Tom Nash answers a caller who wonders whether Christians outside the Catholic Church who do not receive the Eucharist can be saved and whether the caller’s father can receive the Eucharist before his process of annulment has ended.
Transcript:
Host: We go to Patrick in Rockwell, Texas, listening on 910 AM Guadalupe Radio. Patrick, you are on with Tom Nash.
Caller: Hi, guys.
Host: Hi!
Tom: How you doing?
Caller: Hi. My question’s about the Eucharist and its application to the Protestant churches. Given Christ’s command that you had to receive the Eucharist or you’re not gonna have life within you, is there a route for Protestants to seek salvation if they don’t use the Eucharist and…you know, even if they’re, like, Lutheran and they’re almost there, but they’re not quite there? So that’s the question.
Tom: Sure. Well, Patrick, the Church is clear that there’s a possibility that they could be saved. And with regard to Our Lord’s words in John 6 about “If you do not eat the flesh and blood of the Son of Man, you do not have any life in you;” it’s for—as the Catechism will talk about—and again I mentioned these passages earlier, but 846 to 848 of the Catechism, paragraph numbers 846 to 848, salvation of non-Catholics, and in this case Christians—that it’s those who, knowing that the Church was made necessary by Christ for salvation, either refuse to remain in it or to enter into it cannot be saved, because it’s tantamount to rejecting Christ at that point.
So it can—it is possible—you know, you talk about a Eucharistic—Eucharist by Desire and that kind of thing, that’d be speculative theology, but similar to Baptism by Desire for non-Christians, one might argue that. We should never fall into religious indifference; we should encourage people to come into full communion, and yet also recognize that God has the last call, so that, yes, there is a possibility, but we do all we can out of love to share the fullness of the Gospel. And I’d encourage you to check the Catechism for further [reading].
Host: Okay, Patrick?
Caller: Okay. Yeah, can I do a follow-up real quick or—?
Host: Yeah, sure, go ahead.
Caller: Alright, it concerns my father, and he’s attempting to become Catholic but he’s waiting for an annulment to go through. And I’m just—can he receive the Eucharist before he comes in, or—he really wants to get the Eucharist, that’s part of the problem.
Tom: Okay, well, I—he can actually expedite the process; if he’s willing to live as brother and sister, he could expedite the process of becoming Catholic, and…as well as remaining living as brother and sister, you know, no conjugal intimacy, until the annulment process is taken care of, that way he could expedite that process.
So if he’s doing that…actually, at the point, until he gets the annulment, though, he could not receive the Eucharist because it’s…the public conduct, and so he could receive it privately but not at a Mass, if he were, you know, to talk to a pastor. Because this goes back to Canon 915, and there’d still be the public reality of the first marriage, and so if he talked to the pastor he could potentially receive it privately, if he talked to him and said “I’m living as brother and sister;” but not publicly until the annulment comes through, to avoid getting scandal.