39. Roman Catholicism
ROMAN CATHOLICISM Will Catholics go to Heaven?
All born-again folks will go to Heaven, whether Roman Catholics or Protestants. And all are born again who confess Jesus as Lord and believe in their hearts that God hath raised Him from the dead. This involves a definite reception of the Lord Jesus as one’s personal Savior (Romans 10:9-10; John 1:11-12). When did the church of Rome (Catholic) first forbid the priests to marry? The Encyclopedia Britannica has an article on “Celibacy” which will give you the history of the whole matter. The first proposal that celibacy should be required in candidates for the priesthood was in the second Council of Carthage, A.D. 251. But it was much later that the rule was made binding upon all priests in the Roman church. Perhaps the decree of Pope Gregory VII, in A.D. 1074, marked the time when no priest could be a married man, and that ordination should be refused to those who would not promise to live in perpetual celibacy. Will you please give your interpretation of 1 Corinthians 7? Did Paul advocate celibacy, or not?
Paul advocated celibacy in this chapter, but evidently it was only “for the (then) present distress” (verse 26), and not for all time. In 1 Timothy 4:1-3 he particularly warns against the teaching of those “forbidding to marry.” Also, in Hebrews i3:4 (R.V.) he writes, “Let marriage be had in honor among all, and let the bed be undefiled.” (If the Pauline authorship of Hebrews be questioned, it is still the Word of God.) We may conclude therefore that the rule still holds good that is is not good for man to be alone (Genesis 2:18).
If the Pope or the Roman Catholic wants to live in or under the reign of Jesus as Lord and Master and King, will he not have to give up all formality of worship and bigotry? Do the Roman Catholics accept the Lord Jesus as their only Savior and Master, and depend upon His atoning blood for their salvation? The Pope, or any other Romanist, may be saved on the same ground and by the same means as any other lost sinner. Doubtless many adherents of the Papacy will find salvation, but this will be in spite of, rather than because of, the system to which they belong. But all this is true also of much that is called Protestantism. Romanists generally put their faith in Mary and Joseph or some other “saint,” rather than depending only upon the blood of the Son of God; and Protestants, frequently, if not so generally, put their dependence upon the false testimony of some Modernist messenger of Satan, rather than in the plain promises of the Scripture. “From such turn away.”