If the catholic church is the first church established by christ?

Question

Then we must be a member of that church to get to heaven correct?

Answer 1

Not according to the Catholic Church.

The Catholic Church teaches:

+ About Non-Catholic Christian Churches:

Furthermore, many elements of sanctification and of truth are found outside the visible confines of the Catholic Church: the written Word of God; the life of grace; faith, hope, and charity, with the other interior gifts of the Holy Spirit, as well as visible elements.

Christ's Spirit uses these Churches and ecclesial communities as means of salvation, whose power derives from the fullness of grace and truth that Christ has entrusted to the Catholic Church.

All these blessings come from Christ and lead to him.

+ About Judaism:

"The Jewish faith, unlike other non-Christian religions, is already a response to God's revelation in the Old Covenant. To the Jews "belong the sonship, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs, and of their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ"; "for the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable.

+ About Islam:

The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind's judge on the last day.

+ About other non-Christian religions:

All nations form but one community. This is so because all stem from the one stock which God created to people the entire earth, and also because all share a common destiny, namely God. His providence, evident goodness, and saving designs extend to all against the day when the elect are gathered together in the holy city.

+ With love in Christ.

Answer 2

no churches were established by christ. if the catholic church was established by anyone, it was irinaeus (sp?), hundreds of years later, when he decided that there needed to be coherence - up until that point, there were any number of "churches" each passing along their own version of events. what a christian heard (and believed) in rome and another in athens were entirely different things. so our good friend irinaeus decided the christians needed a dogma, a codex, something that would tell them what to believe, so that all would believe the same. he put together the first version of what would later become the bible.
history has it that he looked at all the different gospels that were circulating and picked 4. what his criteria was, well, we can only guess. my guess is it was mostly popularity. christians were a bit hard to come by at the time, and many were dying for their faith. hence, he would have wanted to stick to the version that would bring the most faithful, as well as the version the faithful felt was worth dying for.

Answer 3

The only Church that Christ established is the one that is inside of you. Stop putting your trust in Churches and men who have been dead for over 2000 years and put your trust in God.

Answer 4

>>If the catholic church is the first church established by christ?<<

It is the ONLY Church established by Christ.

>>Then we must be a member of that church to get to heaven correct?<<

"Those also can attain to salvation who through no fault of their own do not know the Gospel of Christ or His Church, yet sincerely seek God and moved by grace strive by their deeds to do His will as it is known to them through the dictates of conscience." -- Lumen Gentium 16
http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumen-gentium_en.html

Answer 5

Again, Catholic church is not the original Christian church and even in your dogma we see Jesus calling Peter “Satan” and Paul didn’t like him very much either (I won’t even go into what the gnostic writings say about that guy). And the part about the keys given to saint Peter "the rock", well the early Catholics added that and any Protestant will tell you it makes no sense [except for the purpose of hijacking the original religion of Jesus who was a gnostic]. If you don’t believe it go read Paul’s letters in the greek where he mentions Aeons, Pleromas, Archons, etc., and also see in the Catholic encyclopaedia where they try to justify his gnostic terminology but fail miserably.

Answer 6

Christ did not establish ANY church. Read the gospels.

Answer 7

That is definitely not a teaching of the Catholic Church.

God bless,
Stanbo

Answer 8

There will be many from all denominations in heaven we as humans can not judge that it is only up to God The Father.

Answer 9

If you want the fullness of truth that came from Jesus and was preserved by His Apostles, then I'd suggest you enter His Church.

God bless.

Answer 10

mythical characters don't establish things.

peter pan didn't establish a restaurant.

please. try to be real, and try to become educated.