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Author Topic: Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?  (Read 3256 times)

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Offline Matto

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Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
« on: August 10, 2016, 11:00:40 PM »
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  • That is my question. Do you think there are many virtuous pagans? People who do not have the true faith like natives in the jungle who do not commit sin without the aid of Church or the sacraments? What do you think?
    R.I.P.
    Please pray for the repose of my soul.


    Offline Cantarella

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #1 on: August 10, 2016, 11:14:34 PM »
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  • I think that if true virtue is scarcely found even among Catholics who have all the supernatural aid of the True Faith, it would be almost impossible for a pagan to be virtous.

    Virtous people are a rarity.
    If anyone says that true and natural water is not necessary for baptism and thus twists into some metaphor the words of our Lord Jesus Christ" Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit" (Jn 3:5) let him be anathema.


    Offline JezusDeKoning

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #2 on: August 11, 2016, 12:56:44 AM »
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  • Quote from: Matto
    That is my question. Do you think there are many virtuous pagans? People who do not have the true faith like natives in the jungle who do not commit sin without the aid of Church or the sacraments? What do you think?


    A large amount of the world is full of uncontacted peoples - tribes living in the insular parts of a jungle or island completely separated from civilization. This makes the chance of them hearing of the Church zero. So, I think so.
    Remember O most gracious Virgin Mary...

    Offline Stubborn

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #3 on: August 11, 2016, 05:41:42 AM »
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  • Quote from: Matto
    That is my question. Do you think there are many virtuous pagans? People who do not have the true faith like natives in the jungle who do not commit sin without the aid of Church or the sacraments? What do you think?

    First, if such a person existed at all, God would see to it that he was brought into the Church, or was given every opportunity to enter it.

    Beyond that, by 'virtuous', I take it you mean 'sinless'. All the natives in the jungle I ever heard of worship false gods, which sins against the 1st commandment. But supposing there is a tribe out there who does not worship any god or has no "religion" at all, we're still talking about a person who, due to original sin, is prone to sin just as we all are. So no, I do not think it possible that even one such person has ever existed and remained outside the Church.

    "But Peter and the apostles answering, said: We ought to obey God, rather than men." - Acts 5:29

    The Highest Principle in the Church: "We are first of all under obedience to God, and only then under obedience to man" - Fr. Hesse

    Offline Matto

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #4 on: August 11, 2016, 12:24:29 PM »
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  • Quote from: Stubborn
    Beyond that, by 'virtuous', I take it you mean 'sinless'. All the natives in the jungle I ever heard of worship false gods, which sins against the 1st commandment. But supposing there is a tribe out there who does not worship any god or has no "religion" at all, we're still talking about a person who, due to original sin, is prone to sin just as we all are. So no, I do not think it possible that even one such person has ever existed and remained outside the Church.


    By "virtuous" I mean one who does not commit grave sins, NOT in the sense that they are in a state of sanctifying grace.
    R.I.P.
    Please pray for the repose of my soul.


    Offline Stubborn

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #5 on: August 11, 2016, 12:57:49 PM »
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  • I still don't think such a person exists - except perhaps those who have not reached the age of reason and the very elderly or ill.

    Sin is all about selfishness, about pleasing our self, our wants and desires period - that is what comes naturally to every human. Catholics must ask heaven to aid us so that with their help, we can go against our natural inclinations because without Their help, we don't stand a chance of not committing mortal sins.

    So natives without God are without the help we all need to avoid grave sin, IOW, because there is nothing to stop them from committing grievous sins, the presumption must be that without the aid of Church or the sacraments, that there are no virtuous natives.
    "But Peter and the apostles answering, said: We ought to obey God, rather than men." - Acts 5:29

    The Highest Principle in the Church: "We are first of all under obedience to God, and only then under obedience to man" - Fr. Hesse

    Offline Lover of Truth

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #6 on: August 11, 2016, 01:10:47 PM »
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  • I think hardly anyone has supernatural virtues and I believe many Catholics are not virtuous in the natural sense and lack the supernatural virtue of charity often times being in the state of mortal sin.  
    "I receive Thee, redeeming Prince of my soul. Out of love for Thee have I studied, watched through many nights, and exerted myself: Thee did I preach and teach. I have never said aught against Thee. Nor do I persist stubbornly in my views. If I have ever expressed myself erroneously on this Sacrament, I submit to the judgement of the Holy Roman Church, in obedience of which I now part from this world." Saint Thomas Aquinas the greatest Doctor of the Church

