The One True Church

by Fr. Arnold Damen, S.J.  (1815 - 1890) Imprimatur: Michael Augustine, Archbishop of New York.

The only church that Christ established is the Catholic Church. "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be condemned." [Mark 16:16].  I. My Dearly Beloved Christians, from these words of our Divine Savior, it has already been proved to you, that faith is necessary for salvation.  And without faith there is no salvation.  Without faith there is eternal damnation.  Read your own Protestant Bible [Mark 16:16], and you will find it stronger there than in the Catholic Bible.   Now then, what kind of faith must a man have to be saved?  Will any faith do?  Why, if any faith will do, the devil himself will be saved, for the Bible says the devils believe and tremble. [James 2:19]   It is, therefore, not a matter of indifference what religion a man professes.  He must profess the right and true religion, and without that, there is no hope of salvation.  For it stands to reason, my dear people, that if God reveals a thing or teaches a thing, He wants you to believe it.  Not to believe, is to insult God.   Doubting His word, or believing with doubt and hesitating, is an insult to God, because it is doubting His Sacred Word.  We must, therefore, believe without doubting, without hesitating.   I have said, outside of the Catholic Church there is no divine faith.  Some of the Protestant friends will be shocked at this, to hear me say that outside of the Catholic Church there is no divine faith, and that without faith there is no salvation, but damnation.  I will prove all I have said.   I have said that outside of the Catholic Church there can be no divine faith.  What is divine faith?  When we believe a thing upon the authority of God, and believe it without doubt, without hesitating.  Now, all our separated brethren outside of the Catholic Church take the private interpretation of the Bible for their guide, but the private interpretation of the Bible can never give them divine faith.   Suppose for a moment, there is a Presbyterian, who reads his Bible.  From the reading of his Bible he comes to the conclusion that Jesus Christ is God.  Now, you know this is the most essential of all Christian doctrines, the foundation of all Christianity.  From the reading of his Bible, he comes to the conclusion that Jesus Christ is God.  And he is a sensible man, an intelligent man, and not a presumptuous man.  And he says, "Here is my Unitarian neighbor, who is just as reasonable and intelligent as I am, as honest, as learned, and as prayerful as I am.  And from the reading of the Bible, he comes to the conclusion that Christ is not God at all.  "Now,"  says he, "to the best of my opinion and judgment, I am right and my Unitarian neighbor is wrong.  But after all,"  says he, "I may be mistaken!  Perhaps I have not the right meaning of the text, and if I am wrong, perhaps he is right after all.  But, to the best of my opinion and judgment, I am right and he is wrong."   On what does he believe?  On what authority?  On his own opinion and judgment.  And what is that?  A human opinion, human testimony, and therefore, a human faith.  He cannot say positively, "I am sure, positively sure, as sure as there is a God in heaven, that this is the meaning of the text."  Therefore, he has no other authority but his own opinion and judgment, and what his preacher tells him.  But the preacher is a smart man.  There are many smart Unitarian preachers also, but that proves nothing.  It is only human authority, and nothing else, and therefore, only human faith.  What is human faith?  Believing a thing upon the testimony of man.  Divine faith is believing a thing on the testimony of God.