argue (though you'd actually have to argue it, mind you) that the example Fellay gave was a poor one, and one to which the principles do not apply.  But the principles themselves are solid and unassailable. 
"Be kind; do not seek the malicious satisfaction of having discovered an additional enemy to the Church... And, above all, be scrupulously truthful. To all, friends and foes alike, give that serious attention which does not misrepresent any opinion, does not distort any statement, does not mutilate any quotation. We need not fear to serve the cause of Christ less efficiently by putting on His spirit". (Vermeersch, 1913).

Offline forlorn

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Yes, that's the quote, but what's the argument?  
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Try reading the whole thing, or at least try reading the surrounding material.  It is obvious that he is speaking of membership in voto, which is described in Pope Pius XII's Mystici Corporis Christi (§103).  He is not speaking of someone who is outside the Church, but someone who is in the Church, but who does not share the bond of membership.  This distinction between "in" and "membership" is an important one that is discussed by Fenton at great length, acknowledged in Mystici Corporis Christi and its ghost-writer the great Dutch ecclesiologist Sebastiaan Tromp, and even contained-- if with different terminology-- in Bellarmine's great counter-reformation works on the Church Militant.  
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In other words, there's nothing uniquely Vatican II-ish about any of this.  
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One might argue (though you'd actually have to argue it, mind you) that the example Fellay gave was a poor one, and one to which the principles do not apply.  But the principles themselves are solid and unassailable.
How is one within the Church if they are neither baptised nor have the faith? Trent explicitly says that baptism is not to be taken as a metaphor, it couldn't get clearer.

Offline tdrev123

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Yes, that's the quote, but what's the argument?  
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Try reading the whole thing, or at least try reading the surrounding material.  It is obvious that he is speaking of membership in voto, which is described in Pope Pius XII's Mystici Corporis Christi (§103).  He is not speaking of someone who is outside the Church, but someone who is in the Church, but who does not share the bond of membership.  This distinction between "in" and "membership" is an important one that is discussed by Fenton at great length, acknowledged in Mystici Corporis Christi and its ghost-writer the great Dutch ecclesiologist Sebastiaan Tromp, and even contained-- if with different terminology-- in Bellarmine's great counter-reformation works on the Church Militant.  
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In other words, there's nothing uniquely Vatican II-ish about any of this.  
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One might argue (though you'd actually have to argue it, mind you) that the example Fellay gave was a poor one, and one to which the principles do not apply.  But the principles themselves are solid and unassailable.
"All non-catholics are damned" Piux X
Sympathy turns into heresy awful quick.  


Offline Mithrandylan

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How is one within the Church if they are neither baptised nor have the faith? Trent explicitly says that baptism is not to be taken as a metaphor, it couldn't get clearer.
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Well what exactly do you mean "have the faith"?  That's ambiguous. 
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With regard to being in the Church prior to baptism, you cited Trent's anathema against baptism as a metaphor.  Do you think that anathema bears on Trent's own description of a non-baptized person receiving all of the theological virtues and being justified before every being baptized (Denz. 798 )?  The metaphor anathema is irrelevant here, that's against the reformers who thought baptism doesn't do anything, that it is merely a symbolic stand-in for professing the faith rather than an actual sacrament which washes away sins and joins a man to the Church as a member.
"Be kind; do not seek the malicious satisfaction of having discovered an additional enemy to the Church... And, above all, be scrupulously truthful. To all, friends and foes alike, give that serious attention which does not misrepresent any opinion, does not distort any statement, does not mutilate any quotation. We need not fear to serve the cause of Christ less efficiently by putting on His spirit". (Vermeersch, 1913).

Offline forlorn

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Well what exactly do you mean "have the faith"?  That's ambiguous.

Whatever you define "having the faith" as being, it's clear that Muslims and Buddhists do not have it. I just inserted that to cover my bases in case you tried to equate them with catechumens.