    Offline Lover of Truth

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #7 on: August 11, 2016, 01:13:43 PM »
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    It is known to Us and to you that those who labor in invincible ignorance of our most holy religion, and who, carefully observing the natural law and its precepts which God has inscribed in the hearts of all, and who, being ready to obey God, live an honest and upright life, can, through the working of the divine light and grace, attain eternal life, since God, who clearly sees, inspects and knows the minds, the intentions, the thoughts and the habits of all, will, by reason of His supreme goodness and kindness, never allow anyone who has not the guilt of willful sin to be punished by eternal sufferings. Pius IX


    We simply admit the possibility and let God do the rest.  We judge appearance, He reads hearts.  
    "I receive Thee, redeeming Prince of my soul. Out of love for Thee have I studied, watched through many nights, and exerted myself: Thee did I preach and teach. I have never said aught against Thee. Nor do I persist stubbornly in my views. If I have ever expressed myself erroneously on this Sacrament, I submit to the judgement of the Holy Roman Church, in obedience of which I now part from this world." Saint Thomas Aquinas the greatest Doctor of the Church


    Offline Matto

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #8 on: August 11, 2016, 01:24:44 PM »
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  • I think this is an interesting topic not just because of the issue of BOD but also about the possibility of avoiding mortal sin without sanctifying grace. I know for myself and I am sure for others it can be difficult to avoid sin even with the aid of the sacraments. So how hard must it be for one without sanctifying grace and without the sacraments to avoid mortal sin.
    R.I.P.
    Please pray for the repose of my soul.

    Offline Stubborn

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #9 on: August 11, 2016, 02:02:10 PM »
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  • Quote from: Matto
    I think this is an interesting topic not just because of the issue of BOD but also about the possibility of avoiding mortal sin without sanctifying grace. I know for myself and I am sure for others it can be difficult to avoid sin even with the aid of the sacraments. So how hard must it be for one without sanctifying grace and without the sacraments to avoid mortal sin.


    Exactly.

    Men are not basically good, they are naturally bad because we are all born with original sin. God purposely designed and created us so that it goes against our nature to not sin. We only cannot sin when we accept the graces He gives us - that's the only chance we have of not sinning, so natives without the Church do not stand a chance.
    "But Peter and the apostles answering, said: We ought to obey God, rather than men." - Acts 5:29

    The Highest Principle in the Church: "We are first of all under obedience to God, and only then under obedience to man" - Fr. Hesse

    Offline Last Tradhican

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #10 on: August 11, 2016, 02:56:08 PM »
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  • Quote from: JezusDeKoning
    Quote from: Matto
    That is my question. Do you think there are many virtuous pagans? People who do not have the true faith like natives in the jungle who do not commit sin without the aid of Church or the sacraments? What do you think?


    A large amount of the world is full of uncontacted peoples - tribes living in the insular parts of a jungle or island completely separated from civilization. This makes the chance of them hearing of the Church zero. So, I think so.


    A large amount of the world is full of uncontacted peoples? Where specifically are these "large amount" of people?

    Do you think that the pre-Colombus Mayans were born in their time and place by chance?

    Quote
    Before all decision to create the world, the infinite knowledge of God presents to Him all the graces, and different series of graces, which He can prepare for each soul, along with the consent or refusal which would follow in each circuмstance, and that in millions of possible combinations ... Thus, for each man in particular there are in the thought of God, limitless possible histories, some histories of virtue and salvation, others of crime and damnation; and God will be free in choosing such a world, such a series of graces, and in determining the future history and final destiny of each soul. And this is precisely what He does when among all possible worlds, by an absolutely free act, he decides to realize the actual world with all the circuмstances of its historic evolutions, with all the graces which in fact have been and will be distributed until the end of the world, and consequently with all the elect and all the reprobate who God foresaw would be in it if de facto He created it." [The Catholic Encyclopedia Appleton, 1909, on Augustine, pg 97]




     
    The Vatican II church - Assisting Souls to Hell Since 1962

    For there shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders, insomuch as to deceive (if possible) even the elect. Mat 24:24


    Offline Last Tradhican

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #11 on: August 11, 2016, 03:03:48 PM »
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  • Quote
    From Mystical City of God , by Sister Mary of Agreda.

