In my life as a Catholic Christian and ministry as a R.C. priest, I have had many conversations with any number of people of all ages, and not surprisingly, the practice of the faith or variations on that theme comes up the most frequently. This prompts me to reflect on many things.
Over the years, I have found the greatest anxiety seems to be felt by parents and grandparents, and about what they perceive to be the state of the faith, or lack of it, in their own children and grandchildren. This also comes up in the course of ministering to people, even when I meet them at the Tribunal, would you believe, but also in the confessional. I believe it is the Lord, the Holy Spirit, who has consistently inspired me with a particular response, which I'd like to share with you, and which I hope you will share widely among your family and friends.
One teaching of our Church which received considerable treatment while I was in seminary was what sounds something like this: "Outside of the Church, there is no salvation." It has prompted many to draw the conclusion: "You have to keep the commandments, go to church on Sunday, and pray every day, or you will go to hell." This teaching has also prompted people to think that unless one is baptized in the Catholic Church, or at least baptized somewhere, they too will go to hell.
Here are the thoughts that I believe the Holy Spirit has prompted me to share with those suffering from the above mentioned anxiety.
First, Jesus gave us a very clear instruction about how the judgement will go when we leave our body behind and find ourselves in the radiant and awesome Presence of the Most Holy Trinity. You know it well. It is Jesus' parable about what it will be like when the Son of Man comes on the clouds and gathers the nations together, separating people as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. It's in Matthew chapter 25.
We could translate this into plain English this way: we are on Earth to become fully human, and the ultimate test of this is how we treat others. That's it. There will be no grueling test on our church attendance or our prayers, or our fasting and penances. God our Creator loves all his creatures, especially human beings, and He hopes that we will come to love them in the same way, and as much as He does himself. "Love one another as I have loved you." Jesus means what He said. Saint John put it this way: we have no love of God whom we cannot see if we don't love the people we can see. That's in 1 John 4:20.
On that score, attending church and saying prayers won't make any difference; remember how Jesus criticized the Pharisees, Sadducees, Priests, and Scribes. He called them hypocrites; they were extremely religious, but still hypocrites, because they had no authentic love, compassion, or caring for their fellow man. Their faith and religious practice did them no good; moreover, it even caused them to try to prevent people from coming to Jesus. Sadly, today we can be just like them and also prevent people from freely coming to Jesus.
This prompts another question. Well, in that case, what difference does being baptized, going to church, doing penances, and praying make?
It makes a big difference, the same difference between loving someone and being devoted to them. We can love our parents by calling and visiting them, but we can do more; we can be devoted to them and assist them in their need, especially when they are sick or elderly, and "give until it hurts" as Saint Mother Teresa used to say. We can go beyond loving and being devoted to family and do that for strangers and even enemies.
As I shared with someone today, God our Creator loves all his human children. Our Church taught at the Second Vatican Council that all human beings can be saved by passing the same test we will all face, based on the quality of our love for others, which includes enemies. The difference that baptism first makes is the divine adoption: God the Most Holy Trinity incorporates us into the communion which the Father and the Son have in the Holy Spirit. We are drawn into the circle of the divine life and love.
The "rub" is that this adoption requires our participation and wholehearted development. If we do learn to know God personally and love Him, in addition to loving our neighbour and even our enemies, then we actually participate in the divine work of salvation in the world. This work of the Holy Trinity in the depths of human souls is very mysterious, and only God can see into human souls. We have no idea what is really going on in other souls; even our own soul remains mysterious to us, and we cannot even judge ourselves, as Saint Paul wrote in his letters.
So, what we need to look for, first in ourselves, and then in others, is this: am I getting to really know God personally? Do I have a relationship with Jesus as my Lord, Master, and Friend? Has Jesus begun to bring me to the Father and reveal Him to me? Have I begun to allow myself to become aware of the presence and action of the Holy Spirit within me? Am I bearing the fruit of the presence and action of God within me? In other words, am I doing the works which Jesus did? When I am at prayer and someone needs me, do I quickly arise to eagerly and gladly attend to them? When I come back from church, am I so radiant with the love of God that others come to be warmed from the warm glow of God's love radiating from me?
