We all want to know: Who can get into Heaven? Sacrament-receiving Catholics? The hundreds of millions in the 40,000 schisms who consciously reject The Church He Founded? There are guidelines in Luke, 13:22-30.
“Jesus passed through towns and villages, teaching as he went and making his way to Jerusalem. Someone asked him, “Lord, will only a few people be saved?”
He answered them, “Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I tell you, will attempt to enter but will not be strong enough. (The ‘narrow gate’ at least refers to those who strive to worthily receive Catholic Sacraments. It possible that it may also be passed by those who do not reject His Church but are separate from it only because they know too little about it.) After the master of the house has arisen and locked the door, then will you stand outside knocking and saying, ‘Lord, open the door for us.’ He will say to you in reply, ‘I do not know where you are from.’
And you (Those in the 40,000 schisms who consciously reject His Church.) will say, ‘We ate and drank in your company and you taught in our streets.’ Then he will say to you, (One assumes He means those who heard His instructions, as in “If you do not eat My Body and drink My Blood you do not have life in you.”)‘I do not know where you are from. Depart from me, all you evildoers!’ And there will be wailing and grinding of teeth when you see Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and all the prophets in the Kingdom of God and you yourselves cast out. And people will come from the east and the west and from the north and the south and will recline at table in the Kingdom of God. For behold, some are last who will be first, and some are first who will be last.”
Those who fully believe and obey may be saved. Those who do not enter through “the narrow gate”, following the Doctrines of The Church He Founded must be trying to get through the easy passage of the “wide gate”. Why would He say “narrow gate” through which the saved would pass if there were not a “wide gate” through which many would be lost?
How could those “not strong enough” to get through the narrow gate be saved? The Sacraments provided by The Only Church He Founded provide the necessary strength. Those aware of Christ’s Church but avoid it are- not “strong enough” to leave their schisms and illusions. They cannot get through “the narrow gate”.
Could anyone too swollen with pride and vanity get through the “narrow gate”? Can those bloated with un-confessed and unforgiven sins squeeze through?
Those focused on passing the narrow gate know that the safest decision that any human can make is to heed His words and understand that He founded only one Church, saying “Thou art Peter and on this rock I build My Church. . .”
The safest bet we can make: Those who consciously reject The Only Church He Founded cannot pass through “the narrow gate”. The Catholic Church is the “narrow gate” through which we must pass to get from here to Heaven.
