CHAPTER V., Part I. There is No Salvation Out of the Roman Catholic Church for those who die without being united to her.
§ 1. S. O. Begins to Comment ON THE ABOVE QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS. [He claims that preaching EENS to protestants is misrepresenting the doctrine]
S. O. emphatically declares that,
"Such expositions of the Church’s doctrine as applicable to modern Protestants have, to my own knowledge, done a great deal of harm to honest, well-meaning, conscientious people, and give an entirely false idea of the belief of Protestants. There is nothing to be gained by misrepresenting our own doctrines, and just as little by misrepresenting the doctrines of those who do not believe all that we do."
Is there not much ignorance contained in the above words of S. O. ? To misrepresent our own Catholic doctrines is to misrepresent God who revealed them; it is to misrepresent the Church of Christ that teaches them; and to do all this is a terrible crime.
Now, what can S. O. mean by misrepresenting Protestant doctrines? Very likely this: It is very wrong to make the devil blacker than he is, and to call him the author of Protestantism; it is very wrong to say that Protestant belief is only human belief and availeth nothing unto salvation; that this faith is no absolute, divine faith in Christ and his religion; in a word, it is very wrong to represent Protestantism such as it is.
Nothing, he says, is to be gained by misrepresenting God and the devil, the teachers from God and those from the devil, truth and falsehood, divine and human faith, true and false Christianity.
But is there nothing to be gained by misrepresenting God and his religion? Is there nothing to be gained in representing Protestant belief such as it is? Alas, S. O. seems not to see the loss in the former, nor the gain in the latter way of acting! It will, therefore, be an act of charity to continue to show him, in the sequel of this treatise, the bad consequences of misrepresenting God and his religion, and the good results of representing clearly the devil and his counterfeit religion.
§ 2. S. O. CONTINUES TO SPEAK EX CATHEDRA.
"And in the hope," he says, "of counteracting the false impressions conveyed by such teaching, I desire to submit the foregoing questions and replies to a fair examination. Let us tell the truth," he says, "and shame the devil."
To understand well the examination to which that great priest of the Church is going to submit some questions and replies of ours, it must be remembered that we had given several clear proofs for the truth that there is no salvation out of the Roman Catholic Church, namely:
Christ has solemnly declared that only those will be saved, who have done God's will on earth, as explained, not by private interpretation, but by the infallible teaching of the Roman Catholic Church.
"Not every one," says Christ, "who saith to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the kingdom of heaven; but he that doth the will of my Father who is in heaven, he shall enter the kingdom of heaven." (Matt. vii. 21.)
The will of the heavenly Father is that all men hear and believe his Son, Jesus Christ.
"This is my well beloved Son. Him you shall hear."
Now, Jesus Christ said to his Apostles and to all their lawful successors:
"He that heareth you heareth me, and he that despiseth you despiseth me, and he that despiseth me, despiseth him, the heavenly Father, that sent me."
Now all those who do not listen to Jesus Christ speaking to them through St. Peter and the Apostles, in their lawful successors, despise God the Father; they do not do his will, and therefore heaven will never be theirs.
What non-Catholic engages a servant who tells him:
"I will serve you on condition that you give me three hundred dollars a month and let me serve you according to my will, not according to yours"?
How, then, could God the Father admit one into his Kingdom, who has always refused to do his will, - who, instead of learning to do the will of God, the full doctrine of Christ, through the Catholic Church, was himself his own teacher, his own lawgiver, his own judge, in all religious matters!
"Go and teach all nations: teach them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. He that believeth not all these things shall be condemned."
Our divine Saviour says:
"No one can come to the Father, except through me."
If we then wish to enter heaven, we must be united to Christ--to his body, which is the Church, as St. Paul says. Therefore, out of the Church there is no salvation.
Again Jesus Christ says: