What do Catholics believe about salvation?

works." Roman Catholicism teaches that Christ's blood "has become the instrument of atonement for the sins of all men. At the same time, they insist that faith in what Christ did on the cross in and of itself is not enough.

Today the Catholic Church teaches what was reemphasized at the Council of Trent: For Catholic theologians, to "justify" means to make righteous and holy, therefore, justification and sanctification are considered to be the same process. For the Catholic, faith in Christ is the beginning of salvation and lays the foundation for justification. Then the Catholic builds on that with good works, because "man has to merit God's grace of justification and eternal salvation." Catholics believe that as they do good works, righteousness is infused into them, sin is eradicated and the soul merits heaven.

Just as Protestants rely on sola scriptura (the Bible alone) for a source of final authority and truth, they rely on sola fide (faith alone) for their source of salvation. The Catholic, however, believes that the Christian must rely on faith plus "good works" and God's grace mediated through the Seven Sacraments. These are:

It is a pity we had not Mr. Carlile before, and we should have been spared all the trouble about this way of righteousness. There is no question as to the truth of God. All the artillery of the Council of Trent might have been spared. "A man," quoth the note, "just or justified before God through the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ," and this "latter sense," etc. The Council of Trent says, "if any one says that men are justified either by the imputation of Christ's justice (or righteousness, as Protestants) alone, or by the remission of sins alone, grace and charity being excluded, which is poured into their hearts by the Holy Spirit and inheres in them; or also that the grace whereby we are justified is only the favour of God, let him be anathema." Again, sir, "this disposition or preparation justification itself follows, which is not the remission of sins alone, but also sanctification and renovation of the inner man through the voluntary reception of grace and gifts; whence a man from unjust becomes just." Again, the instrumental cause is baptism; and again, "with which endued" (that is, the justice of God) "we are renewed in the spirit of our mind; and are not only accounted but are truly called and are just, receiving justice in ourselves which the Holy Spirit distributed (or bestows) to each as He will, and according to the proper distribution and co-operation of each."

We will now examine the decree of the Council of Trent on Justification, and test it by the word of God. (Chap. 7, page 33.) It admits indeed that the meritorious cause of justification is “His most beloved only-begotten, our Lord Jesus Christ, who, when we were enemies, for the great charity wherewith He loved us, merited justification for us, by His most holy passion on the wood of the cross, and for us made satisfaction to God the Father.” But then it goes on to say, that the “instrumental cause, moreover, is the Sacrament of Baptism;” and that, “Lastly, the sole formal cause is the justice of God; not that by which He Himself is just, but that by which He makes us just, that to wit, with which we, being endowed by Him, are renewed in the spirit of our mind, and we are not only reputed but are truly called, and are just, receiving justice within us, each one according to his own measure, which the Holy Ghost divides to every man severally as He will, and according to each one’s proper disposition and cooperation.”

I have now done with the historical part of this enquiry. If any one wishes to see a foreigner's view of the settlement of the English Church, he may consult Mosheim, Cent. XVI, sec. iii, pt. 2, c. 2, xvi. We have seen the doctrine of the professors of divinity in England who were called over at the Reformation. We have seen the views of Luther, and the real character of Melancthon and his views. I suppose we need not attempt to prove Calvin a Calvinist. That is, we have seen not merely the doctrines upon which the Church of England was founded, but we have seen the principles on which the Reformation itself was founded, and arose as the assertor of truth against the errors of the Church of Rome: and we have seen this confirmed by the Church of Rome's stepping out to meet them as a fundamental point of difference, as the primary turning point which upset their errors. And accordingly we have found, in more than one instance, that when these are departed from, acquiescence in the principles of the Church of Rome in material points has been held indifferent; or that there was no difference at all. Such is the state of things which history presents to us: and I think the attentive reader will have already found every point called in question by the author of the "Remarks" fully stated in the affirmative in the extracts from the Professors of Divinity at Oxford and Cambridge. As to justification in baptism, everybody knows that the Roman Catholics were baptized in all that the Church of England holds essential. If therefore the reformers held this to be justification, how they could have turned the world upside down by their arguments with the Church of Rome on the point, is hard to tell. Surely, if this had been their view, all their arguments, nay their lives, for the doctrine of justification by faith (the Articulus stantis or cadentis ecclesiae), would have been very little to the purpose.

30 For my own part, I cannot discern one single jot of difference on this head between the statement of the author of the "Remarks," and the doctrine of the Church of Rome. The Church of Rome held, that righteousness could not be imputed without faith, as well as the author of the "Remarks." The Church of Rome held, that "it were necessary to believe that no sins are, or ever were, remitted, save freely by the divine mercy on account of Christ," and that "no pious person ought to doubt of the merit of Christ's death," as well as the author of the "Remarks." The Church of Rome held, and does hold, that past sin is put away in baptism, only a little more clearly stated than by the author of the "Remarks," that is, original sin in infants, or actual also in adults: so that a person is therein called, pardoned, accepted in Christ; while subsequent evil was to be put away by subsequent repentance. They hold the necessity of good works, and the freedom of the will, as well as the author of the "Remarks." But what they did not hold, and what the author of the "Remarks" does not hold, was, such a reception of the value of Christ's death by faith as gives peace and assurance of conscience, so that "gloriemur confidentissime," as a former Professor of Divinity at Oxford expresses it: which the reformers did hold, did preach, and did profess; and that so universally as to be made a special matter of condemnation as their opinion at the council of Trent.

