Hay una tendencia común entre las personas a hacer juicios negativos sobre otras personas. En las escuelas secundarias, esta tendencia se muestra en las camarillas. Unos pocos chicos populares se meten en un grupo, y poco a poco empiezan a pensar que son mejores que otros porque les gustan más. Los niños que no están "en" pueden convertirse en objetos de lástima, o de desprecio, o incluso de bromas crueles. De una forma u otra la camarilla juzga sutilmente a los demás como una clase inferior de seres humanos.

La misma tendencia a despreciar a los demás se muestra en varias religiones. Algunos grupos religiosos se vuelven tan egocéntricos que creen que nadie de una fe diferente puede ir al cielo. Cuando se lleva a un extremo, este tipo de actitud es mucho más cruel que las camarillas de adolescentes esnobservadores.

Las enseñanzas de la Biblia son un gran contraste con esto. Para empezar, la Palabra de Dios nos dice que no debemos etiquetar a la gente como "salvada" o "pecadora". Jesús dijo,

"No juzgues, para que no seas condenado. ¿Por qué miras la paja en el ojo de tu hermano, pero no consideras la viga en tu propio ojo?" (Mateo 7:1, 3)

El discípulo James lo dijo de esta manera: "Hay un Legislador, que es capaz de salvar y destruir. ¿Quién eres tú para juzgar a otro?" (Santiago 4:1)

Cuando el Señor estaba en la tierra, una actitud de juicio prevalecía entre los líderes de la iglesia. Muchos pensaron que cuando el Mesías viniera, salvaría a los judíos, y no a otros. Cuando Jesús vino, lo condenaron por asociarse con no judíos y judíos por igual.

Jesús desalentó este tipo de actitud. Una vez habló con algunas personas que "confiaban en sí mismas" que se salvaron y otras no. Les pidió que consideraran dos oraciones: "Dios, te agradezco que no soy como los demás hombres", y "Dios, ten misericordia de mí, un pecador". Jesús alabó al hombre que se creía pecador. (Lucas 18:9-14)

Es mejor pensar que eres un pecador que pensar que estás salvado.

Tal vez recuerde también la parábola del buen samaritano, que se detuvo a ayudar al hombre herido al borde del camino. A pesar de que este samaritano era de la fe "equivocada" (desde el punto de vista judío), Jesús dijo que el samaritano debía ser amado como un prójimo, porque era un buen hombre. De hecho, dijo que una persona que quiere la vida eterna debería ser como este samaritano (Lucas 10:29-37), aunque el samaritano no era ni cristiano ni judío. Jesús vio - y ve - lo que hay en el corazón de una persona, no sólo la iglesia a la que uno pertenece.

La Biblia dice claramente que es la forma en que una persona vive, no sólo lo que cree, lo que determina si va al cielo o no. Jesús dijo: "No todo el que me diga: 'Señor, Señor', entrará en el reino de los cielos, sino el que haga la voluntad de mi Padre que está en los cielos". (Mateo 7:21)

De nuevo, "recompensará a cada uno según sus obras". (Mateo 16:27)

"Los que han hecho el bien", dice, "irán a la resurrección de la vida, y los que han hecho el mal, a la resurrección de la condenación". (Juan 5:29)

Dado que la vida de una persona, no sólo su fe, determina su suerte eterna, Jesús predijo que muchos cristianos no se salvarían, porque habían vivido una vida malvada.

"Muchos me dirán en ese día: 'Señor, Señor, ¿no hemos profetizado en tu nombre, expulsado demonios en tu nombre y hecho muchas maravillas en tu nombre?' Y entonces les declararé: "Nunca os conocí: apartaos de mí, los que practicáis la ilegalidad". (Mateo 27:22-23, Lucas 13:25-27)

Una razón por la que un no cristiano puede ser salvado, es que puede amar a su prójimo. Quien ama genuinamente a su prójimo también ama a Cristo, aunque no se dé cuenta. Jesús dijo: "En la medida en que has atendido a uno de los más pequeños de estos mis hermanos, me lo has hecho a mí". (Mateo 25:40)

La fe en Jesús, sin amor al prójimo no tiene sentido.

