Pope declares all other Christian are not worthy!?

Question

Associated Press

LORENZAGO DI CADORE, Italy -- Pope Benedict reasserted the primacy of the Roman Catholic Church, approving a document released Tuesday that says other Christian communities are either defective or not true churches and Catholicism provides the only true path to salvation.

Now, for the Pope to make this claim it is a very bold and aggressive move, how do you feel about it?
If the Catholic Church is the very first church of Christ, is he correct?

Answer 1

Nothing new there... This has always been the theological doctrine of the Catholic church. They believe the Catholic Church is the only true Church of Christ. To them Christian "unity" is everyone becoming Catholic! Fr. Joe and other Catholics.... do you really believe that other Christians are not part of the Church of Christ? The indwelling Holy Spirit proves that they are, and that you have a false doctrine and belief. If the Spirit was enough proof for Jews concerning the Gentiles in Acts... It should be for all of you as well. Salvation comes from God, not the Church. Let us all be one in Spirit and in truth!

Answer 2

When a CDC document says "defective"it means that a particular religious group does not have the full sacramental system with Apostolic Succession of bishops who can trace their ordinations back to the Apostles and have a real sacramental self understanding. This does not mean that the Catholic Church,especially after Vat II, thinks that non Catholic Christians do not have real means of grace in their "ecclesial communities" for salvation and sanctification. Trinitarian(F,S& H Sp)Baptism by other trinitarians is recognized as equal to Catholic Baptism. The sacramentality of 2 rightly disposed (1 man&
1 woman,of course)baptized Protestants' marriage is upheld.


I do not recall the Catholic Church claiming to be the "only true path to salvation" in the text since that would be contrary to Catholic theology. The Catholic Church is the true Church founded by Christ but to teach that outside the Papal Communion there is no salvation is condemned and people have been excommunicated when refusing to accept Protestants as candidates for heaven.

Answer 3

The word Christian means Follower of Christ. In order to be a Follower of Christ, you need to acknowledge him as the Head of the Church because that is what is taught in the Bible.
The Catholic Church claims that the Pope is the head of the Church. Therefore by definition, Catholics cannot be considered Christians. The correct designations for Catholics is Paptist which means Follower of the Pope.
Also, the Catholic Church claims that their religion goes all the way back to the original group of believers and that Peter was the first Pope. However, the idea of one person being Head of the entire Church didn't come into existence until four hundred years after Peter died. Therefore, he could not have been the first Pope.
In summary, Catholics are not Christians. They are using the name of Jesus as a marketing tool to promote their own religion.

Answer 4

The Lord said to St. Peter, "Peter, you are my Rock and upon my Rock I shall build MY church." Then Jesus asked him 3 times if he (Peter) loved Him. Peter answered "of course" and the Lord said "Feed my sheep". The coming of the Holy Spirit to the Twelve after Christ's Ascension gave them the ability to celebrate the Mass, interprete Scripture, perform miracles etc. Thus begins apostolic succession. (meaning tracing the Church to Jesus and St. Peter as the first Pope.)

No matter how you look at it the Protestants are an off shoot of the Catholics and that's where they broke off their Apostolic succession. The Catholic Church can document the fact of being 2000 years old while some Protestent religions are100-700 years old or so. And to get right down to it, the Catholics are an off shoot of Judaism as Christ was a Jew.

+PAX
J.

PS... Reply to Vida-Catholics do NOT worshp Saints or Mary.

Answer 5

The news reports got the document completely incorrect. Following is a copy and paste from teh document:

"It follows that these separated churches and Communities, though we believe they suffer from defects, are deprived neither of significance nor importance in the mystery of salvation. In fact the Spirit of Christ has not refrained from using them as instruments of salvation,

Answer 6

To quote my Chaplain: Faith in Jesus is the meat. Everyone (within the Christian community) agrees on that. Everything else (Baptist, Methodist, Lutheran, etc) is just gravy! Some like it bland, some like it spicy, some like no gravy at all!

Its not an exact quote, my memory isn't *that* good! But its close enough to get his point across. Now, I'm not sure how Catholics fit in there (with the whole Saint worship thing... seems like they're trying to add to the "meat").

Answer 7

Some religious leaders claim myth of exculsive divine revelations of spiritual knowledge contained in the sacred scrolls of an aggressive ideological tradition such as the Catholic Church are truth of the word, will, way and laws of a good one in Heaven at war with an evil one cast down to and ruling over Earth. To claim as some religious leaders do that myth is truth is a lie. Some religious leaders invoke a good one in Heaven to threaten the life and or afterlife of anybody who does not submit to their authority and to extort tithes and offerings in exchange for a lifelong indoctrination in a standard of conduct that these same religious leaders declare to be the will of a good one in Heaven at war with an evil one cast down to and ruling over Earth.

Answer 8

The Pope being catholic obviously believes that Catholicism is the one true path to salvation. Whether or not its true, we'll all find out once we die (unless there's no afterlife).

Answer 9

Nothing new about that attitude. When I was a kid in the 1960s we were taught by the Catholic church that only Catholics go to heaven.

Answer 10

The pope is the leader of a false church. The relationship is supposed to be between man and God directly through Jesus Christ, but Catholicism superimposes a hierarchy of people between the two. They teach works-righteousness and idol worship in the from of praying to their saints (*all* saved people are saints acording to the bible) and to Mary, who was simply a human woman once blessed by God to carry the baby Jesus. So I'm not terribly concerned with what the pope says about me or my church... but I am very concerned about the millions upon millions of deceived Catholics out there that think confessing to a priest will absolve their sins when what is required is simply repentance and faith in the power of Jesus Christ to forgive sins.