Jimmy Akin outlines the Church’s teaching on why non-baptized people who cooperate with God’s grace to the fullest degree can still hope for salvation.
Transcript:
Host: Let’s go to Jorge in North Hollywood, California listening on Immaculate Heart Radio. Jorge, you are on with Jimmy Akin.
Caller: Thank you gentlemen for taking my call, I have a question regarding salvation of souls. People who have faith in Jesus Christ and all his teachings and in the Church but unfortunately never had the opportunity to be baptized into the Church, is there any hope for their, you know, for their soul to be in Heaven? Do they pass on?
Jimmy: Well, the Catholic Church’s teaching is that, yes, there is hope, because if someone is not able to become a Catholic through no fault of their own, then God will enable–God’s not gonna hold that against them. It will enable them to be saved as long as they otherwise cooperate with the grace that they’ve received.
So if someone has a positive response to God’s grace, and they’re not able to, you know, fully embrace the faith or fully become part of the Church, for whatever reason, let’s say they might have a terminal disease while they’re in RCIA, and they might die before they’re able to be received into the Church. That would be just one example. It’d be an obvious example of where someone was–through no fault of their own–was unable to be received into the Church.
But it illustrates the principle that it’s not an absolute necessity for one to enter the Church. It’s a normative necessity, it’s what God wants, it’s what he intends, and if through your own fault you say, “Nah, I’m not going to do that,” well then you’re in trouble. But if through no fault of your own you’re unable to do that, and you otherwise are striving to respond to the grace that God has given you, then God will make it possible for you to go to Heaven. And you can read more about that in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
Caller: All right thank you Jimmy, that actually makes me feel real good, thank you.