in catholicism, what does it mean to be saved?

Question

i have a couple friends who are baptist, and they're always talking about being saved and how i need to be saved. i'm catholic, and i want to stick to my roots and go with what my own church says. is there a "catholic equivilant" to the baptist version of "being saved"???

Answer 1

I'm Catholic but catch a lot of flak from my Christian friends.
I look at it this way. We don't believe in being saved as we are baptized at birth and after receiving all of our sacraments we are on the right path with God.
We don't believe in being saved. We believe in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. We believe that our faith in God and the fact that God tells us that as long as we believe that we will be protected.
There are so many discrepancies in all organized religion. That is why there is freedom of religion here in the US.
As long as you believe, and are happy with your belief don't be a switch hitter when others put you down. Everyone is entitled to their opinion about religion. God doesn't judge so why would anyone else think they have the right to?
Stick to your beliefs and be proud. Sometimes being yourself and showing your belief makes you the bigger person.
God is good, no matter what organized religion you choose!!!

Answer 2

"Once saved, always saved" is not a Catholic doctrine and is, in fact, unscriptural. We believe that a person is saved by accepting Christs' atoning death on the Cross as the perfect sacrifice for our sins. Every time we say the Creed at Mass, we are reaffirming our salvation: He "was crucified, died, and was buried. On the third day, He rose again from the dead."

We work out our salvation through our ongoing obedience to God and by caring for His people. This includes the spiritual and corporeal acts of mercy such as prayer, fasting, giving alms, feeding the hungry, etc. And ultimately, we will be saved by God's grace and through His gift of final perseverance.

So rather than just mumbling some formula and thinking in our presumptuousness that we've fulfilled God's expectations, we keep our faith and our salvation alive by doing what He commands us to do. Salvation is an ongoing walk with God and a process, not a one-time event.

Answer 3

Tell them you are born-again.

You are. Your baptism accomplished that. Now, they'll object (and I'll get "thumbs down" for this, on the same basis). They'll insist that being "born again" means the same thing as "saved", which they identify as the precise moment when they prayed what's essentially a prayer of contrition called the "sinner's prayer" with the addition of a profession of belief in Christ as Lord and Savior and asking Him to come into their hearts.

That's "saved", or "born again", in a nutshell according to not only Baptists but also many other Christians with Protestant roots. For them, it is a one-time event that is forever afterward their ticket to heaven no matter what. You'll notice there are many familiar elements about it, though it's compressed. The difference is that Catholic believe we are:
Regenerated -- by grace, through baptism;
Justified and sanctified -- by grace, in our cooperation with it through faith and through the sacraments;
and like them we have the hope of being
Glorified -- in Christ.

Salvation includes all four of these elements. Your Baptist friends know this, or should know it, as it's spelled out rather clearly by the SBC and other Baptist groups in their statements of faith. If their contention is that you must have a "personal" relationship with Christ, well ... you certainly have that if you're receiving Holy Communion (how much more personal can it get than receiving Him in the Eucharist?) and going to Him in prayer.

If you're a faithful, orthodox (small "o") Catholic, they need not worry on account of the state of your soul -- you are a sister in Christ to them, and they should stop practicing their evangelization techniques on someone who already knows Christ. You could gently remind them that their belief structure doesn't hold the patent on defining what terms like born-again, saved, and even worship are supposed to be.

We have the privilege of receiving grace through the sacraments of the Church (where the "work" accomplished is not ours but the Holy Spirit's), and the responsibility to cooperate with that grace in "working out our salvation". That's why Catholics see salvation as a process rather than a one-time event. You'll never hear a Catholic saying "I got saved on such-and-such a date". But you'll also never hear what is rather often heard in evangelical circles -- that someone who has sincerely prayed that prayer, and even been immersion baptized afterward, but fell back into the same sinful life he had before or walked away from the church "was never saved in the first place", as if it didn't take.

We understand that circumstance as losing one's salvation -- turning one's back on Christ by choice -- and it's also Biblical. (Not only that, it makes no sense at all that by "getting saved" one's free will that allowed faith in the first place is abrogated thereafter.) But rather than call this losing what they are adamant can't be lost no matter what, the "didn't take" thing (or "his conversion wasn't genuine") is asserted. Doesn't sound very eternally secure to me. Especially since that one-time "gettin' saved" event can be, and often is, based almost entirely on emotion. And emotions aren't all that trustworthy; we second-guess ourselves on them all the time.

Answer 4

As a Catholic,

I have been saved...Rom 8:24, Eph 2:5-8, 2 Tim 1:9, Tit 3:5.

I am being saved...Phil 2:12, 1 Pet 1:9

I will be saved...Mt 10:22, 24:13

Catholic can not accept "once saved always saved", because it is not biblical nor accepted in Sacred Tradition.

Answer 5

There are 2 different words used in the scriptures that translate to "saved" or "salvation," and they have 3 different but related meanings:
1. The salvation granted by Christ
2. God's power and gifts continuing to save us
3. Our final salvation in the second coming

If someone asks "are you saved?" one possible response is "Yes, I have been saved." This acknowledges the first meaning of “saved” and “salvation” in scripture—Jesus Christ, Savior, by whose act of salvation we are objectively saved—He died, rose from the dead, saved us from sin.