    537. Seeing him (Judas) thus beside himself Lucifer inspired him with the thought of hunting up the priests, returning to them the money and confessing his sin. This Judas hastened to do, and he loudly shouted at them those words: "I have sinned, betraying innocent blood!" (Matth. 27, 4). But they, not less hardened, answered that he should have seen to that before. The intention of the demon was to hinder the death of Christ if possible, for reasons already given and yet to be given (No. 419). This repulse of the priests, so full of impious cruelty, took away all hope from Judas and he persuaded himself that it was impossible to hinder the death of his Master. So thought also the demon, although later on he made more efforts to forestall it through Pilate. But as Judas could be of no more use to him for his purpose, he augmented his distress and despair, persuading him that in order to avoid severer punishments he must end his life. Judas yielded to this terrible deceit, and rushing forth from the city, hung himself on a dried-out figtree (Matth. 27, 5). Thus he that was the murderer of his Creator, became also his own murderer. This happened on Friday at twelve o'clock, three hours before our Savior died. It was not becoming that his death and the consummation of our Redemption should coincide too closely with the execrable end of the traitorous disciple, who hated him with fiercest malice.

    538. The demons at once took possession of the soul of Judas and brought it down to hell. His entrails burst from the body hanging upon the tree (Acts 1, 18). All that saw this stupendous puniishment of the perfidious and malicious disciple for his treason, were filled with astonishment and dread. The body remained hanging by the neck for three days, exposed to the view of the public. During that time the Jєωs attempted to take it down from the tree and to bury it in secret, for it was a sight apt to cause great confusion to the pharisees and priests, who could not refute such a testimony of his wickedness. But no efforts of theirs sufficed to drag or separate the body from its position on the tree until three days had passed, when, according to the dispensation of divine justice, the demons themselves snatched the body from the tree and brought it to his soul, in order that both might suffer eternal punishment in the profoundest abyss of hell. Since what I have been made to know of the pains and chastisements of Judas, is worthy of fear-inspiring attention, I will according to command reveal what has been shown me concerning it. Among the obscure caverns of the infernal prisons was a very large one, arranged for more horrible chastisements than the others, and which was still unoccupied; for the demons had been unable to cast any soul into it, although their cruelty had induced them to attempt it many times from the time of Cain unto that day. All hell had remained astonished at the failure of these attempts, being entirely ignorant of the mystery, until the arrival of the soul of Judas, which they readily succeeded in hurling and burying in this prison never before occupied by any of the damned. The secret of it was, that this cavern of greater torments and fiercer fires of hell, from the creation of the world, had been destined for those, who, after having received Baptism, would damn themselves by the neglect of the Sacraments, the doctrines, the Passion and Death of the Savior, and the intercession of his most holy Mother. As Judas had been the first one who had so signally participated in these blessings, and as he had so fearfully misused them, he was also the first to suffer the torments of this place, prepared for him and his imitators and followers.

    539. This mystery I was commanded to reveal more particularly for a dreadful warning to all Christians, and especially to the priests, prelates and religious, who are accustomed to treat with more familiarity the body and blood of Christ our Lord, and who, by their office and state are his closer friends. In order to avoid blame I would like to find words and expressions sufficiently strong to make an impression on our unfeeling obduracy, so that we all may take a salutary warning and be filled with the fear of the punishments awaiting all bad Christians according to the station each one of us occupies. The demons torment Judas with inexpressible cruelty, because he persisted in the betrayal of his Master, by whose Passion and Death they were vanquished and despoiled of the possession of the world. The wrath which they had conceived against the Savior and his blessed Mother, they wreck, as far as is allowed them, on all those who imitate the traitorous disciple and who follow him in his contempt of the evangelical law, of the Sacraments and of the fruits of the Redemption. And in this the demons are but executing just punishment on those members of the mystical body of Christ, who have severed their connection with its head Christ, and who have voluntarily drifted away and delivered themselves over to the accursed hate and implacable fury of his enemies. As the instruments of divine justice they chastise the redeemed for their ingratitude toward their Redeemer. Let the children of the Church consider well this truth, for it cannot fail to move their hearts and induce them to evade such a lamentable fate.
    The Vatican II church - Assisting Souls to Hell Since 1962