"Aunque tengo toda la fe, para poder remover montañas, pero no tengo amor, no soy nada." (1 Corintios 13:2)

El amor genuino, por otra parte, es un signo de que una persona conoce al Señor en su corazón, independientemente de la religión que profesa en el exterior.

"El amor lo cree todo". (1 Corintios 13:7)

"El que hace el bien es de Dios, pero el que hace el mal no ha visto a Dios". (3 Juan 1:11)

"Amémonos los unos a los otros, porque el amor es de Dios, y todo aquel que ama nace de Dios y conoce a Dios. Dios es amor, y el que permanece en el amor, permanece en Dios, y Dios en él". (1 Juan 4:7-11)

Resumen:

Algunas iglesias cristianas enseñan esto: Sólo los cristianos se salvan.

Lo que la Biblia realmente dice (y lo que la Nueva Iglesia Cristiana enseña): Gente buena de todas las religiones se salvan.

Algunas referencias de las enseñanzas de la Nueva Iglesia Cristiana: Sobre el Cielo y el Infierno 318-328, La Divina Providencia 326

Usado con el permiso de John Odhner, el autor de este sitio muy útil: http://whatthebiblesays.info/Introduction.html

326. We need to look at these one at a time and expand on them.

(a) Belief in God brings about God's union with us and our union with God; and denial of God brings about severance. Some may believe that people who do not believe in God can be saved just like people who do, provided they lead moral lives. "What does belief accomplish?" they say. "Is it anything but a thought? I could easily believe in God if I knew for certain that God actually existed. I have heard about him, but I haven't seen him. Show me, and I'll believe." Many people who deny the existence of God talk like this when they are given space to argue freely with someone who does believe in God.

But I shall illustrate the fact that belief in God unites and denial of God separates by sharing what I have learned in the spiritual world. If people there think about others and want to talk with them, they are immediately present. This is taken for granted there and never fails. The reason is that there is no distance in the spiritual world the way there is in this physical world, but only an appearance of distance.

[2] Then too, just as thinking about others, together with some awareness of them, causes presence, so a feeling of love for them causes union. This is what makes people accompany each other and converse amiably along the way, live in the same houses or in the same community, meet with each other often, and work on tasks together. The opposite happens, too, if people do not love each other, and even more so if they dislike each other. They do not see each other or get together. They are as far from each other as their lack of love or their active dislike. If by any chance they do meet, that meeting triggers the dislike, and they vanish.

[3] These few examples show what makes for presence and what makes for union in the spiritual world. Specifically, presence comes from remembering others and wanting to see them, and union comes from a feeling that arises from our love.

The same holds true for everything in our minds. There are countless elements there, all arranged and united in accord with our feelings, or the way one element loves another.

[4] This union is spiritual union; and it works the same in widely inclusive instances and in individual ones. The source of this spiritual union is in the union of the Lord with the spiritual world and with the physical world, again in inclusive and in individual instances. We can see, then, that to the extent that we believe in the Lord and think about him on the basis of what we understand, the Lord is present, while to the extent that we believe in him on the basis of a loving feeling, the Lord is united with us. Conversely, to the extent that we do not believe in the Lord, the Lord is absent; and to the extent that we deny him, we are separated from him.

[5] A result of union is that the Lord turns our faces toward him and then leads us; and a result of separation is that hell turns our faces toward it and leads us. So all the angels of heaven face toward the Lord as the sun, and all the spirits of hell face away from the Lord. This shows what belief in God does and what denial of God does.

Further, people who deny God in the world deny him after death. They are inwardly structured as described in 319; and the structure adopted in this world remains forever.

[6] (b) Our belief in God and union with him depend on our living a good life. Everyone who knows anything religious can know about God. People can talk about God from this knowledge or from memory, and some of them can even think intelligently about God. If they do not live good lives, though, this brings only a presence. They are still perfectly capable of turning away from him and turning toward hell, which they do if they live evil lives.

Heartfelt belief in God, though, is possible only for people who live good lives. Depending on those good lives, the Lord turns them away from hell and toward himself. This is because it is only they who actually love God. They love the divine values that come from him by living them. The divine values that come from God are the commandments of his law. These commandments are God, since he is the divine nature that emanates from him. This is also loving God, which is why the Lord said, "Whoever does my commandments is the one who loves me, but whoever does not do my commandments does not love me" (John 14:21-24 [John 14:21, 24]).

