Pope asserts primacy of Catholic Church teaching

Pope John Paul II has declared that it is incorrect to regard the Catholic Church as only one of many roads to salvation, criticising what he called "religious relativism".

"As there is only one Christ, there is only `one Body: one holy, catholic and apostolic Church'," he said yesterday. The "religious relativism" which led people to hold that one religion equalled another was incorrect.

The Pope was speaking in the Vatican to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which is responsible for articulating Catholic doctrine and ensuring that it is taught properly. Dr Desmond Connell, Archbishop of Dublin, is a member.

The Pope told participants at a plenary session of the congregation that in recent years, in certain theological and church circles, a mentality had emerged which tended to "relativise" Christ as the one and only means of salvation, as well as to diminish the church's need of Christ as the only means of salvation.

This "relativistic mentality", he said, was the basic reason for the assertion that the truth about God "cannot be received and shown in its universality and fullness by any one historical religion; therefore, not even by Christianity, much less by Jesus Christ".

That position contradicted the belief that Jesus Christ represented "the full and complete revelation of the saving mystery of God", he said. Linked to that "oneness" of Christ was the oneness of the church He had founded.

"In fact, the Lord Jesus constituted His Church as a saving reality: as His Body, through which He himself works in the history of salvation." He added: "As there is only one Christ, there is only one Body: `one holy, catholic and apostolic Church'."

The Pope noted that Vatican II had stated that non-Christians could attain eternal life "moved by grace" if they "sought God with a sincere heart". The situation of such non-Christians, however, was lacking "if compared to that of those who, in the church, have the fullness of the means of salvation".

Referring to Christian unity, he said: "Our ardent desire to one day reach full communion with other churches . . . must not, however, obscure the truth that the Church of Christ is not a utopia that must be put back together from existing fragments with our human strength."

A special worldwide Jubilee Religious Life Day will be celebrated in Ireland tomorrow, St Brigid's Day, with a candle-lighting ceremony at the "Fire House" in Kildare town. Situated in the grounds of St Brigid's [Church of Ireland] Cathedral, the "Fire House" was the site of a monastery for men and women founded by St Brigid in AD480.