    For there shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders, insomuch as to deceive (if possible) even the elect. Mat 24:24

    Offline BeatusRusticus

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #12 on: August 11, 2016, 05:47:56 PM »
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  • I have met a lot more people who are outwardly good who are pagans, than Catholics. There are a lot more bad Catholics than good Catholics. Is it because the devil particularly assails those who have the Truth? A pagan can try to be good, by acting upon the graces that God sends him. He can choose to practice virtue and abhor vice, and the knowledge of which is which, the natural law, is written on his heart just as it is written on ours, as we are all created by God.

    I've known several saintly Catholics, and know of hundreds or thousands of canonized saints. I've never met a saintly pagan, only fairly virtuous ones. Only God, who reads hearts, knows how much these fairly virtuous pagans acted in good faith, what graces they cooperated with, what graces they rejected and refused to act upon, and how culpable these people really were for the actions and inactions of their lives. What is certain is that had they had the gospel preached to them, and accepted it, and enjoyed the aid of the Church and the sacraments throughout their lives, they would have had much more efficacious aids to virtue, weapons against vice, and would have fully cooperated with God's will by doing so. If they didn't become a Catholic, only God can say whether their reasons were justifiable, (ignorance of the existence of the church, ignorance of the teachings of the church, bad example by Catholics who should have known differently, etc.) and only God can choose whether to extend to them the sanctifying grace to save their soul. We don't know, and can't know, and must therefore prudently assume that in most or all of these cases, they are probably damned. However we can hope, in God's mercy, for their salvation, even if we cannot have "good hope." We know that God loves us all, individually, and wills our salvation, that He gives every human soul the graces necessary to save their soul, and that if a soul is damned, it is due to that soul's own selfish will, in the end. What, precisely, the graces are that God gives to a pagan in the deepest depths of the Congo, or a schismatic in a little town somewhere on the Volga, are known only to Him.

    However, WE know that the ordinary means that God wills to give grace to mankind is via baptism and the Church, and that it is therefore our duty to help God in his great work of redemption, by doing our part to be good Catholics, and to spread the gospel, attempting to make everyone in the world a Catholic.

    Online Ladislaus

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #13 on: August 11, 2016, 07:49:21 PM »
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  • So the Sacraments and the Church are the "ordinary means" of salvation and the Church offers a lot of helps to salvation, making it easier.  That's not what Catholic dogma teaches.  Besides, if morals are subjective, then fornication is not against natural law and so pagans who fornicate on a regular basis do so without mortal sin while Catholics could go to hell after one sin?  Prots who don't think they have a strict obligation to attend church services on Sunday commit no sin but Catholics who sleep in one time from Mass are subject to hellfire?  So much for being a "help" to salvation.

    Offline BeatusRusticus

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    Do you think there are many virtuous pagans?
    « Reply #14 on: August 11, 2016, 11:06:11 PM »
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  • Catholic dogmas bind us, and are given to us for our own guidance on the straight and narrow path.  They do not bind God. Practically speaking it is impossible to be saved without the aid of the sacraments. Theoretically speaking? Well, that's a matter for theologians more learned than myself, and arguments can be adduced on both sides. It really doesn't matter one whit rather a pagan "can" be saved or "can't," all we need to know is that it's obligatory and absolutely necessary for us to try to make him a Catholic. If we succeed? Good. If we fail, either because we never reached him or we presented the faith badly? Only God knows. But we certainly can't say he's likely to be saved. Nor can we say that it is de fide that he is in Hell for eternity, for even though we know Hell exists and people go there, we can't even say for certainty, private revelations aside, that Judas is there, let alone some infidel from Bangladesh.