[7] This is why there are two tablets of the Ten Commandments, one for God and the other for us. God is constantly at work to enable us to accept the things that are on his tablet. However, if we do not do the things that are on our tablet, we are not open to the heartfelt acceptance of the things that are on God's tablet; and if we are not open to them, we are not united. As a result, the two tablets are united as a single one and are called "the tablets of the covenant," and "covenant" means "union."

The reason our belief in God and union with him depend on our living good lives is that good lives are like the goodness that is in the Lord and that therefore comes from the Lord. So when we are engaged in living good lives, the union is accomplished. The opposite happens with people living evil lives. Then there is a rejection of the Lord.

[8] (c) A good life, or living rightly, is abstaining from evils because they are against our religion and therefore against God. There is ample support for the proposition that this is a good life, or living rightly, in Teachings about Life for the New Jerusalem, from beginning to end. I would add only this, that if you do all the good you can, if you build churches and decorate and fill them with your offerings, if you devote your wealth to hospitals and hospices, if you give alms every day, if you help widows and orphans, if you faithfully attend divine worship, even if you think, talk, and preach about these things in all apparent sincerity, and still do not abstain from evils as sins against God, all these good deeds are not really good at all. They are either hypocritical or self-serving, because there is still evil within them. Our life is in absolutely everything that we do, and good deeds become good only by the removal of evil from them.

We can see from this that abstaining from evils because they are against our religion and therefore against God is leading a good life.

[9] (d) These are the general principles of all religions, through which everyone can be saved. Belief in God and refusal to do evil because it is against God are the two elements that make a religion a religion. If either is lacking, we cannot call it a religion, since believing in God and doing evil are mutually contradictory, as are doing what is good and not believing in God. Neither is possible apart from the other.

The Lord has provided that there should be some religion almost everywhere and that everyone who believes in God and does not do evil because it is against God should have a place in heaven. Heaven, seen in its entirety, looks like a single individual, whose life or soul is the Lord. In that heavenly person there are all the components that there are in a physical person, differing the way heavenly things differ from earthly ones.

[10] We know that there are within us not only the parts formed as organs from blood vessels and nerve fibers--the forms we call our viscera. There are also skin, membranes, tendons, cartilage, bones, nails, and teeth. They are less intensely alive than the organic forms, which they serve as ligaments, coverings, and supports. If there are to be all these elements in that heavenly person who is heaven, it cannot be made up of the people of one religion only. It needs people from many religions; so all the people who make these two universal principles of the church central to their own lives have a place in that heavenly person, that is, in heaven. They enjoy the happiness that suits their own nature. On this subject, though, there is more in 254 above.

[11] We are assured that these two principles are basic to every religion by the fact that these two principles are what the Ten Commandments teach, and they were the basis of the Word. They were given from Mount Sinai by the very voice of Jehovah and written on two tablets of stone by the finger of God. Then they were placed in the ark named for Jehovah and constituted the Holy of Holies in the tabernacle and the very center of the temple in Jerusalem. Everything else was holy simply by being there. We are told a great deal more about the Ten Commandments in the ark in the Word: see the passages collected in Teachings about Life for the New Jerusalem 53-61, to which I may add the following.

We are told in the Word that the ark containing the two tablets with the commandments written on them was captured by the Philistines and set up in the shrine of Dagon in Ashdod. Dagon fell to the ground before it, after which his head and his hands were found lying apart from his body on the threshold of the shrine. Because of the ark, the people of Ashdod and Ekron by the thousands were plagued by hemorrhoids, and their land was ravaged by mice. Then, on the advice of their leaders, the Philistines made five golden hemorrhoids and five golden mice and a new cart. They put the ark on the cart with the golden hemorrhoids and mice beside it and sent the ark back to the Israelites drawn by two cows that lowed along the way, in front of the cart. The Israelites sacrificed the cows and the cart (1 Samuel 5, 6).

