How ANY Will Be Saved
August 26, 2007

Readings for the 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time

Reading 1: Is. 66:18–21

Responsorial Psalm: Ps. 117:1, 2

Reading 2: Heb. 12:5–7, 11–13

Gospel: Lk. 13:22–30

Link to Readings

By Father Ray Ryland, Ph.D., J.D.

On his way to Jerusalem, Jesus was stopped by an anxious query. Someone asked Him, "Lord, will only a few people be saved?" Scripture does not tell us what evoked this question. Perhaps it had been on the questioner’s mind for some time.

One thing is clear: In today’s liturgy, the familiar alleluia verse shifts the focus on salvation. JOHN 14:6—"I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the father, except through me." The issue is not "how MANY will be saved." The alleluia verse shifts to the more basic question, "how ANY will be saved?"

We know full well the answer to that question: Jesus Christ is the only Savior of the world. MATT 11:27—"All things have been delivered to me by my Father; and no one knows the son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and any one to whom the Son chooses to reveal him." In ACTS 4:12, Peter witnesses to the Jewish authorities after they had cast him and John into prison for proclaiming Christ: ". . . there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven . . . by which we must be saved."

But this answer raises two further questions: One is, what happens to those who don’t know Christ in this life? Are they doomed? And the other is, how does Christ extend His salvation to the human race? Think with me about these questions for a few moments.

"There is no other name under heaven . . . by which we must be saved"—what are the implications of these words? Christian fundamentalists generally claim this means that unless one makes a personal commitment to Jesus, he cannot be saved. That conclusion sounds logical, but it’s wrong.

In his encyclical Mission of the Redeemer (1990), Pope John Paul II taught that since Christ is the redeemer of the human race, salvation is available even to persons who don’t know Christ and have no relationship with His Church. Countless persons are prevented from knowing Christ by the cultural and social conditions in which they live. Many of them have been raised in other religions. How is salvation available to them?

Pope John Paul taught, it becomes available "by virtue of a grace which . . . [has] a mysterious relationship to the Church. . . ." Though this grace "does not make them formally part of the Church, . . . it "enlightens them in a way . . . accommodated to their spiritual and material situation" (no. 10). The fathers of Vatican II put the matter this way: "For since Christ died for all, and since all men are called to one and the same destiny, . . . the Holy Spirit offers to all the possibility of being made partners, in a way known to God, in the paschal mystery" (Church in the Modern World, no. 22). Even though they don’t know the Gospel of Christ and His Church, persons who try to serve God on the basis of the best knowledge they have of Him can be saved.

But the fundamentalist would persist in his question: If a person doesn’t know Christ, how is it possible for him to be saved? To answer that question, we need to think about the role of the Word in God’s plan of salvation.

We know through revelation that God the Father creates by His Word. Read again the creation story in Genesis. GEN. 1:3, 6, 11, 14, 20, 24, 26—"God said" "and it was so." The prologue to the Fourth Gospel clearly states the role of the Word: JOHN 1:1-3—"In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God; all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made." Or recall these words from COL. 1:16—". . . in him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible . . . —all things were created through him and for him."

Not only does God create by His Word; He also reveals Himself by His Word.

Repeatedly in the Old Testament we read about God’s speaking to His prophets, always in terms of His "word" which came to them. The New Testament tells us about God’s Word who "became flesh and dwelt among us." God creates by His Word—He reveals Himself by His Word—and God redeems by His Word, who became incarnate for us.

People who have no knowledge of Christ and His Church can be saved by living whatever truth they have received through their religion. Saved by the truth they have received, that is, not by the error that is in their religion. But whatever of truth there is in their religion, whatever authentic knowledge of God they have, has come to them through the revealing activity of God’s Word. And we know who that Word is: Jesus Christ our Lord. So any one who is saved is necessarily saved by Jesus Christ, regardless of whether he or she consciously knows Christ.

At the same time, the Church warns us against indifferentism with regard to other religions. We are forbidden to think or say that one religion is as good as another: This is pure relativism. The Church acknowledges—even rejoices in—the fact that God’s grace can come to those who follow other religions. At the same time, she tells us in Dominus Iesus (no. 22), those followers "are in a gravely deficient situation in comparison with those who, in the Church, have the fullness of the means of salvation."

