(urth) Wolfe Heretic?

[Matthew Knight]

On Wed, Jul 16, 2008 at 1:17 PM, Adam Thornton <adam at io.com> wrote:


>  Whoa, whoa, whoa.  Is it actually a permitted doctrine in Catholicism
>> that faith in non-Christian religions can have salvific power?  Doesn't that
>> explicitly contradict John 14:6?  Which is *another* of what I--brought up
>> in, admittedly, a faith without, to be kind, much of a formal intellectual
>> tradition--considered to be one of those bedrock passages.
>>
>> Adam
>>
>
No less a Christian luminary than C.S. Lewis--admittedly an Anglican rather
than a Catholic, but one whom I recall Gene Wolfe mentioning as an
influence--implied believing that non-Christian religions, while not
necessarily possessed of "salvific power" themselves, could have many true
believers within their ranks who unconsciously deduced the truth of the
Christian religion through the false disguise of their own religion and be
saved without explicitly recognizing Christianity.  (Stated most explicitly
in "The Last Battle", where a kind Calormene soldier and devout believer in
Tash is accepted into the Narnian equivalent of heaven.)

Also, as a member of a historically pacifist Christian sect (the
Mennonites), I can state unequivocally that pacifism is NOT a "do-or-die"
article of the Christian orthodox mainstream.  Many Mennonites were
tortured, murdered, and otherwise persecuted by the Catholic and Protestant
authorities for their "heretical" views in the early 16th century
(advocating not only pacifism but the separation of Church and State).  And
not to stir up a can of worms...but George W. Bush.  Need I say more?
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