The Pope does not have the final word!

When Pope Francis says: “ there are no restrictions as to who goes to heaven!”

“I Believe” - “We believe”  

Section One of the Catechism

Where do we begin to justify the thought that we can promote everything in our Catholic Doctrine that Jesus Christ is the basis and Truth of our Salvation?  

In defending the ability of human reason to know God, the Church is expressing her confidence in the possibility of speaking about him to all men, and therefore of dialogue with other religions, with philosophy and science, as well as with unbelievers and atheists.  (CCC 39).  

“It pleased God, in his goodness and wisdom, to reveal himself and to make known the mystery of his will.  His will was that men should have access to the Father, through Christ, the Word made flesh, in the Holy Spirit, and thus become sharers in the divine nature.”  (CCC 51).

God chooses Abraham

In order to gather together scattered humanity God calls Abram from his country, his kindred, and his father’s house, and makes him Abraham, that is, “the father of a multitude of nations.  In you all the nations of the earth shall be blessed.”  (CCC 59).

Abraham became the architect of God’s people guiding and promoting the plan that God instituted from the beginning of time that all men might one day be with God, the Holy Trinity, for all eternity.

Christ Jesus - “Mediator and Fullness of All Revelation.”

“In many and various ways God spoke of old to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us, by a Son.  Christ, the Son of God made man, is the Father’s one, perfect, and unsurpassable Word.  In him he has said everything;  there will be no other word than this one.”  (CCC 65).

There will be no further Revelation

Throughout the ages, there have been so-called “private” revelations, some of which have been recognized by the authority of the Church.  They do not belong , however, to the deposit of faith. It is not their role to improve or complete Chrost’s definitive Revelation, but to help live more fully by it in a certain period of history.  Guided by the magisterium of the Church, the sensus fidelium knows how to discern and welcome in these revelations whatever constitutes an authentic call of Christ or his saints to the Church.

Christian faith cannot accept “revelations” that claim to surpass or correct the Revelation of which Christ is the fulfillment, as is the case in certain non-Christian religions and also in certain recent sects which base themselves on such “revelations.”  (CCC 67).

This is a prime authoritative statement from the Catechism of the Catholic Church.  Recently we have heard too many additions to the faith of our Church which seem to annul the teaching and tradition we adhere to.  We know that God created all men to share with him in eternity.  Christ died on the Cross, for all men’s transgressions.   Yet, there are many who do not believe and accept God’s Son, Jesus Christ.  The above excerpts from the Catechism Put all of these to rest.  God desires that all men will turn back and accept this truth.  

Jesus said to Thomas at the Last Supper:  “I am the way, and the truth and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me,”  (Jn 14: 6).      

Ralph B. Hathaway