Przynależność do Kościoła a problem zbawienia według Lumen Gentium i Dominus Iesus

Abstract

St. Cyprian’s statement ‘There is no salvation outside the Church’ influenced ecclesiology and challenged the Church to re-discover its vocation. Documents such as Lumen gentium and Dominus Iesus express the responsibility for guarding of the deposit of faith. They analyze thoroughly the idea of the necessity of salvation, of Jesus and the Church. Both documents agree as to the question of baptism as a ‘gate’ leading to the community with God and people. To be baptized means to be born a new man in Jesus Christ. Vaticanum II is close to Karl Rahner’s reasoning that also anonymous Christians belong to the Church. Dominus Iesus is sceptical about that. According to this document, non-Christian religions also include the elements of God’s truth and may help people to achieve the state of eternal happiness, as ‘the wind bloweth where it listeth’ (J 3, 8). However, the text also stresses the fact that ‘this is also the consequence of Redemption’. This is not a manifestation of Christian fundamentalism. It is just a simple recognition of the truth that one can be saved within the Church founded by Jesus and this Church can be entered through baptism.