The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1899-12-23

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exceptional case. and that is of what
! is called Invincible Ignorance Oh tiie
Truth. They say (and they put eX-
pound the &eaching of the Catholc
| Church upon the subiecD that per-
son who has led a good life, but has not
had it in his power to be rightly IN
formed of the truths preached by Jesus
Christ and the Apostles, may De con-
aidered to have supplied the defect OIL
actual, visible connection with the
Church by his sincere desire to know,
his efforts to find out, and his readi-
ness to embrace the right faithN How
ever, such a one cannot be said abso-
lutely and in every sense OF the word
out of the church Although, Indeeu
he is rot a perfect member Of the
Church, he is considered to be virtually
such. His errors lin the supposltlon)
| are merely material, and the true falth
is what he implicitly wishes and strives
to have. With the exception of such
case as this, they unanimously assert
with all the councils, that out OF the
True Church there is no salvation.
Protestants exclaim: What an unchar-
liable doctrine! A Protestant, then,
they say, who is morally an eXcelieiiI
man, is to be hereafter repropate' De
cause, forsooth, he is not Roman
Catholic. This can easily be retorted
upon Protestants. for, believing, as
they propose to believe, that Baptism IS
a necessary sacrament, and that WIN
out 1T no man can enter into the king
dom Of heaven, if they are consistent
with their own principles, they must
needs confess that an honest Quaker is
not in the way of salvation. Such, IN
fact, is the belief of the Reformed
church. The Church of Scotland, for
instance, in her confession of talth,
agreed upon by the divines OF West
minister, approved b. the general as
sembly in the year 1647, and ratified by
act of parliament, speaks thus: I1e
visible church, which is also Catholc
or universal under the Gospel mot con-
fined to one nation. as BEFORE under
the law consists of all those through
out the world that profess the true re-
ligion, and of their children, as is the
Kingdom Of the Lord Jesus Christ, the
house and family of God, out OF which
there is no ordinary possibility of sal
walton" In the Protestant catech1sn
we find that to be saved By the death
of Christ, we must become members
of that spiritual society or body OF
which He is the head, because we can
not partake of the Spirit of Christ, un-
less we are members of the Body of
Christ, and that the Body of Christ is
called the Church.
1t will therefore be observed that
Catholics are found fault with by per-
sons for holding the very self-same doc
trine that they do on this all-important
point Let us now examine upon what
Scrlptural ground rests this doctrine.
We read in the Acts of the Apostles
(chap. . THAT all they that believe
were praising God together, and hav-
ing favor with all the people, and the
Lord added to their society such as
should be saved To. be saved, then,
it was necessary to be added to the
Church. Again, we have in Mark, 16)
these very precise words of our Lord:
He that beheveth and is baptized shall
be saved: but he that believeth net
shall be condemned To be saved,
then, it iss necessary to believe, and TO
believe rightly; because if all sorts of
belief were as good the one as the ether,
if believing agreeably to each persons
own conscience were sufficient, the
Turks and the Jews would be in the
way of salvation One Lord, one faith,
one baptism, says st. Paul to the Ephe-
slams and to the Hebrews; without
faith it is Impossible to please God; and
consequently, if there be but one faith,
and if without faith lit is impossible to
please God, he who does not believe
Him. In the Acts Q3th) we read that
of the Gentiles: "As many as were pre-
ordained to eternal life believed" What
did they believe? What Paul and Bar
nabas had preached to them. They.
then, of course. abandoned their an
Gent belief or, in other words, such as
were to be saved changed their wrong
faith into the right one of the truth
delivered to them.
The English communion book, print
ed by authority, orders that onsChrist-
mas day and some ether festivals in
stead of the Apostles Greed, the con-
fessfon of Christian faith, commonly
called the Athanasian Greed, shall be
read. This creed begins: 'Whosoever
will be saved before all things, it is
necessary that he hold the Catholic
faith, which faith except every one doth
keep whole and undecided, without
doubt he shall perish everlastingly.'
The articles of faith next follow, and
the creed concludes thus: This is the
Catholic faith, which except man be-
lieve faithfully, he cannot be saved,
After this solemn declaration, who
would expect that Catholics should be
rebuked by persons adhering to it, as