Penance (confession) is another key sacrament because it involves "acts" or "penances" which the Roman Catholic must do to be forgiven for his or her sins. Catholics differentiate between "mortal" and "venial" sin. Mortal sins are grave offenses committed "with full knowledge and deliberate consent" and result in loss of sanctifying grace. If mortal sin is not confessed and forgiven, "it causes exclusion from Christ's kingdom and the eternal death of hell."

Before asking forgiveness for mortal or venial sin, it is important to have sorrow or contrition brought on by examining the conscience. When confession is made to the priest, the Catholic believer's sins are absolved, but absolution does not remedy all the disorders sin has caused. To recover full spiritual health, the sinner must do something more to make amends or make satisfaction for his sins (do "penance" ) .

The confessor (priest) assigns a penance that fits the gravity of the sin committed. Doing penance might involve repeating a certain number of prayers; acts of self‑discipline, such as fasting; doing prescribed "works of love", which could be anything from a kind word to patiently listening to someone.

N*. They are very shy indeed of saying what it is. Our friend, Dr. Milner, says, "All which is necessary to be believed on that subject is, there is a purgatory, and the souls detained there are helped by the prayers of the faithful, and particularly by the acceptable sacrifice of the altar." This is the same as the Council of Trent. Only they anathematize any one who denies that, after men are freed from the eternal penalty of their sins, they have to satisfy in this world or in purgatory the temporal penalty to which they are liable for them. They do not tell us what it is, and forbid curious questions; only there is, they say, a place of temporary punishment. In the Catechism of the Council of Trent, however, it is called the fire of purgatory, in which the souls of the just are cleansed by a temporary punishment. Those who get in must stay there till they have paid the very last farthing, for so they apply that text; yet their friends can help them to get out by prayers, alms, and particularly by the so-called sacrifice of the Mass. Now all this you can easily see (however little clear it may be) goes clean against the whole testimony of God as to the forgiveness of sins. They ground it in their reasonings on the impossibility of a soul suffering for a small sin as it would for murder. They put a person under vindictive temporal punishment, which does not purify, but satisfies God. They are always labouring to get people out; indulgences are used to spare people part of this temporal punishment due to sin, as they say, but "no one can ever be sure that he has gained the entire benefit of an indulgence, though he has performed all the conditions appointed for this end." How different is scripture. God does chasten for sin with a view to our holiness, even when we are perfectly forgiven — He, for our profit (it is said), that we may be partakers of His holiness. That, the heart assured of His goodness can easily believe, and bless Him for it. He speaks to us (as it is beautifully said) as unto children: "My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him." It is also true that God governs, and shews sometimes His displeasure against sin in this world. And He has so ordered the world that he that sows to the flesh, of the flesh reaps corruption; but a vindictive penalty — when a man is not in the flesh at all, as to which God can be satisfied by the man's sufferings in this or another world, or by his friends' offerings, with which no purifying is connected, but which serve merely to buy him off from God's hand, who will not let him go till the last farthing is paid — is a horrible blasphemy against the truth and grace of God. The scriptures do not teach us thus. What should you say, James, to the thought that, after God had forgiven you, and declared that He would remember your sins and iniquities no more, God was going to put you into the fire or some other horrible pain, till you paid Him the last farthing of these temporal penalties?

N*. Not the least; we will wait to speak of the church and authority till M. comes. I am glad he will be here, we can have our questions fully out. We will take however Roman Catholic doctrines from their own authoritative sources, which is still better. However he can recall any point I might forget, which will be an advantage. As to their arguments, I have Milner's "End of Controversy," which I know is distributed largely in cheap editions, so that I suppose we shall have the best arguments which they have to produce. Meanwhile there is a point I can touch on (for which we had not time the other day), I mean purgatory, because it is directly connected with the all-sufficiency of Christ's sacrifice, which gave you, through grace, such comfort the last time I saw you. The Romanists teach that there are two kinds of sins, mortal and venial. The first, they say, deprives the soul of sanctifying grace (that is, the grace that makes us friends of God), and deserves hell: venial sin does not deprive us of this. It does not, spiritually speaking, kill the soul, so their catechisms speak. The Council of Trent declares that the grace of justification is lost by mortal sin. Venial sin however, according to the same authority, does not exclude from grace, but by mortal sins men are sons of wrath and enemies of God. They say that if a man dies in mortal sin he goes to hell, but if he dies in venial sin he goes to purgatory; or if his mortal sin has been forgiven, and he is again justified by penance, he may go to purgatory to satisfy for the penalties that may remain after forgiveness.

Hence, fourthly, they resort to a sacrament of penance to meet sins after baptism, and they urge "contrition" as its condition, that is, not only hatred of the sins but desire to make reparation or atonement for them, proportionate to the crimes it effaces. Now as few could hope to attain such an end, they pretend that God eases the difficulty by giving the keys of the kingdom to the church, and thus opening the gate of heaven to those who, not truly contrite, have only reached "attrition." Penance, therefore, is a deliberate device of Romanism to give absolution where there is confession without due repentance or contrition. Nor was auricular confession established till the fourth Lateran Council (1215), when Innocent III. had it imposed as an article of faith. For previously, though confession of sins was held to be a duty, it was left open to do so to God alone or to a priest also. The new development was by the usual fiction declared to be the church's faith from the beginning. So they say of all their peculiar dogmas, no matter how recent they be as articles of faith, nor how loudly their highest authorities are known to have once rejected them. More barefaced deceit than in Romanism it were hard to imagine.