[12] Now let us see what all this means. The Philistines meant people who believe in faith separated from charity. Dagon portrayed that system of belief. The hemorrhoids that afflicted them meant earthly loves, which are unclean when they are separated from spiritual loves; and the mice meant the destruction of the church by distortions of the truth. The new cart on which they sent back the ark meant a new teaching, though on the earthly level, because a chariot in the Word meant a teaching derived from spiritual truths. The cows meant good earthly feelings, the golden hemorrhoids earthly loves purified and made good, and the golden mice the destruction of the church taken away by goodness (gold in the Word means what is good). The lowing of the cows along the way pointed to the difficulty of turning the obsessions with evil of our earthly self into good desires, and the sacrifice of the cows and the cart meant that the Lord was appeased.

[13] This is what this story means spiritually. Put it all together into a single meaning and see how it can be applied.

On the meaning of the Philistines as people who believe in faith separated from charity, see Teachings for the New Jerusalem on Faith 49-54; and on the ark meaning the holiest values of the church because it contained the Ten Commandments, see Teachings about Life for the New Jerusalem 53-61.

318. Now, though, I need to say how our state changes as a result of our justifications and the convictions that they yield, in the following sequence. (a) There is nothing that we cannot rationalize, and we can rationalize falsity more easily than truth. (b) Once we have justified what is false, we cannot see what is true; but once we have justified what is true, we can see what is false. (c) Our ability to justify whatever we please is not intelligence. It is only cleverness, which even the worst of us may have. (d) There is a kind of intellectual justification that is not volitional as well, but all our volitional justification is intellectual as well. (e) Our justification of what is evil, both volitionally and intellectually, is what makes us believe that our own prudence is everything and that divine providence is nothing. Intellectual justification alone does not do this, however. (f) Anything that we have justified both volitionally and intellectually lasts forever, but not what we have justified only intellectually.

[2] (a) As to the first point, that there is nothing that we cannot rationalize, and we can rationalize falsity more easily than truth, is there anything that we cannot justify? Especially when atheists can "prove" that God is not the creator of the universe, but that Nature is her own creatress; that religion is nothing but chains for simple people and commoners; that we are animals and die the way they do? And especially when they can prove that there is nothing wrong with adultery or with surreptitious theft, fraud, and deceptive plots, and that shrewdness is intelligence and malice is wisdom? We all justify our own heresies. Are there not volumes full of proofs of the two primary heresies in Christendom? Make up ten heresies, as obscure as you like, ask clever people to prove them, and they will prove them all. If you then look at them solely on the basis of their proofs, will you not be seeing false things as true? Given the fact that anything false may shine in our earthly self because of its superficialities and illusions, while truth shines only in our spiritual self, we can see that what is false is easier to prove than what is true.

[3] Let me offer an example to show that anything false and anything evil can be justified to the point that what is false seems to be true and what is evil seems to be good. Let us prove that light is darkness and that darkness is light. Can we not ask what light really is? Is it anything but what we see in our eyes because of their state? What is light to a closed eye? Do not bats and owls have eyes, and do they not see light as darkness and darkness as light? I have heard that some people have sight like this, and they say that hellish people see each other even though they are living in darkness. Do we ourselves not have light in our dreams at midnight? Does this not mean that darkness is light and that light is darkness?

We can answer, though, "What are you talking about? Light is light the way truth is truth, and darkness is darkness the way falsity is falsity."

[4] For another example, let us prove that crows are white. Can we not say that a crow's blackness is simply shadow that is not its real being? Its feathers are white inside, and so is its body. These are the substances that it is actually made of. Since its blackness is a shadow, it becomes white when it gets old. I have seen crows like this. What is blackness, essentially, if not whiteness? Grind up black glass and you will see that the powder is white. This means that if you call a crow black, you are talking about its shadow and not about its real self. We can answer, though, "What are you talking about? This would mean that all birds are white."

I offer these examples, even though they are irrational, to show that we can "prove" the falsity that is opposite to what is true and the evil that is opposite to what is good.

