Catholic writers are still using the Archbishop Richard Cushing error of assuming that the baptism of desire and those saved in invincible ignorance are exceptions to the dogma outside the church there is no salvation.
Phillip Gray’s article on the Catholics United for the Faith website is posted with the same errors by the Catholic Education Resource Center,Canada..
He writes that many people who claim that God restricts salvation to baptized Catholics cite the Fathers of the Church to prove their assertions. According to him ‘their words ‘were not directed at those who, by no fault of their own, did not know the Gospel of Christ.’
Those who ‘by no fault of their own, did not know the Gospel of Christ’ was not an issue in the Catholic Church before the 1940’s. Since it was known that these cases were implicit and unknown to us. It was the Archbishop of Boston who implied that these cases are defacto known to us and so are an exception to the dogma and the traditional interpretation of Fr.Leonard Feeney.
Magisterial documents including Vatican Council II mention those saved in invincible ignorance and the baptism of desire but no where claims that this is an exception to the dogma extra ecclesiam nulla salus or that this is the ordinary means of salvation.
Phillip Gray has to accomodate the error of Richard Cushing so it is convenient to say that the Church Fathers must be understood in the context of their writing and write off centuries of consistent interpretation of the dogma and the Church Fathers.
None of the Church Fathers claim that the baptism of desire was an exception to the dogma. Even St.Thomas Aquinas mentions the man in the forest in ignorance and at the same time says every one needs to enter thte Church for salvation; the Church is like the only Ark of Noah that saves in the Flood. St.Thomas Aquinas does not imply that the man in the forest in ignorance, and to whom God would send a preacher, is an exception to the dogma extra ecclesiam nulla salus.
-Lionel Andrades
1.
Many people who claim that God restricts salvation to baptized Catholics cite the Fathers of the Church to prove their assertions. While space does not allow an exhaustive analysis of the Fathers, there are several necessary points to keep in mind. First, the Fathers must be understood in the context of their writings, not in the context of the one quoting them. The majority of the Fathers who wrote on this topic were concerned about those who had once believed or had heard the truth, but now rejected it. Many of them believed the entire world had heard the Gospel. Their words were not directed at those who, by no fault of their own, did not know the Gospel of Christ. –website Catholic Education Resource Center
http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/apologetics/ap0043.html
http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/apologetics/ap0043.html
CATHOLICS UNITED FOR THE FAITH IMPLIES THOSE SAVED WITH THE BAPTISM OF DESIRE ARE VISIBLE,FR.LEONARD FEENEY WAS EXCOMMUNICATED FOR AFFIRMING THE SAME TEACHING AS SAINTS AND POPES
USCCB NOTIFICATION ON FR.PETER PHAN CONTAINS HERESY AND ECCLESIA DEI, CUF, CATHOLIC ANSWERS AND OTHERS ACCEPT IT
CARDINAL RATZINGER DID NOT VIOLATE THE PRINCIPLE OF NON CONTRADICTION AS CATHOLICS UNITED FOR THE FAITH IMPLY
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