1

Broderick Lemke
THRS 320A
Christian Tradition
2 May 2017

Starving Kids are Cool and All, but Maybe They Should Have Eaten More Communion Bread

Both the Catholic and Protestant churches base their soteriology on substitutionary

atonement, but the method of who mediates salvation and how it is mediated differs. This

difference allows varying demographics of people access to salvation and creates means of

achieving it that differs between the churches. Thus, by establishing a soteriology and choosing

the priests that mediate it, church authority is given the power to mediate salvation.

The core beliefs of Soteriology for Catholics and Protestants is laid out in Anselms Cur

Deus Homo. In this document, he refutes the Orthodox belief of Christus Victor in which the

Orthodox Church believed that the devil had power over humanity and in order to save

humanity, God sacrificed his son as a ransom to the devil. This raised a problem for the Catholic

Church, insinuating that God was not all-powerful as the devil held some form of power over

him.

To solve this problem Anselms Cur Deus Homo proposes that humans owe God an

infinite debt for creating them, and this debt is increased for any sins they have committed.1 God

cannot allow this imbalance of debt as it is not just, and humanity must be saved from this

infinite debt. Salvation is necessary in both the Catholic and Protestant Churches to gain

assistance in paying this debt, as they are incapable of paying it themselves. God then created

Jesus and he was sacrificed to pay the debt for humanity as God was the only one who could pay

1 Anselm, Cur Deus Homo (Why God Became Man), 11.

 2

a debt as big as humanity owed.2 This sacrifice then creates a superabundance of grace, which is

then mediated through priests in both religions.

These differences from Christus Victor establish a soteriology that is separate from the

Orthodox Church, as there must be a mediator who distributes the abundance of grace from

Jesuss sacrifice. Without someone to distribute the grace to pay for the debt, the debtors would

be left without a way to cash their Jesus check for salvation. The interpretation of who can be a

mediator differs between Catholics and Protestants, as does the way in which the mediator can

mediate the salvation.

The Catholic Church believes that the pope has authority to mediate salvation as well as

to appoint others the same permission. This belief stems from an argument by Aquinas in which

he stated that Jesus passed the power of choosing who enters heaven. He passed this permission

to Peter, and Peter passed the power onto the pope.3 Through this belief, the pope and his bishops

and priests hold the power to mediate salvation. This belief places priests and the pope into a

position of power over the members of the congregation, establishing an authority that members

of the church are dependent on.

This dependence is furthered by the Catholic Churchs view that there is a range of

salvation that someone can receive based on their acts. As a result, members of the church must

participate in the holy sacraments regularly to make themselves holier and to come closer to

salvation. These sacraments are completed through a priest who then is able to mediate more

salvation to them and increase their holiness.

2 Ibid, 45.
3 Thomas Aquinas, Against the Errors of the Greeks, 181-184
 3

While the Catholic Church believes that power over mediating salvation was passed

through Jesus to the pope, the Protestant church believes that the mediation of salvation is passed

through apostolic succession in teaching. The Protestant Church believes that authority to

mediate salvation is given to anyone that has placed their faith in the teachings of Jesus and the

apostles. This is accomplished by claiming that all members of the congregation are priests,

which Martin Luther does in The Freedom of a Christian, saying Christ has made it possible for

us, provided we believe in him, to be not only his brethren, coheirs, and fellow-kings, but also

his fellow-priests.4 Luther condemns Catholic believers as he accuses them of insulting the

gospel and scripture by ignoring them in favor of the pope.5 In this way he points to the scripture

and words of the apostles as the true way to access salvation. By translating the Bible into the

vernacular, everyone who owned the Bible and could read had access to these teachings and

could become their own priest. The priests in the Protestant faith do not mediate the faith for

others, but rather themselves, lessening the dependence of Protestants on the church authority.

Regardless of this idea that Protestantism is built of individual authority, the church

authority still holds ultimate power. Priests are still dependent on church authority to come to the

proper understanding of the apostolic teachings and to achieve salvation. Luther raises this

concern as he says that there are blind and ignorant pastors and that everyone with faith would

be able to tell the difference.6 In this way, the understanding of apostolic succession proposed by

4
Martin Luther, The Freedom of a Christian. In Three Treatises, trans. W. A. Lambert
(Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970), 288.
5
Martin Luther, The Babylonian Captivity of the Church. In Three Treatises, trans. A.T.W.
Steinhuser (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970), 189.
6
Martin Luther, The Freedom of a Christian. In Three Treatises, trans. W. A. Lambert
(Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970), 308.
 4

the Protestant authority still allows them to choose who can mediate salvation, as priests must

understand the good and true pastors and teachings and defined by the church.7

The role of clergy in the authority of the church is even evident in the language difference

between the Catholic and Protestant churches. While priest is an apt title for a Catholic

clergyman, the Protestant church uses the term Pastor, which comes from the Latin word for

Shepard. This change in title is meant to refer to the guiding and teaching role that passes on the

Protestant Church authoritys good and true teachings.8 In this way, the individual holds the

power to mediate their own salvation, but only under the control of the church authoritys

teachings, still creating a dependence of laypersons on the church.

Additionally, the Protestant Church refutes the dependence of sacraments that the

Catholic Church insists upon. While the Catholic Church creates dependence through claiming

one can become more holy through sacraments, the Protestant Church views salvation as a

binary system. There is no such thing as having partial faith in the Protestant Church. Either one

can have salvation through faith or not, differing from the range of holiness present in the

Catholic Church. As a result the sacraments have diminished importance as most are not even

included in the New Testament.9 The Protestant Church authority is still able to maintain power

of mediation through declaring and emphasizing the importance of the right teaching, whereas

the Catholic Church authority must rely upon the sacraments to ensure their structure of

mediation.

7
Ibid.
8
Martin Luther, The Babylonian Captivity of the Church. In Three Treatises, trans. A.T.W.
Steinhuser (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970), 245.
9
Ibid, 126-132.
 5

Through the method of establishing a soteriology that must be mediated through priests,

church authority maintains control of how and to whom salvation is mediated. This is

demonstrated through the Catholic and Protestant Churches method of mediating the salvation

granted through substitutionary atonement. Both churches utilize different elements of their

authority to create a dependence of laypersons upon the authority. Neither option seems to be

objectively truer in this case as both are dependent upon the texts and traditions of the church

that came before them, such as utilizing the Bible or the teachings of apostles that were passed

down. This leaves several questions. Is there an objectively right method to mediate salvation? If

there is, how can one know which method is correct? And perhaps most importantly, how can

one ethically participate in a religion which holds the power to offer salvation to all, but chooses

to present it to only the people that follow church authority?