On Catholicism
On Catholicism
Saturday, May 2, 2009
On Catholicism
During the course of many conversations as well as in many teaching situations, I have often been asked what I believe about Catholicism, and when answering this has often been construed as some personal attack on Catholic people. I remember clearly one man storming out of a class I was teaching on Galatians, and when I asked him what the problem was he told me my stand on Catholicism was divisive and un-Christlike. I had no right to question them. On another occasion, I indicated that Mother Theresa was not in heaven if she believed what she said she believed. The response was interesting, as many were put off and even offended that I would suggest such a “saintly” person would not be in heaven. Of course, the fact that she denied many of the essential doctrines of Salvation was not an issue. She was such a wonderful and loving person – of course she is in heaven! The same held true when Pope John Paul II died. I was asked about him and said that he was not in heaven, but in hell. When challenged on this point I merely stated that Pope John Paul II was a “good” Catholic, believed he was saved by human effort, and depended more on Mary for his salvation than Christ. Of course he is not in heaven. If we attempt to come to God any other way that the way of the cross we will not get there. The message of the Gospel is not Christ AND but Christ ALONE.
The real issue here is that there is a difference between Catholics and Catholicism. I have many friends who are Catholic, and in fact one of the men I have worked with for many years is Catholic in name, but not in theology. Where issues arise is when people cannot separate the system of Catholicism from individual Catholics. Attacking the system of Catholicism should not be construed as attacking individual Catholics, except in the cases where those Catholics are espousing or promoting the doctrines of the Catholic Church. Additionally, one cannot take their view of Catholicism from individual Catholics, who may or may not know the official teachings of the Catholic Church. I have often been told “I know my neighbor who is a Catholic and they don’t believe that” to which my response is “it is irrelevant whether they believe it or not, because that is what the Catholic Church officially teaches.” I know a lot of Baptists who do not believe everything the “Baptist” denomination believes. Determining the official doctrine of a system by looking at individuals in that system is not the way it can be done – one needs to look at the official teachings of whatever system is in question. Only then will a true picture of their doctrine come out. In the case of Catholicism one needs to look at the official teachings of the Vatican and many Church Councils, most notably the Council of Trent in the 1500’s and Vatican I and II in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
So what about Catholicism? Is it Christian or not? My answer is that I firmly believe the system of Catholicism is pagan to the core, and is at best a completely apostate form of Christianity. Those who are “good” Catholics, that is, those who believe the official teachings of the Church and do those things the Church tells them to do, are not true Christians and will not go to heaven. “Bad” Catholics, that is, those who do not believe the official teachings of the Church but believe in salvation by faith alone in Christ alone by grace alone do go to heaven even if they attend Catholic services. This is where the real issue lies, not with the individuals who may be enmeshed in this system, but the system itself. Those who consider themselves to be Biblical, Orthodox believers need to understand what Catholicism is all about, and just how far from New Testament Christianity it is.
The problem with this approach, however, is our pluralistic age. This is an age when absolute right and wrong is under attack, and the greatest virtue seems to be toleration of any and all beliefs as equally valid. This is deadly, especially when it comes to the greatest question in life, “How can I be right with God?” The Bible clearly gives us the answer to this question, and any attempt to come to God by any other way leads not to life, but to death. This is an issue of the utmost importance, as it will determine where one spends eternity. That is why we need to take such a strong and uncompromising stand when it comes to the essentials of the Christian faith. We can debate end time scenarios, the validity of sign gifts, the organization and structure of the Church, and many other secondary and tertiary doctrines, but to miss what the Bible teaches about the person and work of Christ is to miss heaven.
So having said all that, how is it that a “good” Catholic believes he or she will get to heaven? If we were to interview the Pope of the Catholic Church, how would he say one becomes right with God? What follows is a high-level overview of official Catholic Theology – this is what the Catholic Church believes and teaches even though various individuals within it may or may not hold to all of the details.
Catholicism teaches that salvation is accomplished through the various sacraments of the Church that are channels of grace. Although they teach that Christ died for our sins, and that he is fully God, they distort how his death is applied to the sinner in order to accomplish salvation. For the Catholic, salvation is a process, not a finished work that begins with baptism. At baptism, Catholicism teaches that original sin is removed and the recipient is thereby put into a state of grace. Put another way, Baptism is the instrumental cause (the means by which something is accomplished) of salvation and does its work with or without the knowledge or understanding of the recipient. By contrast, the Bible teaches that the instrumental cause of salvation is faith (Ephesians 2:8-9).
Once baptized, any infant, or for that matter any person, will at worst go to purgatory and not hell – more about purgatory in a bit. That is why baptism is such an integral part of Catholicism – since without it one is in danger of being sent to hell since original sin is still upon the un-baptized person. There are some exceptions to this, the most important one being the concept of Limbo. A baby who dies un-baptized and unable to make a conscious choice cannot go to heaven since they have original sin – rather they go to a place called Limbo, which is neither heaven nor hell.
Once a person is baptized, they are “saved” in the Catholic sense of the word, and unless one commits a mortal sin, at worst they will go to purgatory, since Christ’s death only takes care of original sin, not acts of sin. Individual acts of sin need to be dealt with through a second sacrament, the sacrament of Penance or Reconciliation. A Catholic needs to regularly confess their sin and perform acts of repentance or contrition in order for God to forgive their individual sins. Venial sins are sins of a lesser nature that do not kill the state of grace received by baptism. Mortal sins, such as murder, will kill the state of grace so that anyone who dies in a state with un-confessed mortal sin will go to hell. That is why the sacrament of penance is so necessary – as it is required to keep one in a state of grace.
