Do most Americans, and most people in many other countries
too, go to hell, since they have had a chance to hear of the
Church, but yet have not entered?
So we must explore why they have not entered, since they have
an opportunity.
There are several reasons, mostly based upon one situation.
The CCC in #37 says that in actual conditions, man experiences
many difficulties in coming to know God by the use of reason
alone. The CCC then quotes from <Humani generis> of Pius XII.
He says that in itself, the mind is capable, by its natural
powers, of finding God, yet there are obstacles. First, the
truths about the relations between God and man are beyond the
visible order of things. Second, if they are to be effectively
known, there is need of "self-surrender and abnegation." The
reason for this: The human mind suffers difficulty not only
from the impact of the senses and imagination, but also from
the disorder of the appetites that stems from original sin.
The net result is this: "... men in such matters easily
persuade themselves that what they would not like to be true
is false, or at least doubtful."
We notice the language: what they would not LIKE TO SEE as
true may not register as true, for they can easily persuade
themselves that the things they do not like are not true, or
at least are doubtful.
How do they "persuade themselves" that the things they do not
like are not true? No one gets up in the morning and decides
what lies he will tell himself today. Such a view is nonsense.
The work is not a matter of <conscious and deliberate>
rejection of the truth. Rather, their disordered appetites, as
a result of original sin, can work beneath the level of
consciousness and cause them to fail to see the force of the
reasons why the truth is true. The reason is that our feelings
exert a pull on our judgment
This situation is made still worse by personal sins, which add
to the disorder coming from original sin. It is not that
original sin took, as it were, a hunk out of the power of
reason. John Paul II assured us (Audience of Oct 8, 1986) that
there is "only a relative, not an absolute deterioration...
not a loss of their essential capacities even in relation to
the knowledge and love of God."
So there is the possibility that men can, without realizing or
intending to do it or realizing that they are doing it "easily
persuade themselves" that what they would not like to see as
true is not true.
We see this in the area of politics. How is it that Pat thinks
candidate A is great, but Mike thinks the same candidate is
immoral? Pat and Mike may each be honest men, trying to face
the facts. Yet things may register differently on them because
of this disorder stemming from original sin, aggravated by
personal sins.
So most of us have known some persons who grew up in a
Lutheran or other Protestant family who yet live a good moral
life, but do not consider entering the Church? Objectively
they should investigate and then join. In practice, we all
tend to think that what we have grown up with, at least if our
family seems good to us, is right. To even reach the point of
wondering: Should I investigate?-- takes quite a shove to
overcome the inertia.
We could hardly judge all these who live rightly to be in bad
faith. A good example is Bill Bright, of Campus Crusade for
Christ, Orlando, Fla. As reported in the periodical <Worldwide
Challenge> Jan-Feb. 1995 he and his wife Vonette in 1951 made
a "contract with the Lord": "From this day, Lord, we surrender
and relinquish all our past, present and future rights, and
material possessions to You. As an act of the will, by faith,
we choose to become Your bondslaves and do whatever You want
us to do, to go wherever You want us to go, say whatever You
want us to say, no matter what it costs, for the rest of our
lives. We will never seek the praise or applause of men or the
material wealth of the world." At age 73 he is still working
on this Crusade. The same issue reports "He and Vonette do not
own a home or car. They pay rent for their Campus Crusade
owned condominium and drive donated cars. They have given $50,
000 of their pension to help train new believers in Moscow."
It is not easy to judge such people are just in bad faith,
that they have seen the reasons for the Catholic Church but
yet by their own fault refuse to come in. Really, it is not
quite right to ask such a question. For according to Matthew
7. 1,"Judge not," we distinguish two things: 1)the objective
rating of what someone is doing; 2) the interior dispositions.
-- In this case, the objective rating is partly heroic as per
that contract, partly defective as embedded in a protestant
creed. But as to the interior - we are told in Mt. 7. 1 not to
judge the interior of others, since in general we simply
cannot know it. So we should not judge them to be in bad
faith. And it surely does not look like that.
In fact, most cradle Catholics adhere to the Church with no
rational cause. Commonly during the high school period they
come into a time of changeover from the child pattern of
believing things just because the adults said so, to the adult
pattern, or wanting reasons. The trouble is that most persons
do indeed drop the childlike pattern - but they never even
look for adult reasons. Those reasons will be apologetics.
Most Catholics probably do not even suspect that we can
construct a rational proof, without depending on faith at the
start, that the Church has been given a commission to teach by
someone sent by God, Jesus Christ.