The faith can never be transmitted by coercion, but only by divine infection. Even then, how and when others come to discover that God is real, and that He loves them, it all remains so very mysterious because of the extreme degree to which God respects human freedom and gives us as much time as possible to come freely to know and love Him. Whenever we employ other methods to try to drag people to God, not only does it not work, but it often achieves the opposite effect. We only succeed in portraying a false or distorted image or representation of God, which turn others off and pushes them farther away from God or the Church or both, and into the peripheries; as Pope Francis called the shadows.
If we really want to help others come to know and love God, we need to pay the price, which is expensive: much persevering prayer, fasting, and personal sacrifices joyfully offered. We cannot show people we do this, unless they ask about it. The gift must be hidden, freely given, and not become and exaction, pressure, or coercion. Our devotion to the Father, to Jesus, to the Holy Spirit, and to our Blessed Mother Mary and the saints must pass the test of our authentic love of neighbour, especially those we find most difficult to love, and loving them "until it hurts". If I truly love Jesus for the passion He endured for me and all of humanity; then this love will bring me to love others as He does, even to the point of eagerly accepting sufferings for the sake of love, as the saints did and do.
There will be many "degrees" of intensity of joy and happiness in Heaven. At the lower end, we would find those who gave a little, in the middle, those who gave a lot, and at the upper end, we will find those who gave everything. 250622 I received a very insightful and precise question on this very statement. The reader doesn't think that God has "levels" of love, which would be very disturbing, and that my statement as it is does not show full communion. I appreciate the observation and question and try to answer it below in green. I hope that this will make this post and reflection better and more useful to the reader.
Dear Reader, you can feel quite free to reject this as a personal opinion on my part. Truthfully, it is the result of all my years of life, faith, learning, ministry, searching, and God's mercy. Call it an intuition. You are quite right to say that God hasn't levels of love... the Most Holy Trinity are perfect and infinite in their divine persons and in their giving of Self to us. There are, nonetheless, limitations, or levels, or degrees, as you may prefer, but they are entirely in us.
Consider how different have been the saints, and how varied in the degrees or "intensity" of "intimacy" or "communion" they experienced with God; which also had to do with how far they gave of themselves, without any thought for themselves, in service to and love of others. Loving care and forgiveness and mercy to enemies does expand the soul. Saint Augustine taught that it is by exercising holy desire that our "capacity to receive from God" grows, which is why, he taught, that God allows us to wait for good things and blessings. While we wait and hope and trust, we "exercise our desire", and God stretches the limits of our soul, our "container"; until there is enough room to take in and receive what it is that God wants to give us.
Jesus did say to the Apostles that there are many rooms or mansions in the Father's house. There is diversity in Heaven, rather than uniformity. Souls are unique. It makes perfect sense that God would completely fill souls with divine presence, communion, and love in eternity. It also makes sense that the "volume" of our containers, our souls, varies. We can see that plainly in everyday life, in our relations with others. This is not a judgement or unfair; it is plainly the truth. We see in creation limitless variety of substance, size, colour, texture, fragrance, and so on; even in the very same variety of a thing. It is not a curse or injustice, but rather all to the glory of God. In Heaven, no one will be disappointed or discontented, because they will all experience fullness of life, communion, and joy together and in God, entirely filling their "container", their dynamic and living soul.
I hope this helps. I cannot think of a specific source for this perspective... it is a cumulative intuition after 76 years of living and faith.... Thank you, Reader, for your astute question and for responding, rather than remaining passive. May others be inspired to do the same.
There's a saying: "Give a little, it costs a lot. Give a lot, it costs a little. Give everything, it costs nothing at all." — Archbishop Raya, Madonna House Apostolate (RIP 2005). Pope Saint John Paul II referred to Jesus' command to love as "the law of the gift"... God loves us by giving his own Self in what can be called a "divine transfusion" in his own Body and Blood in the Holy Eucharist, the Blessed Sacrament, bestowing upon us a participation in the divine life; which is why to love as God loves, we must also give of ourself.
Blessed days in the glow of the Most Holy Eucharist, the Blessed Sacrament, and on Friday, Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and World Day of Prayer for the Sanctification of Priests, and on Saturday, the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Blessings to you and your families.
