Catholic Apologetics Online

Choose a topic from Vol 3:

God

Man

Religion

The Religion of the Bible

The Christian Religion

A Definite Christian Faith

The Problem of Reunion

The Truth of Catholicism

The Church and the Bible

The Dogmas of the Catholic Church

Moral Teachings of the Catholic Church

The Church in Her Worship

The Church and Social Welfare

Catholic claim absolute

294. I can't find references to any definite religion of Christ in either the Old or New Testaments.

If so, it is certainly not because the references are not there. Take one classical passage from the Old Testament: The prophet Isaiah, II., 2-4, certainly predicted a very definite and new form of religion to be given by Christ. The passage says, "The house of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go, and say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and He will teach us His ways, and we will walk in His paths. For the law will come forth from Sion; and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And He shall judge the Gentiles and rebuke many people." The correct sense of that passage is as follows: When the Christ shall come, He will solidly establish the religion of God in a visible form which all men will be able to recognize. As opposed to the one chosen people of the Jews, all nations will be represented amongst its members. And they will learn from it the ways of God, and will walk in His paths under its guidance. This promised religion will originate in Jerusalem. Now, if we turn to the New Testament, we find Christ carefully fulfilling this prophecy of the Old Testament. He says in Matt. XVI, 18, "I will build my Church." He prescribed its doctrine and commissioned it to go forth from Jerusalem teaching men, as He says in Matt. XXVIII., 20, "To observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you." In Matt. XVIII., 18, He gives this Church His authority. "Amen. I say to you, whatsoever you shall bind on earth shall be bound also in heaven." In the preceding verse He gives the Church judicial power. "If a man will not hear the Church, let him be as the heathen." And He sends that Church, no longer to the Jews only, but to the Gentiles also. In Matt. XXVIII., 19, "Going, therefore," He says. "Teach all nations." His Church must remain one Church, for it is to be "one fold under one shepherd." It is to last with the constitution He gave it all days till the end of the world. "The gates of hell shall not prevail against it." And again. "Behold, I am with you all days even to the consummation of the world." All this obviously indicates a very definite religion, and a very definite Church.

295. If I were to embrace Catholicism, would I, if at any time I was not satisfied, be at liberty to leave the Catholic Church?

Firstly, so long as you think it even possible that you would want to leave the Church in the future, you have not attained an absolute conviction of its truth. And you cannot become a Catholic with lingering doubts in your mind. When a person has really attained to the gift of Faith, all such vague fears vanish. But, secondly, if you did receive the gift of Catholic Faith in all its fullness and certainty, yet after becoming a Catholic you were to lose that Faith through your own fault, you would be under no physical compulsion to continue to profess the Catholic religion and fulfill its duties. You could walk off, declare you had left the Catholic Church, tell your friends that you had become a Christadelphian, or anything else you might wish; and nothing would be done to restrain you. The only thing that really prevents Catholics from abandoning their Church is their own interior conviction of its truth, and of their personal obligation to remain loyal to conscience and to God. Whilst they have that conviction, they themselves do not feel at liberty to leave the Church. Should they lose that conviction, they would feel at liberty to do as they pleased. But, if ever you receive the gift of Catholic Faith, I can assure you that you won't be afraid lest you cannot get away from it; you will rather dread lest anybody or any thing should get it away from you. For you will find that, instead of robbing you of your liberty, it has given to you the liberty of the children of God; liberty from error, and weakness, and sin; and the liberty to use wonderful means of divine grace, thus to progress in virtue and holiness of life before God and man.

296. What does your Church teach concerning the fate of a man who was brought up as a Catholic, but who leaves the Church, and dies still rejecting the Catholic Faith?

The Catholic Church has no teaching concerning the ultimate fate of any individual soul. She leaves that to God. But she does teach that no Catholic who has been brought up as such can ever have a sufficient reason to justify his abandoning it. If, therefore, a Catholic should lose his faith and abandon the Church he has certainly been guilty of sin; and if he dies in that state without repenting of his sin he will lose his soul. Whether any particular soul goes from this world without interior repentance God alone, of course, can say.

297. What if a man reasoned himself out of his faith?

In such a case the man would have misused his reasoning powers. No instructed Catholic can renounce the Catholic Faith without a grave fault on his part. Always he has a grave duty to adhere to his faith, and always he has reasonable grounds for doing so. If he abandons it, he does so by a wrong and guilty choice as well as by an unreasonable choice. If any reading awakens or fosters doubt in the mind of a Catholic, he knows at once that he must cease reading things which endanger his faith. If he goes on reading such things, he does so at the price of violating his conscience. Then, too, when some difficulty presents itself, he behaves most unreasonably in thinking that because he can't solve it, therefore there is no solution of it. Ordinary prudence dictates that he seek advice from some competent guide. Certainly, if such a Catholic did end by losing the faith, it would involve the resistance of grace, the neglect of prayer, the refusal of ordinary prudent consultation, and the guilty following of an evil will.

298. Supposing that he carefully studies the Catholic religion in the light of science, and finds it untrue?

As God is the Author of the Catholic Faith, and also the Author of all natural truth, there can never be any real conflict between the authoritative teachings of the Catholic religion, and the true findings of science. Any man who thinks that science proves the Catholic religion to be untrue, either does not know the Catholic religion, or has wrong ideas of science. And a man who has but an inadequate knowledge of Catholicism, and who is quite untrained in science, should know that he is simply incompetent to form such a judgment as you indicate unless he is sublimely unconscious of his limitations. He has not the elements of humility, and a sin of pride and presumption at least has preceded his fall. Most men have a general instinctive knowledge of what they must do to safeguard their bodily health. But if any serious trouble threatens, they are sensible enough not to rely upon such inadequate knowledge of physiology or medical information which they have picked up by their own reading. They seek advice from one who has received definite medical training in a qualified university. So, too, the average man has a sufficient working knowledge of the law for ordinary purposes. But if he finds himself in a legal tangle, he rightly distrusts his own knowledge and capacity, and consults one whose very business it is to be trained in legal matters. Yet, when not his bodily health, and not his temporal affairs, but his eternal destiny is at stake, this same man will consider himself fully competent to decide the gravest issues for himself. He chooses to throw to the winds a prudence he would never dream of abandoning in lesser matters. And the choice is a guilty violation of reason and conscience. The ordinary Catholic has sufficient working knowledge to save his soul. But where special religious difficulties occur, he is obliged to consult those qualified to advise him. Ignorance alone can conclude that science conflicts with Catholicism, as that famous scientist, Louis Pasteur, ever maintained. When people marveled that so great a scientist should have such fervent faith in the Catholic religion, he would reply, "I believe as firmly as the Breton peasant; and, ifI had a little more knowledge, I would believe as firmly as the Breton peasant's wife." The man you suggest for consideration would be guilty of pride in setting up his judgment against the authority of the Church established by God to leach mankind the truths of religion; guilty of imprudence in not seeking counsel; and guilty of presumption in not seeking light from God by prayer. If he lost the faith, he would be responsible for doing so; and if he died without repenting of his sin, he would lose his soul.

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MORE FROM VOLUME 3

• About the Author
• Preface
  - Msgr Fulton J Sheen
• Author's Foreword
  - Dr Rumble, MSC

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