However, no matter how many times a person may go to confession, there is always the possibility that there is some sin somewhere that was not confessed. That brings us to the sacrament of extreme unction, or last rites, in which a person is insured of dying in a state of grace so that at worst they will go to purgatory to work off their personal sins.
The sacrament of the mass is intended to keep the state of grace alive in the Catholic, as when it is taken it is seen as a channel of grace. The entire Catholic system is designed such that one needs to constantly maintain themselves in the state of saving grace so that if they were to suddenly die they would die in a state of grace and not go to hell. In the Catholic mass, grace is conferred on the recipient who, according to Catholic theology, literally eats the body and blood of Christ. This infuses grace into the person, which is why it is important that they regularly attend mass. This makes the Catholic mass not a memorial to be remembered, but a means of salvation and a channel of grace.
The engine that makes Catholicism run and provides a safety net is the doctrine of Purgatory. Catholicism teaches that when ones dies, just about everyone will go to purgatory, a place of punishment and cleansing, and will stay there until they are purified and ready for heaven. The length of stay in purgatory depends on ones faithfulness to the Catholic Church, and its teachings, as well as individual acts one can do in life. In fact, one can significantly reduce the amount of time they will be in purgatory by performing various works, pilgrimages, and rituals in life. So essential is this doctrine that the Catholic Church teaches only individuals who have special revelation from God can be assured of going directly to heaven after death – everyone else goes to purgatory.
Not only can one’s stay in purgatory be reduced by acts in life, but one can have the excess merits of saints applied to their account to decrease the amount of time they need to stay in purgatory – and in some cases this merit can even eliminate their stay altogether. This excess merit is found in the Treasury of Merit. Saints who die with more than enough good works to allow them to go directly to heaven have their excess merit deposited into this treasury. This merit is at the disposal of the Catholic Church and can be dispensed whenever the Pope or Church leaders decide to do it. One example is the plenary indulgence given to those who meet with the Pope on one day a year at a special time and place in the Vatican. If one is so blessed as to be there at the right time, one’s stay in purgatory is completely eliminated by the plenary indulgence granted by seeing the Pope.
Many individual Catholics I have talked to in America have no idea about this teaching. I have had the opportunity to make several trips to Europe, and one of the things that is evident is how much different Catholicism looks over there as compared to how in looks here. I have walked into many cathedrals and churches in Europe, and in all of them one can purchase candles for 1 or 5 Euros, that can be lit in memory of a loved one that has died. In lighting such candles, the living can reduce the amount of time their loved one is in purgatory. In Notre Dame Cathedral I saw thousands of lit candles. Additionally in Notre Dame there are numerous little alcoves off the main area in which one can pay for private masses for loved ones and thereby significantly reduce their time in purgatory. I remember visiting a church in Durnstein, Austria, in which there were glass coffins containing the skeletons of two Catholic saints from hundreds of years ago. By kneeling and praying next to their coffin one can take years or centuries off their purgatorial sentence. And in most of the churches there is a reliquary – a place where one can find holy artifacts. By paying a fee and looking at these artifacts, even more years can be taken off ones purgatory sentence. These artifacts consist of vials of Mary’s breast milk, slivers of the cross, pieces of garments worn by the Apostles, and a host of other “holy hardware.” These things are worshipped by the Catholics of Europe, and many make pilgrimages all over Europe to visit all of the reliquaries and thereby reduce the time they will need to spend in purgatory.
On top of this, Catholicism venerates Mary, the mother of Jesus. This veneration is so strong, that in the minds of many Catholics Mary is equally responsible for their salvation as Christ is. One of the interesting things in recent years is the movement within Catholicism to declare Mary co-redemptrix – that is, it would be a requirement of each faithful Catholic to believe and hold to the teaching that Mary is as much our savior as Christ. Pope John Paul II dedicated his pontificate to Mary and credited her with saving his life in the assassination attempt early in his reign as Pope. He constantly prayed to Mary, and venerated her more that he venerated Christ.
So esteemed is Mary, that a recent doctrine, that of the Immaculate Conception, was passed by the Church. This doctrine teaches that Mary herself was sinless and conceived in a state of perfection. Linked to this doctrine is that of the Assumption of Mary in which Catholicism teaches she was assumed into heaven without dying much as Christ ascended into heaven. Both of these doctrines are completely foreign to the New Testament and pave the way for Mary to be worshiped at the same level as Christ.
Of course, there are many other teachings of the Catholic Church we could examine as well. There is the issue of Papal Infallibility, monasticism, the celibacy of the clergy, the exaltation of tradition over Scripture, and a host of other teachings that are foreign to the New Testament. These doctrines can be debated, but quite honestly it is almost irrelevant to do so as the one issue, the doctrine of Justification by Faith, is the one damning error in Catholicism. The Scriptures clearly teach that one is justified by faith alone, not faith plus works. If one is wrong on this central issue, it really does not matter what else one may believe.
As one looks at Catholicism, one is inexorably led to see that it is not Christian when compared to the teachings of the New Testament.
In Catholicism salvation is a process began at baptism and ending with extreme unction – in New Testament Christianity it is an accomplished work.
In Catholicism grace is conferred by means of the Sacraments – in New Testament Christianity the sacraments are memorials.
In Catholicism one is ultimately saved by works – in New Testament Christianity one is saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.
In Catholicism one is cursed if they believe they are saved by faith alone – in the New Testament that is the only way one can be saved.
In Catholicism Mary is venerated and even worshiped – in the New Testament she is blessed among women yet a sinner as all of us are.
The bottom line in all this is one of eternal destinies. Those who place their faith in the Catholic Church and its teachings place their faith in a system of religion created by men and will miss heaven. Those who place their faith in the New Testament teaching of Christ alone will have their sins forgiven and be assured of heaven. It is one or the other – not both.