Another response, one I like, is "I am being saved." This acknowledges the second meaning “saved” and “salvation” have in scripture—the present experience, God’s power delivering us constantly from the bondage of sin. Since we are all sinners and we continue to make errors, we need to continue to be saved throughout our lives.

Finally, you could respond "I will be saved" - you hope (and pray) that God will give you the grace of perseverance; that you will respond to it; and accept his gift of salvation until your death. This acknowledges the third meaning the words “saved” and “salvation” have in scripture—the future deliverance of believers at the Second Coming of Christ.

I'd rephrase your question as "the Baptists have a rough equivalent to the original Catholic version of being saved." The Baptists have developed doctrines in the last century or two that we don't believe such as "solo scriptura" - the idea that the only source of truth is the scriptures, the Catholic bible that was created by assembling various religious texts over a millennia ago - several centuries after Christ died and was resurrected. The obvious rejoinder to this is "where in the bible does it say that the bible is the only authority?" Since the books collected in the bible predate the bible by centuries, of course there is no notion of the bible in the books of the bible.

Catholics believe that the truth is important, and there are sources of truth outside of the bible. The first Universities were founded by the Catholic church long ago, and worked to uncover the truth in order to increase our understanding of the beauty of God's creation. Advances in science have led us to a deeper understanding of the universe God created, and we continue to work at uncovering the truth, and don't imagine that all truth was revealed only in the books of the bible.

Any faith that denies truths that can be objectively determined makes me suspicious. Why would God create a universe designed to deceive us, with fossils that test out as being millions of years old, and evidence of creation billions of years ago, in a universe that is only a bit over 6,000 years old? It isn't God who is associated with deception in the bible, it is Satan.

Answer 6

You've got to remember that the Baptist are "protestants" to the Catholic Church's dogmas and religious tenets--not the same thing

Answer 7

I have been asked " have you accepted the lord in your life, have you been saved, are you born again?" I calmly explain that I never lost my faith in God so never needed to search for rebirth. I take responsibility for straying from my path as well as returning to it and any who feel the need to guide others to the "path " are acting as the Pharisees did in their assumption of having a closer relation to God than others. I believe this shows a doubting of ones personal beliefs, as they seem to need others to confirm the dogma they are claiming to believe.
I was raised in a Catholic family and confirmation and confession are the equivalent.

Answer 8

You have been blessed to be Catholic.

Have you any idea as to the amount of people in the World that have the desire to be a Catholic?
They question themself over and over, then they finally get the nerve to drive to a Catholic church, proceed up the steps only to turn around when their hand is practically on the door.

Why?

Because, they have not been given the grace to enter.

The latter is not meant to be mean or ignorant but what else is preventing the final push?

Here, read about how you are already saved:

http://www.catholic.com/library/Assurance_of_Salvation.asp

God bless'

Answer 9

Catholics being they are justified or made right with God by faith in the Son of God and works of their own doing.

Protestantism says salvation is by grace through faith. It is a gift of God not of works lest you should boast. That we are saved by believing alone in the blood of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of our sins.

an addition: We cannot add anything to the finished work of Christ on the cross. If we started adding requirements, we would be in a religion called Islam which is based on the Law and doing good deeds in order to get into heaven.

Answer 10

The easy answer:
+ Accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior
+ Be baptized and spiritually born again
+ Follow the teachings of Jesus Christ
+ Do not commit mortal sin

The complicated answer:

We are already saved:
+ “For in hope we were saved.” (Romans 8:24)
+ “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not from you; it is the gift of God.” (Ephesians 2:5-8)

We are being saved:
+ “He will keep you firm to the end, irreproachable on the day of our Lord Jesus.” (1 Corinthians 1:8)
+ “For we are the aroma of Christ for God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing.” (2 Corinthians 2:15)
+ “So then, my beloved, obedient as you have always been, not only when I am present but all the more now when I am absent, work out your salvation with fear and trembling.” (Philippians 2:12)

We have the hope that we will be saved:
+ “How much more then, since we are now justified by his lood, will we be saved through him from the wrath. Indeed, if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, how much more, once reconciled, will we be saved by his life.” (Romans 5:9-10)
+ “If anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, or straw, the work of each will come to light, for the Day will disclose it. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire (itself) will test the quality of each one's work. If the work stands that someone built upon the foundation, that person will receive a wage. But if someone's work is burned up, that one will suffer loss; the person will be saved, but only as through fire.” (1 Corinthians 3:12-15)

Like the Apostle Paul, we are working out our salvation in “fear and trembling,” (Philippians 2:12) and with hopeful confidence in the promises of Christ:
+ “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access (by faith) to this grace in which we stand, and we boast in hope of the glory of God.” (Romans 5:2)
+ “This saying is trustworthy: If we have died with him we shall also live with him; if we persevere we shall also reign with him. But if we deny him he will deny us. If we are unfaithful he remains faithful, for he cannot deny himself. (2 Timothy 2:11–13)

With love in Christ.