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We are
saved in community
PRAISED BE JESUS
CHRIST!
(Now and Forever)
I was raised in Anderson, the headquarters of the Church of God. Being a
Catholic meant you were in the minority. That’s still true of our state,
at least in the sense that officially recognized Catholics (registered
members of parishes) account for a mere 13 percent of the population. In
our Local Church, Catholics are 8 percent of the population. It wasn’t
unusual 50 years ago for some to think that Catholics weren’t
Christians. Among a variety of challenges one commonly heard was, “Do
you accept Jesus Christ as your personal Savior?,” the presumption being
Catholics did not. Or, “have you been saved?” You may have come across
that from time to time yourself.
These questions do not resonate with the Catholic mindset. It’s not
Catholic vocabulary. Catholic tradition teaches that we are saved in
community, the community of the Church. And, we are urged to keep in
mind that salvation must not be taken for granted. A source none other
than the Bible suggests that one can walk a straight and narrow path for
years and still blow it. Jesus speaks of casting out inappropriately
dressed invitees to a wedding banquet (Matt. 22:11-14). Foolish virgins
blew it by failing to have enough oil for their lamps (Matt. 25:11).
And, the great St. Paul expresses anxiety that after having preached to
others, he might himself be rejected (1 Cor. 9:27).
The way Catholics look at salvation differs from the way some
non-Catholics approach it. Community is the prism through which
Catholics view salvation. Others, however, in a 90-degree turn rooted in
the Protestant Reformation, tried to view religion as a personal matter.
Faith is privatized. Focus is on “being saved from damnation” rather
than being “saved for something.”
One of the most consistent teachings of the fathers of the Church
(teachers and writers of the early centuries) is that we are saved in
community, the community of the Church.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church instructs: “Faith is a
personal act — the free response of the human person to the initiative
of God who reveals himself. But faith is not an isolated act. No one can
believe alone, just as no one can live alone. You have not given
yourself faith as you have not given yourself life. The believer has
received faith from others and should hand it on to others. Our love for
Jesus and for our neighbor impels us to speak to others about our faith.
Each believer is thus a link in the great chain of believers. I cannot
believe without being carried by the faith of others, and by my faith I
help support others in the faith” (166).
Article 781 of the Catechism, quoting the Second Vatican
Council’s Constitution on the Church (Lumen Gentium), furthers
this thought. “At all times and in every race, anyone who fears God and
does what is right has been acceptable to him. He has, however, willed
to make men holy and save them, not as individuals without any bond or
link between them, but rather to make them into a people who might
acknowledge him and serve him in holiness. He therefore chose the
Israelite race to be his own people and established a covenant with it.
He gradually instructed this people. … All these things, however,
happened as a preparation for and figure of that new and perfect
covenant which was to be ratified in Christ … the New Covenant in his
blood; he called together a race made of Jews and Gentiles which would
be one, not according to the flesh, but in the spirit.”
We are not saved independently and separately from others. God has not
so individualized salvation that the only thing that should concern us
is to know for certain that “I” am saved. God does not save on the basis
of a person’s confidence that Jesus is his/her personal Savior, but on
the basis of the faith of Jesus Christ which is present in the community
of his followers, the Church into which God calls me through baptism.
For Catholics then, the definition of salvation is essentially communal.
Jesus is not “my” Savior, but “our” Savior. The spotlight is not on
“me,” but on “us.” We are sanctified by our common incorporation into
the Body of Christ, the Church. Jesus is personal to me, but not
exclusive to me, and he does not save me separately from others. Rather,
he saves me through incorporation into his Body (the Church).
This is expressed par excellence in the Lord’s Prayer. We pray to our
Father in heaven, not to my Father. Give us this day our daily bread,
forgive us our trespasses. Deliver us from evil. Even when this prayer
is said in private, it is prayed together with the whole community of
faith.
There are ramifications to this, specifically, what affects any one of
us affects all of us. St. Paul wrote: “If one member suffers, all
members suffer with it; if one member is honored, all the members share
its joy. You, then, are the body of Christ. Every one of you is a member
of it” (1 Cor. 12:26-27).
Is it perhaps the concept of salvation as a private and individual
experience that generates an image of death that is fearful and
isolated, the dissolution of friendships and a time of loss? A person
with a privatized vision of faith would tend to see him/herself standing
alone before God with no one to testify on their behalf except their
personal faith in Jesus and, perhaps, the good that has been recorded on
their “permanent record.” The “permanent record,” of course, can also be
expected to chronicle evil deeds, what has been done and what one has
failed to do. It is an “anxious” thought.
Balance this against the view that a person finds salvation in the
community of the Church where he/she, despite lapses into sin, has
always turned back to that community. Such a person does not die alone
nor does he/she stand alone in judgment before God. Rather, such a soul
is accompanied by all those who have gone before them “marked with a
sign of faith.” At death, millions of fellow Christians welcome this
believer into heaven and stand with that believer before God,
proclaiming, “This one, too, is a Christian.”
As long as we remain faithful to the Church, the Body of Christ, we can
be confident of salvation in Christ. In death, we shall not stand alone.
Is the Church important? Indeed it is. Does membership in the Church
bring responsibilities? Indeed it does.
“We” are challenged to ongoing conversion. “We” are called to holiness.
And, these challenges come to us as members of a faith community
sanctified by the blood of Jesus Christ.
This is a huge part of what we are urged to celebrate during the Easter
Season. |