[5] (b) Once we have justified what is false, we cannot see what is true; but once we have justified what is true, we can see what is false. Everything false is in darkness and everything true is in the light. We cannot see anything in darkness, so we do not know what anything is unless we feel it. It is different in the light. That is why falsities are called "darkness" in the Word, and why it describes people who believe falsities as walking in darkness and the shadow of death [Psalms 23:4; Isaiah 9:2; Isaiah 50:10; Isaiah 59:9; John 12:35]. By the same token, truths are called "light" in the Word, so it describes people who believe truths as walking in the light [Isaiah 2:5; John 11:9; Revelation 21:24] and as "children of light" [John 12:36].

[6] There are many indications that once we have justified what is false, we cannot see what is true; but once we have justified what is true, we can see what is false. Can anyone see anything that is spiritually true without being taught by the Word? Would there not be nothing but darkness that can be dispelled only by light from the Word, and then only for people who are willing to be enlightened? Are there any heretics who can see their errors unless they are open to real truth from the church? Until they are, they cannot. I have talked with people who had convinced themselves of faith separate from charity, asking whether they had seen how much it says in the Word about love and caring, about works and deeds, and about keeping the Commandments, to the effect that people who kept them were blessed and wise and that people who did not were stupid. They have told me that when they read such things, all they could see was that they were about faith, so they skipped over them as though their eyes were closed.

[7] People who have convinced themselves of falsities are like people who see streaks on a wall, and when they do so in the evening shadows, they see the streaks in their imagination as a rider or some other human figure, an optical illusion that disappears when daylight shines in. Can anyone feel how spiritually filthy adultery is who does not feel the spiritual purity of chastity? Can anyone feel the cruelty of vengefulness who is not engaged in doing good out of love for his or her neighbor? Is there an adulterer or anyone eager for vengeance who does not ridicule the people who call these pleasures hellish--the people who say that the pleasures of marriage love and love for their neighbor are heavenly? The list could go on.

[8] (c) Our ability to justify whatever we please is not intelligence. It is only cleverness, which even the worst of us may have. There are people who are brilliant at justifying things who do not know anything true. They can still justify both truth and falsity. Some of them say, "What is truth? Is there any such thing? Anything is true if I make it true." In this world, these people are considered intelligent, but they are nothing but whitewashers. The only people who are intelligent are the people who can tell that a truth is true and who corroborate this by a constant awareness of truths. It is hard to tell the two kinds of person apart because it is hard to tell the difference between the light of rationalization and the light of a genuine sense of truth. It can seem as though the things we see in the light of rationalization are being presented in the light of a genuine sense of truth; and yet the difference is like the difference between a deceptive light and real light. In the spiritual world, that deceptive light turns into darkness when real light shines in. It is the light that many people in hell live in; and when they are let out into real light, they cannot see a thing. We can see from this that the ability to justify whatever we please is only cleverness, which even the worst of us may have.

[9] (d) There is a kind of intellectual justification that is not volitional as well, but all our volitional justification is intellectual as well. Some examples may serve to illustrate this. There are people who firmly believe in faith separated from charity but who live caring lives. In general, there are people who firmly believe in a false theology but do not live by these false beliefs. They are people who engage in intellectual justification but not volitional justification along with it. However, people who justify a false theology and live by it are engaged in both volitional and intellectual justification. This is because our discernment does not flow into our volition, but our volition does flow into our discernment.

This enables us to see what malicious distortion is and what distortion is that is not malicious, to see that nonmalicious distortion can be united to what is good, but that malicious distortion cannot. This is because nonmalicious distortion is distortion in our discernment but not in our volition, while malicious distortion is distortion in our discernment because of malice in our volition.

[10] (e) Our justification of what is evil, both volitionally and intellectually, is what makes us believe that our own prudence is everything and that divine providence is nothing. Intellectual justification alone, however, does not do this. There are many people who inwardly are convinced of their own prudence because of the way things seem in this world but who still do not deny divine providence. Their conviction is intellectual only. If they also deny divine providence, though, they are engaged in volitional justification as well. This attitude and bias are found primarily among people who deify the material world and themselves.

[11] (f) Anything that we have justified both volitionally and intellectually lasts forever, but not what we have justified only intellectually. Anything that is only in our discernment is not within us but outside us. It is only in our thought, and nothing really comes into us and becomes part of us except what is welcomed by our volition. This becomes part of our life's love. The next section will explain that this stays with us forever.