The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1912-03-16
WHO BELONG TO THE
SOUL OF THE CHURCH
Bishop of Kildare in Lenten Pas
toral Gives Clear Exposition
of This Doctrine.
Tells What is Meant by Assertion,
Outside of the Church There
is no Salvation.
Simply Afirms That for the Unre-
pentent Sinner There Can be
no Hope of Pardon.

Moved by, a eommunication, which
he received fromII.:A, Poor Protestant"
who: asked whether the Church taught
chat Protestants would stand no
chance Of going. to heaven, or that God
created them to be damned" Bishop
Foley, of the ancient Diocese Of Kill
dare and Lieghlin, Ireland, selected as
the particular topic of a recent Lenten
pastoral the doctrine which is summed
UP in the formula: Outside Of the
church there is no salvation" Since
there is hardly any other dogma Of
the Catholic faith which lends itself
so readily to Misrepresentation at the
hands of outsiders, or which is so call
culated to prejudice inquiries against
the claims of the Church, Bishop
Foley's lucid explanation is of per-
manent value. He writes:
Looking out upon the world and
realizing the enormous number Of hu-
man beings who have never even heard
Of Christ, we cannot be surprised If
many earnest inquiries are repelled by
the apparent harshness and intoler-
ance of this great truth of Catholic
belief. Seeing that fully two-thirds
Of the human race are not even nonl
inally Christians and that nearly one
half Of the remaining third is outside
the fold of Christ, we are asked by
outsiders to believe that this dogma
which, it is said, dooms fve-sixths Of
the human race to everlasting damna-
ton, is absolutely incredible in itself,
as we'll as in hopeless conflict with
the well-known will Of God that .all
men should be saved and come to the
knowledge of the truth
what obligations, then, do we con-
ceive to be implied in the words of
the catechism that mo one can be
saved out of the Catholic church?'
Are we bound by this doctrine to be-
lieve that there can be no hope Of SAL
vation for those who have not been
baptized, have lived all their lives out
side the Catholic Church? Every in
structed Catholic knows that we are
bound to believe nothing of the kind.
We are all familiar with the axiom
that God Almighty refuses His grace
to no man who makes the best use he
can to the faculties afforded him.
"It is we'll known writes Plus TX,
that those who labor under invincible
ignorance with respect to our most
holy religion, and who, carefully OBJ
serving the natural law imprinted by
God on their hearts, live all upright
life, may through the operation of di-
vine grace attain eternal life, since
God, of His great goodness and mercy,
never allows anyone to be consigned
to eternal punishment who has not
been guilty of grievous sin. But the
Pontiff adds, the dogma is also we'll
known which declares that outside the
Catholic Church no one can be saved
In what sense, then, can it be truly
said that some of those who are in
culpably ignorant of her claims are to
certain extent inside the Church of
Christ?
'In real sense of the words and
speaking of things as they are in the
eyes of God. we truly say that all who
are in the state of grace, whether they
have been baptized or not, are inside
the Church. Like her Divine Found
er, the Church is composed of two ele-
ments-the one material, visible and
of itself natural. and this we call the
body; the other the spiritual, invisible
and supernatural, which we call the
soul. We may belong to the soul Of
the church and not belong to the body;
and we may be member of the body
without belonging to the soul. All men
are bound to belong to the soul of the
Church as a matter Of indispensa BILE
necessity, but membership of the body
is a matter of divine precept, from
the observance of which one may be
excused, but only by impossibility or
inculpable ignorance I. e. There is
only one condition necessary in order
to belong to the soul of the Church,
and it is to be in the state Of grace.
Il ~ / y 4lisg.s !