We see this fact illustrated in the Moslem religion, for example. Look at that religion’s treatment of women as slaves of men. Or consider its announced goal of conquering the world and either converting or subjugating or killing all non-Moslems. This goal is being carried out today in Moslem nations in the mid-East, in Asia, and especially in Africa. In recent decades, hundreds of thousands of Christians have been slaughtered, without a word of criticism from Moslem leaders. Thousands of Christians and non-Christians have been enslaved by Moslems, again, without a single word of criticism from Moslem leaders.

All this and much more has been documented from the statistics of reliable international organizations. (Get a copy of the recent fairly book, The Sword of the Prophet, by Serge Trifkovic, and be appalled at what you read!) Though the Church has not explicitly said so, these are indications of what she means by a "gravely deficient situation" among non-Christians.

Where are we? We have said Jesus Christ is the savior of the world. We have acknowledged that Jesus Christ can save those who do not know Him in this life. Now we must say, Jesus Christ saves only through His Church.

When he was on earth, Jesus Christ lived a human body. He redeemed the whole universe through that body and through no other. The risen Christ continues to live on earth and carry on His redemptive work in a supernatural body, the "Mystical Body" of Christ. Jesus Christ works through that supernatural body and through no other. We know through revelation that Jesus Christ works both inside and outside the visible boundaries of His Church, but always through His Church. Thus we read in EPH 1:22, God "has put all things under his [Christ’s] feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all."

The body of the risen Christ, the Church is the "fullness" of Christ. That’s why the second Vatican Council (Dogmatic Constitution on the Church¸ no. 48) calls the Catholic Church "the universal sacrament of salvation." Ponder that word "universal": the Catholic Church is Jesus Christ’s sole means for applying His redemption to the human race.

A few years ago, the Church again underscored this fact. We are taught that the Church, Christ’s Mystical Body, is always united with Him in "a mysterious way," in God’s plan, Therefore the Church has "an indispensable relationship with the salvation of every human being" (Dominus Iesus, no. 20).

Vatican II’s Dogmatic Constitution on the Church (no. 14) teaches that "the Church . . . is necessary for salvation: the one Christ is mediator and the way of salvation; he is present to us in his body which is the Church." And then come these strong words. Persons who know [note that word—"know"—really "know"] that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ" and who "refuse either to enter it, or to remain in it" "could not be saved. . . ."

Strong language indeed! Why? The reason is simply this. If a person really knows what the Catholic Church is, namely, the Mystical Body of Christ; if a person really knows that the Catholic Church is Jesus Christ’s "instrument for the salvation of all" (as the second Vatican Council declares, Ibid., no. 9); if a person really knows all that and still refuses to enter the Church, or refuses to remain within the Church, that person in fact is rejecting Jesus Christ Himself.

We have to assume that persons who leave the Church, or refuse to enter the Church, don’t fully know what they’re doing. But if they do know what they’re doing and still persist, they cannot be saved.

Now perhaps you can see the reason for the traditional teaching of the Church, extra ecclesiam nulla salus: "outside the Church, no salvation." Non-Catholics and non-Christians—and even some Catholics—totally misunderstand this teaching. They think it means that persons who are not Roman Catholic are going straight to hell. What we have already seen of the Church’s teaching shows plainly that this interpretation is wrong.

The fact that a person is outside the Roman Catholic Church does not itself mean he is going to hell. The Church ever so plainly teaches there is salvation for those outside the visible boundaries of the Catholic Church.

Extra ecclesiam, nulla sallus, however, does mean that whatever keeps that person from going to hell—whatever aids in his salvation—comes to him only through the Catholic Church. This is the fact, regardless of whether the person knows it. His salvation necessarily and only comes through the Catholic Church because Jesus Christ is the only one through whom we can be saved; and Jesus Christ identifies Himself with His Church and works unceasingly in and through her.

Through her—His Church—the one true Church He created—the Roman Catholic Church. She is the Church "through which he communicates truth and grace to all men" (Ibid., no. 8).

(Ed.: CUF Vice President Mike Sullivan heard CUF Spiritual Advisor Fr. Ryland's outstanding homily this past Sunday. Fr. Ryland graciously provided it so that we could share it with our web visitors.)

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