c. 2005 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) Theologians and spiritual leaders have grappled with the question for centuries, and pastors often choose packed Easter Sunday services to raise it anew.

Who goes to heaven? And perhaps more troubling, who doesn’t?

When Abby Meyers first brought it up, she was asking about her own dad. She was 7 years old when she visited a friend’s church and heard that Jews don’t go to heaven. Her dad is Jewish.

“I assured her … that God is a big and loving God, and her daddy is a very good person,” says Lee Meyers, 48, Abby’s mom and a Presbyterian in Memphis, Tenn. “She seemed completely reassured by that. She knows the kind of human she lives with.”

Just who goes to heaven? It no longer is an abstract question but a personal one for Christians, especially those with non-Christian loved ones. With the country growing more diverse and a new emphasis on interreligious relations after the Sept. 11 attacks, the question is a hot one for congregations and academics alike.

The belief that Christians are saved by Jesus’ resurrection _ which is celebrated on Easter _ is a cornerstone of the faith. The verse John 14:6 in which Jesus says, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” is most often recited as biblical evidence of the traditional belief that one must commit one’s life to Christ to go to heaven.

But in today’s increasingly diverse country, more Christians are asking how they can maintain this belief without seeming intolerant. Some argue it is but one interpretation of the Bible. This is just one factor reinvigorating the centuries-old debate.

“It has become only more and more intense,” says Paul Knitter, professor emeritus at Xavier University, a school in the Catholic Jesuit tradition in Cincinnati. He is also the author of “No Other Name?”, a survey of Christian attitudes toward other faiths.

“If we really understand Jesus, then we realize that we have to open ourselves with love and trust and dialogue with persons who follow other ways,” he says. “I think we’re starting to understand that more and more.”

Attitudes began to shift decades ago.

The Roman Catholic Church affirmed in 1965 that God is at work in other faiths, saying they “often reflect a ray of that Truth that enlightens all.”

In recent years, two different beliefs have been gaining ground. One asserts salvation is possible outside Christianity but only because of Jesus’ resurrection, and so it is a Christian salvation. A newer one says that because God is at work in other faiths, those followers are saved, too.

There always will be rivals to the traditional belief on salvation, says Bob Wenz, vice president of national ministries for the National Association of Evangelicals.

“We don’t want to hold to that position out of arrogance but out of great humility that God has made known to us the great opportunity of salvation through Christ,” he says. “It is a difficult doctrine for many people, and consequently some seem to always be looking for an alternative.”

But Knitter argues Jesus may have never uttered some of the exclusivist statements attributed to him in the Bible. Instead, the passages are interpretations made by early Christians striving to preserve their faith amid persecution, he says. When Christianity later became the faith of the Roman Empire, the belief that only Christians are saved was solidified, he says.

What about “The Great Commission,” Jesus’ directive that Christians make disciples of all nations? Knitter describes a belief endorsed by the Vatican. “We also have to learn what God may be teaching us Christians through Buddha … or through Krishna,” he says. “In other words, the Great Commission is to go forth and to preach, to proclaim but also to listen and learn.”

No matter what some scholars may argue, the message of the New Testament is clear, says William Cook, professor of New Testament interpretation at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky. He points to passages such as Acts 4:12, which, referring to Jesus, says, “Salvation is found in no one else.”

“There are other places where Jesus indicates that one’s attitude toward him determines their eternal destiny,” he says. “So in my mind that corroborates very strongly that Jesus said, `I am the way and the truth and the life.”’

(OPTIONAL TRIM FOLLOWS)

At the 1,500-member Idlewild Presbyterian Church in Memphis, so many members asked about salvation that last summer Dr. Stephen Montgomery, the church’s pastor, preached a sermon on it. The sermon was part of a series based on questions from the congregation.

In it, Montgomery described the verse from John as “a club with which we beat others over the head.” The sermon was so popular that the church printed copies for parishioners to hand out. Montgomery got an outpouring of thanks, especially from interreligious families.

“What I encourage people to do is look at the broader themes of the Bible, and what we see is a God who loved the world, a God whose intention is that all creation be made whole and healed,” he says. “A lot of people kind of had a gut feeling that their God was a more loving God and a bigger God than they had imagined … and were yearning to have their large and loving view of God validated. And I think that’s what happened.”

The sermon affirmed what Heather Pearson Chauhan had believed all along, she says. Chauhan, 31, an obstetrician/gynecologist, grew up a Christian and then married a Hindu man she met in medical school. Her husband converted to Christianity after they wed, and now the couple plans to raise their 4-month-old son a Christian.

“To define religion or Christianity as this narrow path I think is not a global perspective,” she says. “Everybody gets to God a different way.”

Meyers, a hospital marketing director, attends Idlewild with her now 9-year-old daughter. Her husband comes sometimes. He came to a recent Sunday school class on different faiths. She doesn’t worry about his salvation. She notes the sermon’s point that only God can judge.

“You know we don’t all know the answers,” she says. “My husband is one of the most ethical, loving human beings on the planet, and I believe God makes room for people like that.”

MO/PH END GREEN