Converts, in contrast, are apt to be stronger in faith,
precisely because they have gone through such a process. But
the cradle Catholics probably do not suspect such a thing
exists.
Sadly, some after that childlike period, give up their faith.
Some, without a reasoned basis, join a protestant
denomination, under the influence of a prospective marriage
partner, or for other insufficient reasons. We even see
American women joining the Islamic religion, even though it is
so restrictive on women. They think it looks good to them.
There is something they like about the way of life. But they
have never heard, nor have they expected to hear, a reasoned
proof that Mohammed really did have divine revelations, that
he proved it, that we know what was revealed to him.
Some join protestant denominations because they have heard
there are not so many moral demands, and that they will have
infallible salvation if they do. They never ask for, nor are
they given, a rational proof of these beliefs. But they go
anyway.
Underlying all these things is the simple fact that there can
be SUBCONSCIOUS INFLUENCES AT WORK, EVEN SUBCONSCIOUS BLOCKS
IN THE WAY of accepting the Catholic church. For example, a
person may perceive that if he does so, his family will turn
against him, or the other professors at his university, or his
business associates, or that he will have to give up
contraception and the possibility of divorce and remarriage.
Do these subconscious blocks make it really objectively all
right for the person to fail to do what he should? By no
means. But they may keep him from seeing the reasons. He DOES
NOT CONSCIOUSLY REJECT THEM. He as Pius XII said, MAY EASILY
PERSUADE HIMSELF that the reasons are not valid, or at least
are doubtful.
We are easily influenced by this sort of subconscious
motivation. These things are like submarines, and submarines
are all the more effective because they are not seen, when
they do not surface.
For example, suppose I am living in a large institution , and
I hear the announcement that Thursday evening a collector will
come to each door to pick up contributions for some good
cause. I think it over, and decide: I will give him $50. Now
of course that is much more than most people will give. What
is my MOTIVE? I would like to think it is 100% charity. But it
could easily happen that the motive is only partly conscious.
I may, without being aware of it, be influenced by the desire
for a big congratulation, or my hand may creep around to pat
myself on the back.
So it could easily happen that let us say, 40% of what
motivates me is the desire for big congratulations, while the
motive of real charity provides 60% of the drive.
Do I then sin by vanity? Not if I am completely unaware of
that hidden motive, if the submarine remains completely
beneath the surface.
We take another case. It used to easily happen that a boy in
the first year of college would be taking a general
introductory biology course. Early in the semester he did no
more work than what it took to just get by. But then they come
to the chapter on sex, and he says to himself: I really should
be studying more. So he reads the whole chapter carefully,
goes to the library to find more.
What motives drive him? There are three: 1)The real desire for
study - the early part of the semester shows that is not very
strong; 2) natural curiosity about sex. To indulge curiosity,
if there is no great danger of consent to illegitimate
pleasure, is not more than a venial sin; 3) bootlegging kicks.
The boy is not aware of that fact, yet it is happening to him.
He may in some cases come to the point of saying: I wonder if
I am just kidding myself? Then he will contract some guilt,
which only God can measure. But the submarines may stay well
below the surface, and so he contracts no guilt.
No wonder a famous motto on the Oracle of Delphi in ancient
Greece advised: Get to know yourself. For real spiritual
progress, growth in self-knowledge is essential. How can we
correct faults of which we are not yet aware? So at a retreat,
one good project is to try to grow in self-knowledge, to
search for submarine motives. The most common of those is some
variety of pride or vanity. It easily crawls into even our
best actions, without our fully knowing it.
So in a similar way, these submarine blocks may keep a person
from realizing that they should investigate their religion.
The blocks can make it easy to as Pius XII said, persuade
themselves that what they would not like to see as true is not
true or is at least doubtful and so need not be checked
carefully.
Even the Apostles showed patterns like these. Jesus predicted
His death and resurrection at least three times. Yet when it
happened, they acted as if they had never heard of such a
thing. The reason: they had a set of ideas already installed
in their minds, namely, of a Messiah who would be a great
conqueror who would throw out the Romans. The idea He would
suffer terribly would not fit such a picture. So it never got
in at all. In fact, just before His ascension, they asked:
Lord, are you going to restore the kingship to Israel now? The
Teacher must not have felt good: They flunked their final
exam.
