[richlevy]

Originally posted by Slartibartfast


as noone has picked up this question I'll take a shot at it from my POV.


The way I understand the RCC teachings (Roman Catholic Church) It helps a great deal to 1) Be Catholic, 2) if not a Catholic at least to be a Christian (as in being a true believer of Jesus).

HOWEVER, neither of these two are mandatory requirements to getting through the pearly gates. (And of course, falling into one of those categories is not a free ticket either.) Getting into heaven involves being in a state of grace, and not being weighed down by any mortal sins and such.

I couldn't be sure, but I would think someone like Gandhi is a good candidate for Catholic heaven... And according to South Park, Saddam is up there too.

Well, you have my vote for Pope, but you should check out what the Vatican has to say on the subject at

DECLARATION "DOMINUS IESUS" ON THE UNICITY AND SALVIFIC UNIVERSALITY OF JESUS CHRIST AND THE CHURCH

The high points are:

1. The Lord Jesus, before ascending into heaven, commanded his disciples to proclaim the Gospel to the whole world and to baptize all nations: “Go into the whole world and proclaim the Gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized will be saved; he who does not believe will be condemned” (Mk 16:15-16); “All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the world” (Mt 28:18-20; cf. Lk 24:46-48; Jn 17:18,20,21; Acts 1:8).

It appears that according to this statment, Ghandi does not get a 'get out of Hell' card.

The rest of the document discusses Catholocism in relation to other religions. Here the church declares itself the one true religion while not completely denouncing other faiths. The justification for this is:

Nevertheless, God, who desires to call all peoples to himself in Christ and to communicate to them the fullness of his revelation and love, “does not fail to make himself present in many ways, not only to individuals, but also to entire peoples through their spiritual riches, of which their religions are the main and essential expression even when they contain ‘gaps, insufficiencies and errors'”.27 Therefore, the sacred books of other religions, which in actual fact direct and nourish the existence of their followers, receive from the mystery of Christ the elements of goodness and grace which they contain.

This states that anything good found in other religions was inspired by Jesus. I guess this includes paganism, although Christ affecting a religion which predates his birth would have to be considered another miracle. Then again, I don't know enough about paganism to say how far back the 'writings' go.

The Vatican has a problem in that, if they come down too hard on other religions, people go around committing hate crimes and atrocities. If they are too accomodating and inclusive, they become less unique and run the risk of losing their identity and message in a sea of multiculturalism. This document was written in 2000 and basically says "we're going to play nice, but let's not forget who's top dog around here".

Im not an expert in theology or advertising. However, if you've ever read anything about 'brand identity', you can see the issues they have to deal with.

From an interactive website to a business card, a brand must be recognizable, differentiated and help build customer loyalty.

This is from a book description on Amazon.

Religion is an idea. It is one idea in a marketplace of ideas. Anything in a marketplace usually differentiates iteself from the otghers by branding. Almost anyone in the US has at least some mental picture about most of the religions in the US. A lot of these ideas might be slightly or completely wrong, but they still exist. We sort of know the difference between a Baptist, Buddhist, Catholic, and Jew. These labels have meanings to us. We probably do not know every type of Christian or Jew, or the difference between Hinduism and Buddhism, but the rough outlines are there.

Heaven (or enlightenment) is the prize in many of the world's religions. It's the equivalent to the toy suprise inside a cereal box or the frequent flyer miles attached to a credit card. Noone can prove it exists, and everyone understands that those who are rewarded don't usually come back to show those still working towards those rewards (expect in certain instances always witnessed by someone else). In some cases, the desire for confirmation leads to sightings in the frost on a window, a knot in a tree stump, etc.

The interesting area in all of this is the effort to treat religion as a science. Religious science is an oxymoron. Religion is based on faith, which is the existence of belief without proof. If anything, the fact that Jesus is a historical as well as religious figure, probably complicates things. Moses and Mohammed were prophets. While they occupy a special place in their religions histories, their followers never claimed divinity for them. Moses especially is even written in the Bible as a flawed character.

So, they're them, we're us, and we all have to get along and try to concentrate on our similarities and desire for a stable society. This does not, however, mean that Christianity, at least in the eyes of the Vatican, has to share it's heaven with non-Christians. In some way, this mirrors the 'restricted' country clubs and resorts in the first half of the 20th century in the U.S. The response to this by the Jewish men and women who were excluded was to build bigger and better clubs and resorts. It might be that in the same way I will not end up in the same heaven as the popes. Taking a look back at early papal history, I don't really mind this.