NECESSITY OF THE CHURCH. — According to Catholic doctrine, it is necessary to belong to the Church in order to attain eternal life. In negative terms, this truth is expressed by the celebrated maxim: « Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus »: outside the Church there is no salvation. The interpretation of this axiom has been much debated, and it is therefore necessary to determine the precise sense of the necessity attributed to the Church.
Jesus Christ is the sole and unique source of supernatural life. « In no other is there salvation; for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved » (Act. 4:13). It is impossible to become friends of God except through the Son, who became man in order to communicate the life of the heavenly Father to his brethren. Sanctifying Grace is, in the soul of the just, the anticipatory yet real participation in the divine nature. The beatific vision will not be a simple replacement of Grace, but its natural efflorescence, as soon as the soul has reached its homeland. This interior righteousness, produced in human beings by God through Christ dead and risen, is, as the Council of Trent says (Denz-U, 799), the sole formal cause of justification and salvation. It is therefore necessary with a « necessity of means », and it is impossible to replace it with any other element. Those who have not been regenerated by the Grace of Christ cannot contemplate the face of the heavenly Father. Accordingly, this « necessity of means » must be regarded as absolute.
In order to spread among human beings the Grace of which he possesses the fullness, the Incarnate Word instituted the mystery of his Eucharistic Body and of his Mystical Body, which is its extension and the organ of divine communications: « Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you » (Io. 6:54). Now, it is precisely the Church that exercises and applies, through the very power of Christ, this indispensable sacramental activity. The Church is not the formal cause of human salvation, but rather its instrumental cause in relation to God and his Christ. Dependence upon it is therefore necessary with a « necessity of means »: a necessity established by the positive will of the Founder, not absolutely by its very nature, and therefore relative and « institutional » in character.
There is no doubt that the intrinsic vital reality animating the Church is absolutely necessary for all; but the concrete means employed by the Church to communicate supernatural life are not always within the reach of all human beings. It is therefore permissible to think that God’s universal salvific will has provided for such a deficiency of external means by other ways. Indeed, Tradition teaches that martyrdom (Baptism of blood), an act of charity or of perfect contrition (Baptism of desire)
with complete certainty communicates the treasures granted to other human beings by the Sacraments. The normal means, therefore, of entering heaven is actual and perfect incorporation into the Church. But there are other ways of entering into its inner mystery, besides that of sacramental rite. Catechumens killed for their fidelity to Christ, and also children subjected to martyrdom (such as the Innocents of Bethlehem), have always been regarded by the Church as being in a state of salvation, and indeed honored as saints. By this path, a person submits generously and without any limitation to everything established by Christ. He is sincerely disposed to respect all the institutions willed by him; but in the event of impossibility or invincible ignorance, one could not think of condemning him because he has not made use of those means. He belongs in some way to the Mystical Body, and this is sufficient for salvation. It is always the Church, the continuation of Christ, that saves these « scattered children ».
It is therefore impossible to speak of a contradiction if, on the one hand, God wills that all be saved and, on the other, institutes a means of salvation which, in its visible form, is not accessible to all. The bond with the Church is always possible, imperfect but nevertheless effective, and it comes to the aid of these distant ones (v. BATTESIMO; CONTRIZIONE; MARTIRIO E MARTIRE; CHIESA).
The necessity of belonging to the Church cannot, however, be reduced to a simple « necessity of precept ». Certainly, such obligation is imposed upon all those who know the means instituted by Providence for salvation: they have the moral obligation to enter the visible Christian society. Only then will they be « marked » with the character of Baptism and elevated to the dignity of perfect members. Nevertheless, the Church remains a cause of salvation and not merely a condition. Attending Sunday Mass or abstaining on Friday are obligations proper to Catholics: these are not acts that produce eternal life, but only precepts to be observed in order not to lose or in order to develop that same eternal life. The Church, as a salvific organism, is superior to these prescriptions: belonging to it is not merely an obligation; rather, it is in the Church that the principle of Grace lies. Protestantism does not understand this character and dignity of the Church; one might say that it diminishes the divine transcendence of the Church, which is truly the City of God, descended from heaven to earth, the Bride of the Lamb who gives birth to her children for eternal life.
For Protestants, it is nothing more than the place where those who believe in Christ gather, the society constituted by the juxtaposition of all the faithful, imperfect and sinful, not the organ through which God himself forms his elect. According to the « reformers », it is Christians who form the Church; for Catholics, on the other hand, it is the Church that forms Christians. It is therefore evident that the two groups cannot have the same concept of n. of the C. The « mystery » of the Church is nothing other than the Revelation and communication of God himself, the infinite source of truth and life, diffused by Christ through time and space. In Protestantism, this mystery partly vanishes. While on the one hand Protestants are tormented by nostalgia for return, on the other they cry out against the « scandal » of the Church, instead of looking only at the weaknesses of the Church’s members.
As a conclusion to the doctrine set forth, certain attempts at theological explanation must be excluded which, if not altogether erroneous, are nevertheless superficial or inaccurate. Mention has already been made of the theory of mere « necessity of precept ». According to this doctrine, the famous maxim « outside the Church there is no salvation » is explained as follows: whoever remains outside the Church through his own fault cannot reach heaven. Undoubtedly, God deprives no one of reward except one who is guilty of sin. But there will always be sin in one who refuses even spiritual incorporation into the organism of salvation, which is necessary for all because it constitutes the Body
Mystical Body, which is the sole source of supernatural life. The precept could not in itself be the cause of resurrection (one should think of the Jewish law in the light of Pauline thought), but could nevertheless be an occasion of falling. Now the Church is not the prolongation of the Law, but rather its abrogation. Another theory, which goes beyond a Pauline image by somewhat materializing it, distinguishes between the Body and the Soul of the Church: belonging to the Soul would be a “necessity of means,” whereas being part of the Body would be required only by a “necessity of precept.” Such a distinction, however, is fallacious and would reduce the Church to the type and regime of the Law. Ecclesiastical society, organized and hierarchically administered, does not in reality differ from the Church-mystery or from the Church-spirit. By attaching oneself to one, one therefore attaches oneself to the other as well. But belonging to both can be, as has already been explained, more or less perfect. At times such belonging is realized solely through Baptism of desire, but this, at least implicitly, also has as its purpose incorporation into the “body,” and not only into the “soul.” The Holy Spirit, says s. Agostino, gives life only to the members who are in the body, of which he is the soul. It must be added, however, that in certain cases one can be “incorporated” through a simple desire and inner dispositions. This is what matters above all. Purely material incorporation, in fact, if it did not exclude sin, would be of no benefit whatsoever. Sincere desire, on the contrary, will lead to social affiliation as soon as this becomes possible. The Scholastics, after s. Agostino, elaborated their thought through the system of the “implicit vow.” This doctrine has the advantage of being traditional, faithful to the expressions and spirit of Scripture, and full of balance. Thus the Church remains in her mysterious dignity as the sole means instituted for salvation and, while she is apostolically urged, through her expansion, to facilitate the entry of all human beings into the one little ark, at the same time, through spiritual belonging, every appearance of rigidity and inflexibility is excluded—qualities that would be at variance with the universal love of God and of the Redeemer of the world (v. CHIESA; CHIESA).