Again, one of the last things He told them was: "Go and teach
all nations". Yet in Acts 10, when Peter came to the pagan
centurion Cornelius, some Jewish Christians on the sidelines
were horrified that Peter would speak to a gentile. God had to
work a miracle to get that out of it: then the Holy Spirit
displayed His power visibly so that Peter said:"If God accepts
them, I guess I have to accept them too.
So if someone says: Cannot grace overcome these blocks? Of
course, grace can do anything. But in some cases an
EXTRAORDINARY GRACE is needed, to overcome resistance already
present. These blocks are submarine resistance. Now
extraordinary graces are extraordinary, God cannot, without
self-contradiction, make the extraordinary to be ordinary. So
He does not routinely give the miraculous graces.
Similarly we should not say: A man should be ready to give up
family and friends and all for Christ. True. But the blocks,
the submarines beneath the surface may cause him to, as Pius
XII said, easily persuade himself that what he does not like
to be true is not true, or is at least doubtful.
St. Paul was well aware of this situation. Beginning in
Chapter 8 of 1 Cor he treats the question: May we eat food
sacrificed to idols? He replies, in effect: An idol is
nothing. Nothing changes nothing. So it is all right to eat-
except in cases where there would be scandal.
He gave this case: you are invited to a dinner, and on the
table is some meat. Someone at table says: That came from the
temple. Would we think Paul would tell them: Say that Paul
says it is all right. But no, Paul argues, eloquently and at
length, that they should be willing to give up meat rather
than lead such a person into eating when he considers it
morally wrong.
How could that happen? Some had grown up with a belief that
things offered were changed. No use to tell them they have not
been changed. They would not explicitly say they are not
changed. But they could not digest, as it were, the truth
here. So Paul does not say: "Tell them they are silly", or:
"Say Paul says it is all right". No, he argues eloquently and
at length: Christ died for this soul. Cannot you give up meat
on occasion to avoid ruining that soul?
It is also helpful to notice that there are two kinds of
evidence that lead one to accept something as true--
compulsive and noncompulsive evidence. Compulsive evidence,
such as 2 x 2 = 4, forces the mind. We are not free. But most
things depend on noncompulsive evidence. In it there is a
large range - at one end of the scale are the things so solid
that no one doubts them. At the other end are things in which
feeling can play a part, e.g., if someone says Mayor Barry is
a good honest politician - we can easily find yes and no
answers.
Where is the evidence for faith? It is of course
noncompulsive. It lies at a point at which it is objectively
valid, yet not such as to force one. God wants faith to be
free. He could have arranged to have the resurrection take
place with all Jerusalem, including Pharisees, present. But
that would leave no freedom. So He purposely sets the evidence
at such a pint that it really does justify belief, but does
not force it.
How a person reacts depends much on his basic moral stance.
For example, if a man has never been drunk before, but tonight
goes out and gets very drunk -- next morning he will have
guilt feelings, from a clash between his moral beliefs, and
his actions. Our nature hates such clashes. In time, something
will give: either he will align his actions with his beliefs,
or his beliefs will be pulled to match his actions. A
confirmed drunk cannot understand that there is anything wrong
in getting drunk. And other moral beliefs can be pulled along
with it. Even doctrinal truths can be pulled: before John Paul
II visited Denver, Dignity, a militant homosexual group that
defies the Church, published a statement saying that the Pope
is only the titular head of the Church: we ARE the Church.
Now if a person continues to go out on the evil spiral, his
ability to see moral and religious truth goes down and down.
On the other hand, if he lives strenuously according to the
faith that says the things of this world are worth nothing
compared to eternity -- he will grow in light on spiritual
things.
It reminds us of the Gospel saying: to him who has more will
be given, and he will abound; from him who does not have, that
which he seems to have will be taken away.
Again, it is clear that one's dispositions can affect how much
he sees. At the time of acting, he may, if he is on the bad
spiral, have less responsibility from having less light. Yet
he may - it is just possible - have foreseen when starting out
on that course that he would run into more and more blindness.
If so, he would at that early point contract responsibility
for everything he would foresee. But do so many persons act so
rationally?
We conclude again: there are such things as subconscious
conditions that can keep a person from seeing the reasons for
the faith: he does not consciously reject, but as Pius XiI
said, the result is that he easily persuades himself that the
reasons are not valid, or at least, are doubtful.
Such persons can be saved according to repeated declarations
of our Magisterium. HOW this can be is the subject of further
theological work. For it, please see Wm. Most's file "salvific
will", or <Our Father's Plan>, appendix.
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