With regard to being in the Church prior to baptism, you cited Trent's anathema against baptism as a metaphor.  Do you think that anathema bears on Trent's own description of a non-baptized person receiving all of the theological virtues and being justified before every being baptized (Denz. 798 )?

"and finally when they resolve to receive baptism, to begin a new life and to keep the commandments of God."

That's a pretty important part to leave out, don't you think?

 The metaphor anathema is irrelevant here, that's against the reformers who thought baptism doesn't do anything, that it is merely a symbolic stand-in for professing the faith rather than an actual sacrament which washes away sins and joins a man to the Church as a member.

No, that's a different canon. Canon II "On Baptism" states that true and natural water is necessary for baptism, and anathemises all those who would wrest that into a metaphor. How exactly was someone who died a Muslim baptised with true and natural water?

It's canon V that addresses the reformers' belief that baptism is not necessary for salvation.

When you combine those two canons together we are told that first of all, baptism is necessary for salvation, and secondly that baptism MUST be of true and natural water, and that the requirement for true and natural water MAY NOT be wrested into a metaphor. How exactly does this fit with baptism of desire?

Offline Mithrandylan

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I didn't leave anything out, Forlorn.  Would've been pretty silly for me to point you to the passage if there was something I was trying to conceal in it, wouldn't it?
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You're getting way ahead here.  This is turning into a baptism of desire debate.  Your initial problem was in what you perceived as a shared soteriology between traditionalist organizations (which, may I point out, have in this thread only been represented by two figures: Lefebrve and Fellay) and Vatican II.  I already gave you an argument that reconciles the quotes you gave with preconciliar theologians.  And they weren't the likes of de Lubac or Rahner, but of committed and renowned traditionalists, including a pope.  The point here-- just to be clear-- is simply that what you are complaining about has a very plausible explanation in the corpus of pre-conciliar theology.  Whether or not that is the right explanation we can debate.  Then we get into the issue of baptism of desire more broadly.  But I think before we do that it's only just to clarify where we stand on your initial point of inquiry.
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"Be kind; do not seek the malicious satisfaction of having discovered an additional enemy to the Church... And, above all, be scrupulously truthful. To all, friends and foes alike, give that serious attention which does not misrepresent any opinion, does not distort any statement, does not mutilate any quotation. We need not fear to serve the cause of Christ less efficiently by putting on His spirit". (Vermeersch, 1913).

Offline forlorn

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I didn't leave anything out, Forlorn.  Would've been pretty silly for me to point you to the passage if there was something I was trying to conceal in it, wouldn't it?

But you did give a brief summary of it, where you ignored that fact that Trent specified such an individual would have an active desire for and attempt to receive baptism. This is the explicit baptism of desire for catechumens and the like which many saints in the past have proposed. It is an entirely different concept to "implicit" baptism of desire where believers of false religions who don't actually want to be baptised are somehow "invisibly" part of the Church and saved.

You're getting way ahead here.  This is turning into a baptism of desire debate.  Your initial problem was in what you perceived as a shared soteriology between traditionalist organizations (which, may I point out, have in this thread only been represented by two figures: Lefebrve and Fellay) and Vatican II.  I already gave you an argument that reconciles the quotes you gave with preconciliar theologians.  And they weren't the likes of de Lubac or Rahner, but of committed and renowned traditionalists, including a pope.  The point here-- just to be clear-- is simply that what you are complaining about has a very plausible explanation in the corpus of pre-conciliar theology.  Whether or not that is the right explanation we can debate.  Then we get into the issue of baptism of desire more broadly.  But I think before we do that it's only just to clarify where we stand on your initial point of inquiry.

Modernism started before Vatican 2, that was just its coup de t'at, in a sense. But I fail to see any support for people in false religions being saved in Church history until the last 100 or so years, when individuals started to propose it, but even then I don't think any Pope or any authoritative docuмent said as much until after Vatican 2. I don't see any way in which people in false religions being saved is not a direct contradiction of EENS. How exactly are Muslims and Buddhists within the Church?