The Case of the Sinning Minister

The Case of the Sinning Minister

The following dialogue is adapted from a real exchange that took place after a Catholic Answers parish seminar:

"Thanks for your presentation. I found it, er, . . . interesting."

"Glad you thought so."

"I'm not a Catholic. I'm a Christian."

"I suspected you weren't a Catholic from the way you phrased your compliment."

"I think the only important thing is that you accept Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior. That's all that's required."

"As I explained in my talk, that isn't what the Bible says. The Bible nowhere makes that claim. That claim is a modern development of some branches of Protestantism."

"I'm not a Protestant. I'm a Christian."

"First of all, Protestants are Christians, as are Catholics and Eastern Orthodox. Second of all, you are indeed a Protestant. If you're a Christian, you belong to one of the three traditions, even if you aren't aware of that. You may not call yourself a Protestant, which is fine, but you take your principles from Protestantism, so you're a Protestant."

"Anyway, as I said, all that's necessary is that you accept Jesus. After that, you'll live as a saved Christian."

"What do you mean by that? Do you mean you won't sin seriously?"

"That's right."

"But you will commit what we Catholics call venial--that is, light or minor--sins?"

"We remain sinners."

"But no major sins?"

"Let's take a hypothetical example. Let's talk about a born-again minister. After being born again, he works as a minister for fifty years. So far as anyone can see, he leads a holy life. Then, in his old age, in one day, he engages in adultery, shoots his wife, intentionally runs over a pedestrian with his car, and commits suicide. (Let's presume he's not insane.) He dies unrepentant. Is this man saved or damned? Will he go to heaven or hell?"

"Explain That, Please"

"But how does that square with being born again? You said a born-again person wouldn't sin seriously, and here we have four serious, unrepented sins in one day."

"It just means he was never saved in the first place."

"Are you sure about that?"

"But think of what that implies. It implies you have no way to tell who's saved and who's not. You and all the other members of this hypothetical church thought for fifty years that this minister was truly born-again,; now you discover he wasn't. If you couldn't tell in his case--a case where he did, in fact, live a holy life until his last day--then how can you tell in anyone's case, including your own?"

"You just know when you're saved."

"Didn't this minister know too? No doubt he was convinced he was saved, but on your theory he was wrong. Don't you see the problem here? If the minister couldn't know his own status, how can you be sure you know yours? If he could be mistaken, why can't you be? You seem to make a big deal out of this assurance of salvation, yet it's no assurance at all because the only way you can be sure is to die without having sinned seriously. If you are logically rigorous, you'll find yourself perilously close to the Catholic position."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that the most you could have would be a moral assurance of salvation, not an absolute assurance. At any one time, you could say to yourself, 'If I died now, I'd go to heaven,' but you could never be absolutely sure that you'd always be in that condition. Catholics say the necessary condition is the state of grace. So long as we're in the state of grace, we have a moral assurance of reaching heaven. But we know we can sin seriously and lose grace and throw away our salvation. Do you see what I'm saying?"

"But you can know you're saved!"

"Not on the principles you've just told me. There's only one consistent line for you to take."

"Let me make clear first what it's not. You can't say the born-again Christian has an absolute assurance of salvation and, at the same time, say that we can't tell who's saved until death intrudes. That would mean we'd have to keep the assurance in suspense until death, which means it's no assurance at all. Do you see that? That's the line you can't logically take."

"So what line can I take?"

"There's only one alternative. You'd have to say that the born-again believer is, indeed, assured of salvation . . . "

" . . . that's just my point!"

"Wait a minute! Let me finish. You'd have to say he is, indeed, assured of salvation--and here's the kicker--even if, at some time far in the future, he ceases to live uprightly and enters a course of frequent, serious sinning. In other words, you'd have to say that this hypothetical minister was saved despite the sins he committed and despite his lack of repentance. If you make any other argument, you undercut the absolute assurance of salvation. Do you see what I'm saying?"

"And you see what I'm leading to--a rather revolting prospect: The born-again believer who is a gross sinner, even from the first day of his conversion, will be saved. After all, if he is saved even if he sins seriously only on the last day of his life, having lived a holy life until then, you have to say he's saved if he starts sinning half-way to the end, or after only a year as a Christian, or even after only an hour. You have no good reason to put the dividing line one place or the other. Once saved, always saved--that's your principle, and you must take it literally or not at all. Of course, that means you'll have a tough time reconciling yourself with Galatians 5:19-21, which is aimed at Christians and which explains what sins will exclude them from heaven--just the kinds of sins this minister committed--and he warns the Galatians that these sins exclude from heaven, even though they were already Christians at this point. Beyond that, most Christians, of any stripe, immediately sense something's wrong with that whole approach. It seems to go against God's justice. It's a divine invitation to engage in antinomianism."

"In lawlessness. If nothing can undo the salvation of the born-again Christian, if no sin can merit hell for him, then he may think there's precious little reason to be good. Since he's got it made, why not enjoy himself here below? Why be good if being good can't help effect your salvation? Perhaps it's better to put it in reverse: Why not be evil if evil acts can't forfeit your salvation? "

"As I said, the minister couldn't have been saved in the first place."

"Haven't you been listening to what I've been saying?"