The good news about Jesus is not all that the Roman Catholic Church believes and teaches.
That is also equally as true of those who self-identify as Biblical Christians. There is a whole litany of extra-Biblical beliefs and practices they engage in as well, yet somehow overlook in their criticism of the other things Catholics add as part of their traditions. They themselves add stuff too, such as getting politically involved to keep prayer in school, teachings of creationism alongside real science, so-called "sanctity of marriage" agendas, adding music or not to services, having their hair cut or not, women wearing slacks or skirts, worshipping on Saturday or Sunday, full immersion baptism or sprinkling, tongues talking or not, and a whole litany of beliefs they all claim are supported by scripture.
The Catholics claim to be able to support their practices with scripture as well. They are all doing the exact same thing they accuse the other of doing in error. It is simply the pot calling the kettle black, in other words.
I was raised in the Catholic Church and there is a lot more required by the Church for salvation and eternal life than simply trusting Jesus Christ.
As far as I know salvation for Catholics is based on how they read the Bible, just as salvation for Protestants is based on how they read the Bible. Both are "Biblical" according to each respective school of thought.
I was never taught Christ is sufficient. I did not read the scriptures while a Catholic so I never knew what they really said on the subject. I know for a fact that I was not a biblical Christian while a Catholic. I can't speak for all.
I would challenge the claim that you came to the view that you did simply by reading the Bible. The sequence was probably something along the lines of someone telling you what the Bible teaches, and then showing you the passages to support that, which you read and could see for yourself which confirmed what they just told you. Am I correct? Catholics do the same thing. The only difference is how they read it, with which presuppositions held in mind as they read a passage, versus the presuppositions held in mind for the "Biblical Christian" when they read a passage.
The challenge I make to all this is that looking at someone just reading it from a completely blank slate, without any suggestions from anyone whatsoever, will they in an absolutely independent fashion conclude the same things as one particular group does over the other? I more than doubt that. Having no beginning frame of reference in reading the texts will leave them with something that will be quite foreign to the beliefs that any one particular group holds. If you find at the end of the day, "I believe pretty much everything they teach in the Nazarene church," for instance, only confirms the prior conditioning that went into what was being read.
Granted, there are underlying reasons why someone is attracted to a set of teaching over another, which I have no doubt pertains to yourself as well as anyone leaving one group for another within a religion, that's as true of me as it is of you, but make no mistake, how you read a text will be conditioned by the thoughts and ideas of those who share similar temperaments and views as yourself. All in all, what we read is completely relative to our subjective realities.
Claims it is "objective" let alone "authoritative" because you read it as something external to yourself, is simply false. The subjective self interprets what is "objective", because it sees itself in it. All interpretations are primed by the context within which one reads it, filtered through one's own subjective conditioning of culture, language, beliefs, and personal and group values. This is universally true, without exception.
It is prideful when some set themselves apart with a arrogant, self-exalting attitude, but it is not prideful if one simply uses the term to distinguish between true or false teachings to prevent deception of themselves and others.
But it is prideful to judge another's approach to God as "false teachings" or "deception of themselves and others". I keep coming back to Paul's wisdom when he explicitly talks about this attitude of judging another's beliefs and practices as "false":
One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them. Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To their own master, servants stand or fall. And they will stand, for the Lord is able to make them stand.
In other words, if a Catholic uses a rosary and recites the Lord's Prayer in mantra sytle of worship, who are you to judge another man's servant? He or she does so to the Lord, as Paul says. Who are you to say they are practicing "false teachings" or or deceiving themselves or others? This does not seem in accord with the Spirit of Truth. It is consistent with pridefulness, however.
It is not meaningless when you consider that many people or groups add extra requirements to the scriptures, disregard, or twist the teachings of the Bible for their own agendas, gain, or control.
Personally, I think all of them do that. It's the nature of the human ego to see ourselves as right and others who are not like us as wrong. Each mold the teachings of the Bible for their own agendas, gain, and control. It's not until we are beyond the ego that that stops. Then at that point, you begin to see all religions as doing the same thing, or rather being used the same way by the ego to support its own positions of rightness in opposition to others.
Beyond the ego, it's all seen through the eyes of Love, as simply tools which people use to seek the Divine in ways that fit their needs, be that in traditional religious forms, or some new startup form which makes the claim it's the "true religion". Again, it's all the same thing.
Yes, even if one has never heard of the Bible, I believe God will lead a sincere seeker to Himself and ultimately that person's beliefs will line up with the scriptures because they are God's words about Himself, humanity, and temporal and eternal reality. This is happening right now in Islamic countries.
I agree that if one is truly hearing and responding to God, they will all align with the Love, which Jesus taught about. They will align with it, even if they remain practicing that Love through their respective religions of birth. One does not need to convert to a religion or a practice of religion to align with the Truth that Jesus taught, to "Love God with all your heart.. and love your neighbor as yourself.". Christianity at is essence is a spiritual attitude, a practice of being in the world through a heart of Love, not a set of religious doctrines.
