Expert: Father Dave Bechtel - 12/23/2011

Question
QUESTION: Greetings,



I was wanting some insight on this, thanks!



"...if you believe that the Catholic Church is the Church founded by Christ and is His true Church, and you leave it anyway, you cannot be saved."

 (Lumen gentium 14)



So, if one does NOT believe that the Catholic Church is Christ true Church they can properly leave the church (this person has left anyway) but wanted to let his parish know.



Ryan

ANSWER: Here is the relevant citation in content from Lumen Gentium 14:

"This Sacred Council wishes to turn its attention firstly to the Catholic faithful. Basing itself upon Sacred Scripture and Tradition, it teaches that the Church, now sojourning on earth as an exile, is necessary for salvation. Christ, present to us in His Body, which is the Church, is the one Mediator and the unique way of salvation. In explicit terms He Himself affirmed the necessity of faith and baptism(124) and thereby affirmed also the necessity of the Church, for through baptism as through a door men enter the Church. Whosoever, therefore, knowing that the Catholic Church was made necessary by Christ, would refuse to enter or to remain in it, could not be saved."

In other words: If one knows full well that the Catholic Church is the Church founded by Jesus Christ, and if one knows full well that Jesus Christ has entrusted to his Church the fullness of the graces of salvation----and one leaves the Church anyway one cannot be saved.

My experience is that most people who leave the Catholic Church do so in ignorance.  Protestantism is extremely good at making it appear as though they are God centered and Catholicism is not. In actuality Protestantism glorifies man, while Catholicism glorifies God.  The doctrine of Scriptura Sola bears this out.  In Protestantism, each individual sits in judgement of the Church. In the Catholic Church the individual defines himself in relationship to the larger community.  Protestantism is the reverse: the community defines itself in relationship to the individual

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: I agree with most of what you said, but the thing is if I ask someone else this same question i get a different answer...it's according to ones own subjective view.

This person, who is a dear friend of mine, was a protestant for 30 years of his life, born and raised in the Baptist church. He converted because he was looking for something that the protestant churches just didn't offer...He was intrigued by the early church and how they perceived Our Lord.

He suffers from many psychological factors, much like myself, this is how we met, and he pursues understanding and loves God dearly, but I think because of he can't understand the difference in mortal sin/venial...the Bible's "not-s-'defined" detail into purgatory and Mary...is why he is leaving. (It's not that he doesn't try to pursue to know it better, He knows more about the catholic faith than what some priest do!

So, because of his condition I try to be gentle with him, but I know how bipolar disorder effects someone and how it makes one have poor decision making and flip-flops on their beliefs from one day to the next.

Answer
I don't know if the average lay person knows more about the Faith then some priests so much as it is the average lay person is no longer the average lay person!  Pre-Vatican II the average lay person had perhaps a high school diploma whereas the priest had a graduate education and beyond. Now the average lay person has at least an undergraduate degree and probably a graduate degree. Thus, people are generally as educated if not more so then the priest. Some lay faithful are reading works in theology as well. However there are many aspects to the Faith.  A lay person might know more then me on some aspect of the Faith---such as the latest pastoral document that came out of the Vatican, but I might know more then that same person in Systematic Theology.  There are many aspects to the Faith, and different branches of theology.

I can't make a judgement on your friend and neither can you.  God is the only one that knows the heart therefore we commend your friend to God and let God sort it out.